The flexible functioning of the speech genre
(based on the speech genre of the «personal diary»)

The paper develops the idea of an extrapolation of the main statements of the theory of variability
to the area of genristics. Taking into account the N. S. Trubetskoy’s thesis about the existence
of the variant-invariant relations in the language system and opposition of primary/
secondary speech genres marked by M. M. Bakhtin, the primary and correlated secondary
speech genres are considered as the genre variants of a certain invariant. An invariant is considered
as an abstract unit of language, a set of genre-relevant features integral to the speech modifications
of this unit, that is, inherent in each of its modifications, called variants of the speech genre.
The distinction between variants and variations of the speech genre is determined by the
variation of its sub core (variants) and peripheral (variations) characteristics. Variants
of the speech genre include regularly reproduced modifications of the same speech genre, preserving
the identity of the illocutionary-intentional and thematic content, the formal composition
structure and differing in a number of communicative-pragmatic (sub core) properties: the sphere
of functioning, as a consequence, the nature of the interaction between author and addressee, the
course of communication (spatial and temporal) and, possibly, the substrate (handwritten and
virtual personal diaries). While maintaining the invariant properties of the genre, the variations
of the speech genre reveal the variation of peripheral features, for example, associated with the
content of the personal diary. The phenomenon of genre variability is studied by defining a set of
core and peripheral characteristics of the primary genres including the genres of course-writing,
then by tracing the realization of these features of the genre in other communicative spheres (art
and virtual). Given the pragmatic conditions of implementation there appear to exist the following
features: a) the dominant or invariant (illocutionary-intentional content, autocommunication,
«day-to-day» aspect of the records, mono-authorship) remaining unchanged during the implementation
of the genre and providing the identification of the genre in different communicative spheres; b) sub core and/or peripheral having been subjected to modification ( the options and
variations of the genre) or transformation (in the case of a new genre) in the implementation
of the genre in a new communicative sphere.