In Andrea Lunsford’s “Writing Addresses, Invokes, and/or Creates Audiences”, she explains why connecting to your audience is important. The rhetorical triangle is the writer, audience, and text that develops meaning in writing. Lunsford says that writers will imagine their audiences in order to form the intent behind their pieces. With developing technology it becomes harder to create an audience. Digital writing blurs the line between the writer and the audience. Lunsford ends by saying the way we address, invoke, become, and create new audiences becomes a creative gateway to others.
My past academic writing has definitely formed the way I view audiences. An example is the Voice of Democracy essay my school writes every year. We are required to write an essay about a history topic that is read and reviewed by veterans. This experience has made me realize that directing your writing to a specific audience will have a better outcome than always directing it toward your teacher. In this article, I learned that digital writing has made it more difficult to cater to an audience. I also learned that creating an imaginary audience can be useful when writing because it helps creativity. From now on I will imagine reading my work from my audience’s point of view.
