The relationship between orality/writing in formal and public oral genres: the case of the academic conference

Abstract

The relations of continuity and mutual constituency between oral and written language are central to the understanding of how formal and public oral genres function in educated discursive communities, as well as to the understanding of the phenomena of literacy and the teaching-learning of languages at school. In this article we analyse a formal public oral genre – the academic conference – in terms of the relationship between orality-writing, orality-orality, and writing-writing in the constitution of the conference and its “retextualization” (MARCUSCHI, 2001a) as a transcription. The bases for this analysis are several oral and written texts produced by/around a conference given by Bernard Schneuwly. Finally, we argue that, in formal public oral genres, there is a complex relation of mutual effect and interference between orality and writing, a relation that can be better understood in terms of the “activity systems” which put into circulation and in contact “genre systems” (BAZERMAN, 2005a, 2005b).