Autobiographical texts on the Internet: genre and discursive aspects of the analysis

This article is about autobiographical practices on the Internet. It is a new phenomenon that appeared in recent decades. The material of the research is Russian federal and regional TV workers' autobiographical information. The analysis is based on the concept of speech genre. Posting information about oneself on the Internet is a new phenomenon, which is unfamiliar for a modern person. The study has shown that there are no specified norms for autobiography composing in such a new communicative space as the Internet. On the one hand, I analyse autobiographies corresponding to the official-business style documents. On the other hand, I focus on autobiographical texts with discursive features (autobiographical texts and questionnaires). The purpose of every text in the analysed material is to provide information about oneself. These texts perform several functions: information, self-identification, and self-presentation. The genre of autobiography is the prototype for the analysed texts. Transformation of form, composition, content and style is considered in this paper. The composition of the autobiographical texts created by the employees of TV companies is characterised by relative stability. They include the following elements: date and place of birth, information about parents, about education: secondary and higher, information about how they come into their profession, about the first experience in the profession, about the career and achievements in the profession, family (wife / husband, children), information about the hobby. There are texts with missing elements: for example, the authors can describe the part of life relevant professionally. Texts can start with a message about the first day in the profession, or at the channel where the employee works at the moment. Many autobiographical information notes are in the genre of questionnaire. In our opinion, it does not correspond to the traditional form of autobiography and is connected with the specificity of the discourse. TV workers' autobiographical stories are mostly creative. They are posted on the Internet, which stimulates speech creativity. Texts' authors are creative, too: not only the speech subject (what to say), but also the method of verbal presentation (how to say) is important for them. Almost every text has information about the author's education, thoughts about the profession, about family and awards. Autobiographical stories are written in conversational style.

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