I was never the kid in class who, as soon as the teacher announces an upcoming essay, would fall down on the floor, wailing as if death is upon them and continuing this wailing as they are carried out of the class on a gurney. Essays don't scare me. Writing doesn't intimidate me. Of course, this doesn't mean I am the best at it...far from it. I guess it is just easier for me to sit down and start a paper, and I feel that doing this is something that many people struggle with. However, when I read "Writing For an Audience", by Linda Flower, it dawned on me that I have never really considered my audience. Flower discusses three main ideas in her essay that will "create a momentary common ground between the reader and writer", which should allow the reader to see things the way the writer sees them. I read this and thought, "Well, why does this matter? I have never considered this and have done quite well." Flower replies to my question by explaining that a good piece of writing "closes the gap" between me and my audience, and this will make what I write more effective. The three ideas pointed out in this essay include the knowledge that the reader has about the topic, their attitude about this topic, and finally their needs.
The first, knowledge, is specifically chosen by Flower because if the reader has no clue about the topic of the paper, then there is no chance for success. When I read this, it reminded me of a recent speech I read in our group activity titled "The Semantics of Murder", by Amir Taheri, which had such an effective message and it was because Taheri explained and defined every single term or idea he used in his persuasion. Without this I would have been lost, but I was able to use the descriptions and explanations he gave to better my understanding of the issue and finally what his point of view on it was. Taheri used this technique because he knew that his audience would not be as familiar with the subject as he, a professional, is.
The second idea, attitude, is explained by Flower to come from a "cluster of associations" put together differently by each individual. She uses the example of a lake. Her attitude and image of a lake consists of rainy days and damp, wet nights, while her friend's attitude and image includes swimming, sailing, sun and happiness. If a suggestion is made about visiting a lake, it is obvious that each of these individuals would react quite differently to the suggestion, strictly because of the cluster of associations they have made with a lake. This makes sense. Why would anyone, having different life experiences, memories, and even gene make-up, have the same associations of something as I do? Flower perfectly puts into words what I realized about my writing after reading this example; "many people accept uncritically any statement that fits in with their own attitudes - and rejects, just as uncritically, anything that does not."
Finally, once one is able to identify the difference in attitude and knowledge of the readers, it is important to supply the needs of these readers based on this information. Flower makes a key point that these are the readers needs and that the writer must adapt to the reader. When I read this section, it seemed to me that one thing I could always ask myself, in order to identify the needs of the reader, is "why did I choose this audience?". An example of this is the speech that I mentioned earlier by Taheri. He wrote this speech to an American audience, because they had the need of knowing more about and understanding this issue in their fight against terrorism. By asking the question "why did I choose his audience?" Taheri could conclude that it is because their circumstances (attacks on 9/11) call for a greater understanding of these terrorist organizations, which in turn allows him to get a greater understanding of the knowledge his audience has on the subject and what their attitudes are. This is kind of a backward approach to what Flower was saying, but it definitely benefited me in having a greater understanding of how to analyze my audience, and also the importance in doing so.
This is such an important point to make with writing and I’m so glad you brought it up. For the most part, I’m largely in the same boat as you are. Normally speaking, I’m fairly insecure with people reading my writing, but whenever I do let them read it, it’s not them I’m thinking of, but rather myself. For me, it’s one of those incredibly vulnerable moments, but your point about making sure you’re connecting with your audience is so incredibly valid. It seems that when we write, regardless of whether we enjoy it or not, we just assume that the audience will understand what we’re talking about or whether they’ll enjoy what we have to say. I’ve found that considering your audience closely ties in with ethics. You’ve got to be audience-conscious if you’re going to be ethical about the entire thing, you know?
ReplyDeleteWriting has never been a difficult thing for me, either. And, I’d like to believe that I have a way with words, to sound incredibly clichéd. But, you’ve made me consider something I’ve been lacking. I need to be more conscious of my audience because, for the most part, we’re writing for an audience, aren’t we? Thanks so much for those insightful words.
I am struggling with this class at the moment because most of the writing I have engaged in since returning to school after a very long break has been based on research findings. This is hardly a discipline that considers connection to any reader besides a professor who usually knows more about the subject than I am offering.
ReplyDeleteI, too, found Flower’s words very useful to remember when writing prose. I never actually thought about who I was writing to when I wrote in the past. Again, I was typically writing about a given subject, not something in my imagination or a topic of argument or discussion. Constructing a good piece of writing needs to consider the perspectives of others which is something I need to seriously work on in my future writing.
Simply stating facts about a topic is not sufficient, as Flowers points out. One has to really understand what those facts mean, not only to themselves but their audience. If that is not taken into consideration, readers may become lost or disinterested in what has been written.