This paper examines a collaborative partnership between discipline lecturers and an academic literacy practitioner in the context of undergraduate physics. Gee's sociocultural construct of Discourse is used as a framework for the design of an introductory physics course, explicitly framed around helping students access the disciplinary discourse and social practices of physics. Jacobs' model for integrating academic literacies into disciplines is used as a basis to evaluate the effectiveness of this collaboration, drawing on data from students and staff. The study reveals that an important aspect of the collaboration between the physics lecturers and the academic literacy practitioner was a common, shared understanding of themselves as Discourse teachers. The study also points to wider institutional arrangements that may enable or constrain such collaborations, for example, institutional approaches to academic literacy, departmental cultures and the nature of different disciplinary knowledge structures.