Cover not available

Article published In: Journal of English for Research Publication Purposes
Vol. 6:1 (2025) ► pp.146–168

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
EPUB logo with download linkDownload EPUB
authorization required

Tackling complexity

Genre interactions in digital media environments

ORCiD logo with link | University of Zaragoza
Published online: 4 December 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jerpp.25019.per
Abstract
In this conceptual article I aim to advance our understanding of digital genre networks in online science communication. Specifically, I develop genre theory by drawing on the meta-theory of complexity, which involves two highly influential interpretive frameworks, complexity theory and complex systems theory, and their related subfields, complex network theory and complex dynamic systems theory. I conceptualise digital genre networks as analogous to complex, dynamic systems, with their constituent genres acting as interconnected nodes that achieve specific social actions. I explain the theoretical and practical rationales behind this conceptual model and outline how to empirically demonstrate the structured heterogeneity and holistic behaviour of digital genre networks using several constructs from the meta-theory of complexity — non-linearity, adaptability, coevolution, self-organisation and dynamic interactions. The conceptual model also involves methodological developments, which I illustrate using case study research designs. Finally, I suggest some future directions for expanding the field of English for Research Publication Purposes and broader fields, and propose ways of training researchers who need or want to compose digital genre networks to increase the visibility and impact of their work.
Article outline
  • 1.Genres and digital communication
    • 1.1Trends and practices
    • 1.2Contexts and recontextualisations
  • 2.Rationales for a conceptual shift
    • 2.1Theoretical rationales
    • 2.2Practical rationales
  • 3.Theories and analogies
    • 3.1Beyond single genres
    • 3.2The interconnectedness of digital genres
  • 4.Analogies for tackling complexity
    • 4.1Non-linearity
    • 4.2Self-organisation
    • 4.3Adaptability
    • 4.4Co-evolution
    • 4.5Collective dynamics
  • 5.Breaking down complexity
    • 5.1Operationalisation of constructs
    • 5.2Sampling, representativeness and scalability
  • 5.Conclusion and implications
  • Acknowledgements
  • References
References (60)
References
Andersen, J., Bazerman, C., & Schneider, J. (2014). Beyond single genres: Pattern mapping in global communication. In E.-M. Jakobs & D. Perrin (Eds.), Handbook of writing and text production (pp. 305–322). Mouton de Gruyter, Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Arnstein, S. R. (1969). A ladder of citizen participation. Journal of the American Planning Association, 35(4), 216–224. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Askehave, I., & Nielsen, A. E. (2005). Digital genres: A challenge to traditional genre theory. Information Technology & People, 18(2), 120–141. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bazerman, C. (1994). Systems of genres and the enactment of social intentions. In A. Freedman & P. Medway (Eds.), Genre and the new rhetoric (pp. 79–101). Taylor & Francis.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2004). Speech acts, genres, and activity systems: How texts organise activity and people. In C. Bazerman & P. Prior (Eds.), What writing does and how it does it: An introduction to analysing texts and textual practices (pp. 309–339). Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Berkenkotter, C. (2001). Genre systems at work: DSM-IV and rhetorical recontextualisation in psychotherapy paperwork. Written Communication, 18(3), 326–349. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bhatia, V. K. (2004). Worlds of written discourse. Continuum.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Biber, D., & Gray, B. (2016). The competing demands of popularisation vs. economy: Written language in the age of mass literacy. In T. Nevalainen & E. C. Traugott (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of the history of English (pp. 314–328). Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Carter-Thomas, S., & Rowley-Jolivet, E. (2017). Open science notebooks: New insights, new affordances. Journal of Pragmatics, 1161, 64–76. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
De Bot, K. (2017). Complexity theory and dynamic systems theory. Language Learning & Language Teaching, 481, 51–58. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Devitt, A. (2009). Re-fusing form in genre study. In J. Giltrow & D. Stein (Eds.), Genres in the Internet: Issues in the theory of genre (pp. 27–48). John Benjamins Publishing Company. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Egbert, J., Biber, D., & Gray, B. (2022). Designing and evaluating language corpora: A practical framework for corpus representativeness. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Engberg, J. (2020). Institutional dissemination of legal knowledge — an instance of knowledge communication. In M. Gotti, S. Maci & M. Sala (Eds.), Scholarly pathways: Knowledge transfer and knowledge exchange in academia (pp. 175–205). Peter Lang.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2023). Dissemination of science and communicative efficiency of texts: Is level of explanatory ambition a relevant diagnostic tool? TransKom — e-journal, 16(1). [URL]
Fecher, B., & Friesike, S. (2014). Open science: One term, five schools of thought. In S. Bartling & S. Friesike (Eds.), Opening Science (pp. 17–47). Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Finnemann, N. O. (2016). Hypertext configurations: Genres in networked digital media. JASIST, 1–10, online. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gascoigne, T., Metcalfe, J., & Riedlinger, M. (2022). A Escada do Poder: Comunicação de Ciência e Ciência Cidadã. Revista Lusófona De Estudos Culturais, 9(2), 15–27. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gear, C., Eppel, E., & Koziol-McLain, J. (2022). If we can imagine it, we can build it: Developing complexity theory-informed methodologies. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 211. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gimenez, J., Baldwin, M., Breen, P., Green, J., Roque Gutierrez, E., Paterson, R., Pearson, J., Percy, M., Specht, D., & Waddell, G. (2020). Reproduced, reinterpreted, lost: Trajectories of scientific knowledge across contexts. Text & Talk, 40(3), 293–324. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Graham, S. S., & Whalen, B. (2008). Mode, medium, and genre: A case study of decisions in new-media design. Journal of Business and Technical Communication, 22(1), 65–91. Retrieved from [URL].
