Mission Statement

Mission Statement

Why is the physical therapy discourse community so respected, yet so discriminating? Why does this racial discrimination and bias exist in the physical therapy discourse community? First, we should define discourse community. A discourse community can be defined as a group you participate in which everyone has a similar goal. For example, in the running discourse community the common goal is continuously improve while staying healthy. In addition to common goals discourse communities also have “mechanisms of intercommunication among members, have participatory mechanisms to provide information and feedback, possess one or more genres, have a specific lexis (different jargon terms), have a sense of “silential relations,” have horizons of expectations, and have a threshold of members with a suitable degree of relevant content” (Swales). Many students of physical therapy might be unaware that this field has a problem with racism and discrimination. This website delves into the discriminating issues that African Americans face in the physical therapy discourse community. It also focuses on the discrimination of the healthcare community as a whole that people of different races face when they enter this community.