Brian Stock put forward a textually-oriented concept, 'textual communities,' in his case to demonstrate how texts began to form the basis for religious and social organization among Europe's literate and illiterate in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. The increase in literate influence on European society largely was due to the appearance of versions of text in vernacular languages. Stock uses the term 'textual communities' to describe the formation of groups, including schismatic movements, around authoritative texts and the literate interpreters who disseminated the texts to readers, listeners, and intepreters, literate and illiterate alike. Under these conditions, 'individuals who previously had little else in common were unified around common goals." a coherence which 'took place around an agreed meaning for the text.' The minimum requirement for a textual community was a single literate interpreter who developed a new understanding of a text or set of texts which he or she then communicated to others.
http://books.google.com/books?id=mO5iwSn8LQQC&pg=PA18&lpg=PA18&dq=brian+stock+textual+communities&source=bl&ots=zHWCc_XW_7&sig=oIkll9fwY031u8w8xukv6wqohIk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=fHqOUbqpD4f8iwKlyYDoCg&ved=0CDQQ6AEwAjgK#v=onepage&q=brian%20stock%20textual%20communities&f=false