Genre Theory

According to "The Genre Function," Bawarshi argues that as an author beings to write in various genres, they start to "participate within these different sets of relations" within the genre that can work to influence their writing, either consciously or unconsciously. Genre acts as a site of action that helps the writer to articulate motives to write, serving as "an aspect of cultural rationality." Genre theory, in turn, seeks to explain the actions of the writer in creating their works rather than just acting as a description of the works, investigating the "linguistic, sociological, and psychological assumptions" that work to shape these text-types.

The idea of New Criticism complicates Bawarshi's argument towards the importance of genre function significantly, as new critics focused primarily on the text itself rather than the author's influence on creating the text. Bawarshi's idea of genre relying on the importance of author-function seems to directly contradict and complicate the theories posed by new critics, that argue that a work of literature should be treated like an object in itself, and not be influenced by any extraneous content. This includes the influences of the author, whether these influences be historical, social, or cultural. New Criticism argues that a text should be interpreted solely according to what is written, relying heavily on the text itself rather than the author's original intentions. Bawarshi, on the other hand, argues that the author-function of a genre places cultural value on the title of an author, as their name becomes associated with their work and endows the author with a certain cultural status. This idea of author-function also allows readers to place importance to certain text according to the name of the writer that is attached to it, as audiences begin to assign importance to certain texts, but not others. The idea of author-function in general seems to directly contrast the theories of new critics, that believe that a text should be studied and read not because of any information about the author, but because of the text itself.

Similarly, Bawarshi's idea of genre functions and genre theory seems to conflict with the theories of new critics, as genre functions concern themselves with the influences that a genre can have on the author and their writing, while New Criticism focuses solely on the writing itself. New Criticism does not seek to explain what influenced a text or why it was constructed a certain way, it only seeks to analyze what is written on the page. The text becomes the center of discourse, as the act of close reading is stressed in order to gain as much information for a text as possible. Genre theory concerns itself with the idea of rhetorical action, arguing that genre consists of sociological actions that influence a text.

The installation of the "Sugar Boat" in Edouard Duval-Carrie's exhibit serves as an example of the idea of genre theory. Duval-Carrie's artwork was created with the intent to take the plights of marginalized people, specifically African Americans in North Florida that have had their stories erased from the tapestry of the local history, and works to give the power back to those people. The "Sugar Boat" specifically is a boat and a series of stars and other figures constructed out of glitter and hung from the ceiling, allowing the audience to be able to see the boat from the bottom as it passes over them. In creating this stunning piece, Duval-Carrie wants to take back the power that these boats had in tear these people away from their homeland, as they were transported in boats across the Atlantic to be enslaved, cultivating sugar. In taking the thing that stripped them of their power and tore them away from their homes, Duval-Carrie re-purposes this image, traditionally associated with slavery and colonization, to create something beautiful, drawing attention to the plights of these people while also using the artwork to celebrate them.