Development of the blog as a genre of the blogosphere discourse: the sociolinguistic aspect
The idea of the social conditionality of text generation expressed in various discourse theories is broadly discussed in modern linguistics. An aspect of representation of this idea is the analysis of the problem of speech genre formation and development. In this paper the speech genre of blog is considered. The blog is a special type of a statement formed, on the one hand, by the intention of the individual-personal sublimation, on the other - by the technical capacity of the Internet as a particular communication sphere. The features of blog development are considered within its existence in Russian Internet content, under the influence of the socio-cultural factors. The material of the research is over 1000 most popular (by Yandex. Blogs rating) blogs on the most popular platform, Livejournal, dated from 2000 to 2013. The dynamics of the formation and development of the blog has the following stages. 1. The stage preceding the formation of the blog: the period of keeping a diary as a personalised written genre of off-line communication. This stage shapes the basic genre features that form the blog as a genre. 2. The stage of initial formation of the Internet journal and, accordingly, blogosphere as a particular communicative environment it functions within (since 2001 blog-platforms are actively used). The hyper-genre of blog develops. At this stage it is represented by one genre form we define as the blog-journal. 3. The stage of active transformation of the blogosphere. New genres are formed in the blog hyper-genre under the influence of mass media genres, whose intentions enter the blogosphere (2006-2007). At this stage the blog hyper-genre is represented by the genres of blog-essay, blog-note, blog-report, blog-rating, etc. The dynamics of the blog development depends on the following socio-cultural factors. The circle of users of the blogosphere becomes broader, the role of the blogosphere as a medium of communication becomes greater. The consequence is its diversification: functional, related to the expansion of the functions of statements in blogs, penetration into the blogosphere of media intentions, which have a special way of interacting with the diary basis, and technical, manifested in the transition of blog users to the new social networks, to which the blogosphere largely delegates the authority to meet the needs of personalised communication (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Vkontakte). In parallel on the blog platform there appear new - media in their original intentional settings - forums producing media genre statements (e.g., Internet -based media). The blogosphere is restructured thematically: the leading role belongs to the socio-political themes.