Audience Writing

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From Rules to the Ridiculous

understanding audience when considering matters of correctness, style, and choice

What would you do if the person you were talking to looked like this?

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In oral communication, we have the benefit of immediate feedback from our audience.

A smile…

A nod…

A furrowed brow…

We can make adjustments on the fly.

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When we speak to people we are constantly assessing their reactions. We can read their non-verbal cues—their facial expressions, body language, and so forth. Sometimes they will even stop us to tell us what they think about what we are saying, or if they don’t understand.

This feedback allows us to make adjustments.

But how does this work in writing?

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It’s easy to lose sight of our audience when writing…

After all, isn’t writing a lone activity? Something done in quiet solitude? You know the image—the writer alone in his cabin in the woods where no one else matters.

Is this an accurate view of writing?

When talking about writing…

  • There’s no right or wrong writing BUT…
  • There is writing that is effective and writing that is not so effective

  • Who decides if your writing is effective?

Writing is about making choices…

  • How do you know what choices to make as a writer?
  • Every choice you make as a writer should be based on your absolute understanding of just two things…

1. AUDIENCE 2. PURPOSE

But if our audience is NOT sitting in front of us as we write, how can we know them and adjust to their needs?

Audience Analysis

  • As writers, we need to make a deliberate effort to understand our audience
  • We need to do some analysis by asking questions about our audience
  • And then keep the resulting image of who our audience is foremost in our minds as we make our choices
  • Know your audience, know how you want to affect your audience (i.e. know your purpose), and then make choices

PRACTICE:
recognizing the target audience

Choose the right audience…

Dear Sir,

I am sorry to bother you with this, but I just wanted to verify with you an e-mail that I received from Mr. Johnson yesterday afternoon…

  • Your co-worker
  • The CEO
  • Your cousin in Cleveland

Choose the right audience…

Mike,

Johnson sent this to me yesterday afternoon and I have no idea what he is talking about. Does it make sense to you…

  • Your co-worker
  • The CEO
  • Your cousin in Cleveland

Choose the right audience…

Hey man,

Wonder if you can help me out. My boss sent this to me yesterday afternoon and I just can’t figure out what he means. What’s your take on it…

  • Your co-worker
  • The CEO
  • Your cousin in Cleveland

So what about all the rules of English?

Any fool can make a rule
and every fool will mind it.

–HENRY DAVID THOREAU

Choices versus Obedience

  • In some matters of language we have no choice: “up the street” vs. “the street up”
  • But for other matters choice is at the forefront of a good writer’s mind.
  • Which is clearest and most direct?
  • There was a lack of evidence in support for their claim.
  • Their claim suffered from a lack of evidence in its support.
  • They could not support their claim because they lacked evidence.

Choice vs. Obedience

  • Sometimes what is choice and what is not is contested…
  • Can I split an infinitive?
  • Can I start a sentence with and?
  • Can I end a sentence with up?

The fact of the matter…

  • We must write English correctly, but we also must realize that some points of “correctness” are less important than we think (or not important at all).
  • “Correct” writing is a not necessarily clear, direct, or effective.

Unlike matters of style, correctness seems not to offer choices but to require obedience.

Three kinds of rules

Rules that govern the fundamental structure of English

  • the book, not book the

Rules that define standard written form

  • you were, not you was
  • I don’t know anything, not I don’t know nothing

Rules invented by grammarians about trivial points of usage

  • Don’t split infinitives, as in to quickly leave.
  • Don’t use than after different, use from.
  • Don’t use between with three or more.

Observing rules thoughtfully

  • The worst (i.e., safest) case policy
  • Follow all the rules all the time because somewhere sometime, some reader might criticize you for something.
  • But if you follow all the rules all the time you surrender a measure of stylistic choice.
  • A more thoughtful (i.e., riskier) approach
  • The alternative to blind obedience is selective observance
  • As always, be mindful of your audience.
    How conservative are they?
    What will they accept or not accept?
    Put clarity and directness before “correctness.”

Observing rules thoughtfully

If vast numbers of careful writers choose to ignore a rule and the vast majority of educated, careful readers don’t notice, then the deviation from the rule can be neither an error in good grammar nor a violation of “good” usage.
–JOSEPH WILLIAMS

Writing by design…

  • Writing is about choices
  • Writing is architecture
  • Writing is more than just words
  • it is about design, about conscious choices that change the way people experience meaning
  • Writing is power

The secret of style

Have something to say, and say it as clearly as you can. That is the only secret of style.

–MATTHEM ARNOLD

Understanding style

  • It is good to write clearly, and anyone can.
  • Choice is at the heart of clear writing.
  • Before our readers can accept our claims they have to understand them.
  • Why do so many have a style that instead of revealing ideas, hides them? (Read from Williams 4~5)

Some causes of unclear writing

  • Hiding behind language
  • To plump ideas and to mask their absence, hoping to impress those who confuse difficulty with substance
  • Bad memories of HS grammar (Williams 10)
  • Temporary aphasia—
  • a loss of the ability to use or understand language when learning to write or think in a new academic or professional area

Principles of style can help

  • Style takes us beyond rules
  • No one can teach good writing by rule…
  • Help is in a few reliable principles, not in inviolate rules
  • Good style can help us write more clearly and, therefore, see and feel and think more clearly

PRACTICE:
making choices as you write

Guess the audience…

your family priest

best friend

4-year old sister

neighborhood pimp

someone who doesn’t speak English very well

the chief of police

someone you’re talking to at a bar

If you wish to persuade me, you must think my thoughts, feel my feelings, and speak my words.

–MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO