"You could give him a call". On implied genre knowledge

One of the most baffling and inspring characteristics of genre is the knowledge it implies. In fact, I suspect that one of the reasons why genres are so prolific in culture is their ability to communicate effectively through implied knowledge; communication works, because genre knowledge allows both the utterer and the recipient to assume certain things known. 

Take a look at this poster:

This commercial, encountered some years back in one of the posh suburbs to Copenhagen, has a text that reads “Kender du Peter Pabst-Karlsson fra Nybolig…? Du kunne jo ringe til ham...” [“Do you know Peter Pabst-Karlsson from Nybolig...? You could give him a call…”].

Nybolig is a well-known Danish real estate chain. One of the interesting things about the commercial from a generic point of view, is it's suggestion that the spectator calls the friendly gentleman depicted; the assumption being, of course, that the man in the picture is, in fact, the Peter Pabst-Karlsson mentioned in the text. What fascinates me is the fact that the commercial suggests the telephone call, but does not specify what the subject of the conversation is to be.

However, any generically competent member of society is able to infer what this subject is.  The genre of the text is "real estate commercial", so the conversation has to be about a subject pertaining to real estate trading. You call Peter Pabst-Karlsson to sell a property or to buy one, not to chat about the weather. 

This information may not be given in the text, but it is implied in the interplay between genre and utterance. In fact, the successful impact of the commercial depends on this recognition. Interestingly, neither the sender nor the reader need to be aware that they are communicating through genre. The recognition of the genre is instantaneous, and so is the interpretation of the utterance. You do not have to stop and think about genre to fill in the blank-

Members of a particular discourse community can make inferences like his instantaneously, and they will even know that at some point in the process the nice looking man will expect to be paid for his services, and that it is, in fact, the promise of this payment which motivates the poster in the first place. 

For more on implied genre knowledge see my articles "Genre and Interpretation" and "Contemporary Genre Studies: An Interdisciplinary Conversation with JohannineScholarship".