It’s your turn now! Whether your assignment provides you with a specific audience or allows you to choose your audience, it’s time to take some notes and make some decisions about your audience.
Remember, you must think about what you know and what you need to know about your audience and ask yourself the following questions:
- What are the demographics of my audience (things like age, gender, profession, education level, socioeconomic status)?
- What does my audience already know about my issue?
- What kind of language should I use to best suit this audience?
- What kind of evidence will I need in order to be persuasive to my audience?
- Is there a certain form of argument that will work better for my audience (see lessons later in this area on Aristotelian, Rogerian, and Toulmin arguments)?
- What adjustments will I need to make in my writing to be persuasive to my audience?
- How can I balance how I feel about this issue with what my audience will need to read about this issue?
- What risks am I willing to take with my audience? Am I willing to “push some buttons,” or do I want to present an even, formal tone?
As you work to make your notes and make your decisions, be sure to review the Analyzing Your Audience form from the Writing Process area of the Excelsior OWL.
Once your notes are finished, share them with your professor or classmates in order to get some additional feedback, if you can. You may even keep your notes in a writing process journal to share with your professor both during and after your process.