Nonacademic audiences read your writing for reasons other than to grade you. You probably know more about the teacher than you think, and asking questions about how the teacher treats this material in class will help you remember those details to help you shape your paper. In other words, take the time to brainstorm about what you’ve learned about the teacher to help you meet his or her expectations for this paper. Will this professor be looking for an “argument synthesis,” showing how the cases all support one point or will this professor be more interested in seeing how the cases complicate one another? Ask yourself what you know about your teacher and his or her approach to the discipline.ĭo you know, for example, if this teacher always expects papers to be carefully argued? Has this teacher emphasized the importance of summarizing cases accurately before referring to them? The most important reader is probably the instructor, even if a grader will look at the paper first. Academic AudiencesĪssuming you are writing a paper for a class, ask yourself who is the reader? The “experts” may be the most demanding audience in terms of knowledge, presentation, and graphics or visuals.Įxperts are often “theorists” or “practitioners.”įor the “expert” audience, document formats are often elaborate and technical, style and vocabulary may be specialized or technical, source citations are reliable and up-to-date, and documentation is accurate. The managerial audience may or may have more knowledge than the lay audience about the subject, but they need knowledge so they can make a decision about the issue.Īny background information, facts, statistics needed to make a decision should be highlighted. They usually need background information they expect more definition and description, and they may want attractive graphics or visuals. They connect with the human-interest aspect of articles. Three types of audiences are the “lay” audience, the “managerial” audience, and the “experts.” The “lay” audience has no special or expert knowledge. You’ll need to analyze your audience in order to communicate effectively. The context in which they will be reading a piece of writing (in a newspaper, textbook, popular magazine, specialized journal, on the Internet, and so forth).What level of information they have about the subject (novice, the general reader, specialist or expert).Who they are (age, sex, education, economic status, political/ social/religious beliefs).Writers determine their audience types by considering: You need to know your audience before you start writing. Your audience might be your instructor, classmates, the president of an organization, the staff of a management company, or any other number of possibilities.

One should anticipate the needs or expectations of your audience in order to convey information or argue for a particular claim. Audience DefinitionĪn audience is a group of readers who read a particular piece of writing. Companies that are successful have properly identified their audience and attracting them to their products and services.

Presentation expert target description