1. Prewriting: Considering Audience, Purpose, and Tone
Introduction
Analyzing your audience
Determining your purpose for writing
Establishing the right tone
Your Turn 1: Analyze audience
Your Turn 2: Focus on audience and tone

2. Introduction
If there is any great secret of success in life, it lies in the ability to put yourself in the other person’s place and to see things from his point of view—as well as your own —Henry Ford
Success in writing also depends on your ability to put yourself in someone else’s shoes.
You can put yourself in your readers’ shoes by understanding your audience and your purpose.

3. Introduction
Once you know what you’re going to write about, you need to consider who you’re writing for and why—your audience and your purpose.

4. Analyzing your audience
Before you begin to write, analyze your audience by asking yourself some important questions:
1. Who am I writing for? What are my readers’ needs and expectations?
People of different ages and backgrounds often need and expect different things from what they read.
How might these readers’ needs and expectations differ?

5. Analyzing your audience
Your readers’ point of view is important too. If you were writing to convince people to watch your favorite reality show on television, you would have to use different arguments for people who like reality shows and people who don’t.

6. Analyzing your audience
2. What might my readers already know about my topic?
Readers who are familiar with your topic don’t need the same level of detail as readers who aren’t familiar with it. If you were writing about your favorite sport, how might your writing change for a reader who
plays that sport?
has never heard of that sport?

7. Analyzing your audience
3. How can I make my writing appeal to my readers?
Different readers have different interests. Analyzing your audience can help you decide what details to include to capture and hold your readers’ attention.

8. Analyzing your audience
4. What do I want my readers to do or understand as a result of reading my work?
Make sure your readers are capable of understanding and responding to your writing.
to get out and get more exercise?
to vote in the next election?
Would you ask this reader

9. Determining your purpose for writing
Knowing why you are writing is as important as knowing whom you are writing for. Your purpose, or reason for writing, can be one or a mixture of the following:
to inform or explain
to persuade
to entertain
to express yourself

10. Determining your purpose for writing Writing to inform or explain
When you write to inform or explain, you provide your readers with information. This type of writing includes
newspaper and news magazine articles
comparison-contrast explanations
cause-and-effect explanations
research reports
effect
cause
literary analyses
informative Web sites

11. Determining your purpose for writing Writing to persuade
At times you’ll write to convince readers to share your opinion of a particular subject or to take action. Texts you can write to persuade include the following:
editorials
letters to people in authority
brochures and advertisements
movie, book, or music reviews

12. Determining your purpose for writing Writing to entertain
Hollywood screenwriters and novelists aren’t the only ones who write to entertain. You, too, use writing to entertain when you create
short stories
jokes and riddles
graphic novels or comic books
s with funny anecdotes
Keep in mind that to entertain does not always mean to amuse with light reading; horror stories and intense dramas are also forms of entertainment.

13. Determining your purpose for writing Writing to express yourself
Self-expression seems to be a basic need for human beings. We talk, yell, make faces, move our bodies, and often write to express our thoughts and feelings. Written forms you can use to express yourself include
personal letters
blog entries
poems and songs
diary or journal entries
memoirs or autobiographies

14. Determining your purpose for writing Writing for multiple purposes
Many kinds of writing can serve multiple purposes.
For example, Joe Kubert’s graphic novel Fax from Sarajevo serves all four writing purposes.
It entertains readers with a gripping true-life narrative.
It informs readers about conditions during the Bosnian War of the 1990s.
It expresses the thoughts and feelings of the writer.
It persuades readers to pay attention to the tragedy and to take action.

15. Establishing the right tone
How you say something can be as important as what you say. Knowing your audience and your purpose helps you determine the tone of your writing. Your writing can be
formal or informal
subjective or objective
serious or lighthearted

16. Establishing the right tone
You express tone through your choices of language and sentence structure.
To create a formal tone,
To create an informal tone,
use more sophisticated vocabulary
use simple, ordinary language, which can include contractions, colloquialisms, and slang
avoid contractions, colloquialisms, and slang
use shorter, simpler sentence structures
use longer, more complex sentence structures

17. Your Turn 1: Analyze audience
You want to persuade readers to see your favorite movie. Use the questions below to analyze two potential audiences before you write:
a group of friends
a group of parents
Who am I writing for? What are my readers’ needs and expectations?
What might my readers already know about my topic?
How can I make my writing appeal to my readers?
What do I want my readers to do or understand as a result of reading my work?

18. Your Turn 2: Focus on audience and tone
Write two versions of a paragraph aimed at persuading people to see your favorite movie. Write the first version for an audience of friends and the second version for an audience of adults.
Your two paragraphs should show that you
understand each audience’s needs and expectations
know what tone is appropriate for each audience

19. The End