genre
Sign in to saveGenre ( ; ) is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other forms of art or entertainment, based on some set of stylistic or thematic criteria, as in literary genres, film genres, music genres, comics genres, etc. Often, works fit into multiple genres by way of borrowing and recombining these conventions. Stand-alone texts, works, or pieces of communication may have individual styles, but genres are amalgams of
AI overview
Genre is a category or style of communication—whether in literature, music, film, or other forms of art—that follows certain conventions and rules that society has developed and agreed upon over time. Understanding genres matters because they help us recognize patterns and expectations in what we read, watch, or listen to, and because most creative works actually blend multiple genres together rather than fitting neatly into just one.
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Article
18 sectionsContents
- Visual arts
- Literature
- Film
- Music
- Popular culture and other media
- Linguistics
- Rhetoric
- History
- Classical and Romance genre theory
- Audiences
- Subgenre
- Microgenre
- See also
- References
- Citations
- Sources
- Further reading
- External links
Genre ( ; ) is any style or form of communication in any mode (written, spoken, digital, artistic, etc.) with socially agreed-upon conventions developed over time. In popular usage, it normally describes a category of literature, music, or other forms of art or entertainment, based on some set of stylistic or thematic criteria, as in literary genres, film genres, music genres, comics genres, etc. Often, works fit into multiple genres by way of borrowing and recombining these conventions. Stand-alone texts, works, or pieces of communication may have individual styles, but genres are amalgams of these texts based on agreed-upon or socially inferred conventions. Some genres may have rigid, strictly adhered-to guidelines, while others may show great flexibility. The proper use of a specific genre is important for a successful transfer of information (media-adequacy).
Critical discussion of genre perhaps began with a classification system for ancient Greek literature, as set out in Aristotle's Poetics. For Aristotle, poetry (odes, epics, etc.), prose, and performance each had specific features that supported appropriate content of each genre. Speech patterns for comedy would not be appropriate for tragedy, for example, and even actors were restricted to their genre under the assumption that a type of person could tell one type of story best. The academic discipline about genres is called genre studies (or genre theory).