Writing for an Audience
A paragraph that would suit anyone suits no one
- Here is a test for your own draft: would this paragraph read identically to a completely different audience?
- If it would, it has not been shaped by one.
- Writing for an audience means the text could not simply be re-addressed.
The test for whether a paragraph has been shaped for an audience is...
If it could be re-addressed unchanged, it was not written for anyone in particular.
Three questions before drafting
- What does this audience already believe about the subject?
- What do they need — information, reassurance, a reason to act?
- What do they value, and which of those values can honestly connect to my position?
Select all the questions the CED's framing suggests asking before drafting.
Length is a formatting decision, not an audience analysis.
Choosing an appeal honestly
- Use ethos where the audience has reason to doubt you — and show the credential rather than asserting it.
- Use pathos where the audience accepts the facts but does not feel their weight.
- Use logos where they accept the facts but not the connection between them.
Ethos works better when a credential is ____ rather than asserted.
Showing lets the reader draw the conclusion; asserting asks them to take it on trust.
Adding an emotional example does not automatically add pathos that works. If the feeling is not connected to the claim, the paragraph has a moving story and no argument — that is precisely the failure mode the CED describes.
What does this audience need?
Match each audience situation to the appeal it calls for.
Match each appeal to how it characteristically fails.
Knowing the failure mode is how you check your own draft.
Adding an emotional example is enough to make pathos work.
The feeling must be connected to the claim, or the paragraph has a story and no argument.
How each appeal fails
- Ethos fails when credentials are asserted rather than shown.
- Pathos fails when the feeling is not connected to the claim.
- Logos fails when evidence is present but the reasoning is not.
Revising for audience
- Find one sentence that only works for your intended reader. If there is none, add one.
- Find one place where you explained something they already know. Cut it.
- Find one place where you assumed something they do not. Explain it.
Two drafts argue for later school start times. One cites sleep research to a school board that already accepts it — wasted. The other cites the same research and connects it to the board's stated priority, attendance. Same evidence, different audience work.
Before drafting, ask what the audience believes, needs and values. Choose ethos where trust is in doubt, pathos where weight is missing, logos where the connection is missing — and remember each fails in its own way: asserted credentials, unconnected feeling, evidence without reasoning.