Now, answer this reflection question: Applying the work of Swales and Mirabelli, how do you think the discourse communities of law and science shaped the multi-literacies, thinking, and imaginations of audiences watching Birth of a Nation?
When it comes to discourse communities and the law of science i believe that it played a major role in the way the film was viewed from each audience. i try to put myself back in those times and think these people grew up in a time where they felt that this was a normal way of living and this what there grandmother and gran fathers have taught them and how could they be wrong ? right ? so in a world were you grew up viewing African Americas as such discuss and degrade it would seem pretty normal to talk down or feel this way because this is the way they believe and talk at school, church and at home with their loved ones. Now coming from African American prospective watching this film would make you feel so belittled and disrespected. because in your home the black man is a provider and a father and husband. and you know that you all are not what they portray but there is nothing you can do about it. and when you sit around and watch the world celebrate a film that degrades a whole race it goes to show the science behind how we live in our discourse communities and places like radio stations politicians and cinemas helped promote it.
In that short piece of the film i feel they are trying to show us that there families home had been destroyed due to the war going on around them. there whole town was being destroyed and they have been hiding out afraid trying to find safety.
In the first scene the mixed or black women was sad and depressed being a caretaker for her master. she even dressed more ran down in the beginning scenes. she thought that if she slept with him that it would get her and other African Americans the help they needed. She slept with the man and was treated better then some others and dressed nicer but was still owned and controlled.
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