What is an Audience?
The group of people for whom a writer or speaker intends their work.
All About Audience: Writing for Your Readers
The audience is the group of people for whom a writer or speaker intends their work. Understanding your audience is key in creating effective communication through writing. When determining your audience, it is crucial to consider demographics such as age, gender, education level, and cultural background in order to tailor the content and tone of your piece appropriately.
As a writer, it is important to ask yourself: Who am I writing this for? Why will they care? What do I want them to take away from this piece?
By keeping your intended audience in mind, you can structure your writing so that it engages and resonates with them, using language, references and tone that will appeal to their specific interests and motivations.
Writing for an audience can require a shift in perspective from the writer's own voice: It's not always about what you want to say, but how what you say will be received. From emails and routine memos to more creative endeavors like short stories or novels, tailoring your writing to your audience is a crucial step in making sure your message is effectively conveyed to the right people.
Understanding the audience can be a significant factor in how literature is written, communicated, and perceived. Here are two examples of how audience can be used in writing.
In this book, the audience is primarily young adults, but it has also become popular among adults. Rowling's use of humour and light-hearted language makes the book easy to read for all ages. By writing with both the younger and older audiences in mind, Rowling widened the reach of her work and made it accessible to a wider audience.
This novel is written exclusively from the point of view of the young protagonist, Scout. Lee crafted the narrative to appeal specifically to a Southern white audience, accurately depicting the region's dialect and social codes. By doing so, Lee drew readers into the world of the novel and helped them identify with the young protagonist, making the book relatable and its themes close to the audience's heart.