Abstract

Written genres in academic and professional contexts have traditionally been the focus of much of ESP (English for specific purposes) inspired genre analysis. ¹ However, the emphasis in this tradition has always been on the use of text-internal linguistic resources, in particular, on the use of formal properties of language, especially analysis of rhetorical ‘moves’ with relatively very little in-depth analysis of text-external resources, which play an important role in the socio-pragmatics of professional genres, whether written or spoken. This chapter will give a general overview of this approach to the analysis of professional written genres, and at the same, will also widen the scope of the construction, interpretation and use of professional written genres, focusing in particular, on the socio-pragmatic space within which such professional genres invariably function, and will also consider critically how expert professionals exploit this socio-pragmatic space to create new and hybrid forms across disciplinary, institutional, as well as cultural boundaries.