[Podcast Transcript]

Welcome to Screen Space, your podcast about creating usable, accessible, effective, and efficient web, blog, and digital media design for the everyday (and non-expert) designer. This is episode 21 of Screen Space ldquo;The Rhetorical Situation Part 1mdash;Audience.rdquo; In this episode, I discuss the rhetorical situation in general and then focus on audience and how to analyze your audience. In the next episode, ldquo;Rhetorical Situation Part 2mdash;Purpose and Context,rdquo; I cover the last two areas of the rhetorical situation. Finally in the third and fourth parts of this series I provide a full example of an analysis of the rhetorical situation.

I am your host, Dr. Jennifer L. Bowie. I conduct research and have taught in areas related to digital media, web, and blog design. Previously I mentioned being an assistant professor at GSU. However, this is no longer the case and I am currently looking for a job in usability, user-centered design, and/or social media. Stay tuned and Irsquo;ll provide details at the end of this podcast.

Before I get to talking about the rhetorical situation and audience, Irsquo;d like to welcome some of my newest audience members. Welcome to my new listeners from Hayneville, Alabama; Mansfield, Massachusetts; and Boise Idaho. Thanks for listening! Now, letrsquo;s get to the topic.

The Rhetorical Situation: Audience, Purpose, and Context

Audience, purpose, and context are three key considerations in rhetoric, technical communication, and really any sort of communications. Whenever I taught a writing class, I spent a lot of time focusing on these concepts and they were key considerations in my grading. Did the student consider their audience? The context? The purpose? If they did consider these three parts of the rhetorical situation, then they likely have at least a decent paper, website, blog, or whatever the medium.

In some ways audience, purpose, and context are a lot like the 6 Ws of journalism: who, what, when, where, how, and why. Except these are not Ws we are trying to answer explicitly in our writing to tell the news or story, these are Ws we consider in our writing and attempt to answer implicitly not explicitly. In journalism we try to explain who the news happened to, what happened, where it happened, when it happened, how it happened, and why it happened.

In other forms of writing and communication we want to think about this question in regard to not telling a story but making our point understandable. So the ldquo;whordquo; becomes the audiencemdash;who are we writing to? The context involves many Ws: what, when, where, and how. What is the userrsquo;s context? When will they use it? Where will they use it? How will they use it? This leaves us with purpose and why. Why will they use it? Why do they need it? Why do we want them to think, feel, or do whatever it is we are trying to get them to think, feel, or do?

Audience, purpose, and context do go beyond the 6 Ws, so letrsquo;s explore each in more detail starting with audience here, and purpose and context in the next episode.

Audience

Audience is the most important of these three parts of the rhetorical situation. If you do not fully consider and write or design for the audience, it doesnrsquo;t matter your purpose or context. You were unsuccessful. If they canrsquo;t read it, donrsquo;t get it, or donrsquo;t care, your purpose has not been met, and context does not matter. Irsquo;ve talked about audience before, because it is such an important concept. For instance, in Screen Space 12: Usability #38; Usability Testing 101 Part 2mdash;Selecting Users I talked a lot about figuring out who your users aremdash;or your audiencemdash;for usability testing. You may want to go back and listen for more information. I also promised to do a future episode on persona developing, and you can still look forward to this and it will help you take this episode and episode 12 further.

Please note: ...