Greene, A. C., & Greene, C. S. (2025). Science under threat in the United States: Research turns hope into reality. eLife 2025;131:e106706. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hafner, C. (2018). Genre innovation and multimodal expression in scholarly communication: Video methods articles in experimental biology. Ibérica, 361, 15–42.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2023). Academic publishing and the attention economy. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 641, 101253. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ibarretxe-Antuñano, I., & Valenzuela-Manzanares, J. (2010). In G. Bel-Enguix, & M. D. Jiménez-López (Eds.), Language as a complex dynamic system: A view from cognitive linguistics (pp. 3–38). Cambridge Scholars Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kang, M., Jin, T., Lu, X., & Zhang, H. (2024). Exploring the differences in syntactic complexity between lay summaries and abstracts: A case study of The New England Journal of Medicine. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 721, 101444. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kauffman, S. A. (2000). Investigations. Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kelly, A. R., & Maddalena, K. (2016). Networks, genres, and complex wholes: Citizen science and how we act together through typified text. Canadian Journal of Communication, 41(2), 287–303. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kostoulas, A., & Stelma, J. (2024). Complex dynamic systems theory and language education. Reference Module in Social Sciences, Elsevier, online. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kwok, R. (2018). Lab notebooks go digital. Nature, 560(7717), 269–270. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Larsen-Freeman, D. (1997). Chaos/complexity science and second language acquisition. Applied Linguistics, 18(2), 141–165. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2018). Second Language Acquisition, WE, and language as a complex adaptive system. World Englishes, 37(1), 80–92. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Larsson, T., Kaatari, H., Dixon, T., & Egbert, J. (2023). Examining novice writers’ perceptions of formality. Journal of English for Research Publication Purposes, 4(1), 29–55. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lemke, J. L. (2005). Multimedia genres and traversals. Folia Linguistica, 39(1), 45–56. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lindenman, H. (2015). Inventing metagenres: How four college seniors connect writing across domains. Composition Forum, 311. [URL]
Linell, P. (1998). Discourse across boundaries: On recontextualisations and the blending of voices in professional discourse. Text & Talk, 18(2), 143–158. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mauranen, A. (2013). Hybridism, edutainment, and doubt: Science blogging finding its feet. Nordic Journal of English Studies, 13(1), 7–36. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2018). Second Language Acquisition, World Englishes, and English as a Lingua Franca (ELF). World Englishes, 37(1), 106–119. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mehlenbacher, A. R. (2019). Registered reports: An emerging scientific research article genre. Written Communication, 36(1), 38–67. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Miller, C. R. (1984). Genre as social action. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 70(2), 151–167. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2016). Genre innovation: Evolution, emergence or something else? Journal of Media Innovations, 3(2), 4–19. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Miller, C. R., & Kelly, A. R. (Eds.), (2017). Emerging genres in new media environments. Palgrave Macmillan. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Miller, C. R., & Shepherd, D. (2004). Blogging as social action: A genre analysis of the weblog. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, [URL]
Pauwels, L. (Ed.) (2006). Visual cultures of science: Rethinking representational practices in knowledge building and science communication. Dartmouth College Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pérez-Llantada, C. (2021). Research genres across languages. Multilingual science communication online. Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2022). Online data articles: The language of intersubjective stance in a rhetorical hybrid. Written Communication, 39(3), 400–425. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2023). ‘Help us better understand our changing climate’: Exploring the discourse of Citizen Science. Discourse & Communication, 0(0). (online first) Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pérez-Llantada, C. & M.-J. Luzón. (2023). Genre networks. Intersemiotic relations in digital science communication. Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Prokopenko, M. (2019). Systems. In B. Fath (Ed.), Elsevier encyclopaedia of ecology (Second Edition), (pp. 546–552). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ross-Hellauer, T. (2017). What is open peer review? A systematic review. F1000Research, 61, 588. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Spinuzzi, C. (2004). Four ways to investigate assemblages of texts: Genre sets, systems, repertoires, and ecologies. The 22nd annual international conference on design of communication: The engineering of quality documentation (pp. 110–116). Association for Computing Machinery. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(9 July 2009). What if I had called them “genre networks”? Retrieved from [URL]
Spinuzzi, C., & Zachry, M. (2000). Genre ecologies: An open-system approach to understanding and constructing documentation. ACM Journal of Computer Documentation, 24(3), 169–181. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Swales, J. M. (1990). Genre analysis. English in academic and research settings. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
(2017). The concept of discourse community: Some recent personal history. Composition Forum, 371. Retrieved from [URL]
Tardy, C. M. (2023). How epidemiologists exploit the emerging genres of twitter for public engagement. English for Specific Purposes, 701, 4–16. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vivas-Peraza, A. C. (2022). Engaging the public in science crowdfunding: Scientists calling to action through visual and verbal strategies. Visual Review, 91, 1–15. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Welbourne, D. J., & Grant, W. J. (2015). Science communication on YouTube: Factors that affect channel and video popularity. Public Understanding of Science, 25(6), 706–718. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wickman, C. (2023). Genre and metagenre in biomedical research writing. Journal of Business and Technical Communication, 37(2), 140–173. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zou, H., & Hyland, K. (2019). Reworking research: Interactions in academic articles and blogs. Discourse Studies, 21(6), 713–733. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue