Generic integrity in document design

Abstract

Genre is realization of a set of communicative purposes embedded in recurring rhetorical contexts displaying typical cognitive structuring. Most professional documents display their typical 'generic integrity' which is often identifiable in terms of a combination of text-internal and text-external factors. Although generic integrity is somewhat flexible and fluid, and dependent on participant relationship and institutional discursive practices, it is one of the important contributors to effective and successful design and development of professional and public documents. In this paper, I would like to consider examples of public documents from legal and business settings to focus on the generic integrity of these documents in the context of issues like the simplification and easification of legal documents, selection and appropriation of linguistic resources in the textualization of professional genres, reader accessibility of professional and public discourse, suggesting implications for the writer's commitment to the intended message and readership(s), in the act of document design, and the relationship between the design and performance of professional documents in their real contexts of use.