Ian Walker

Erin Workman
ENC 1145
1 December 2014
Theory of Writing
When I initially entered this class I had no theory of writing. To be honest I
had never even contemplated the subject nor realized there were people who
developed theories of writing. So I can honestly say that before this class I never had
even developed a theory of writing. I believe we all at some level use what amounts
to a theory of writing, but you dont realize you are until the idea of a theory of
writing is actually presented to you.
Now I have slowly, I think, found an understanding of a theory of writing. It
seems more apparent how different aspects of writing relate to one another.
Honestly reflecting on this I believe everyone has at some point in their life thought
about or used a theory of writing, but never realized it. For example, whenever I
gave a speech in any class throughout high school, the speech was always tailored to
the audience I was giving it to. This means I was incorporating the factor of audience
into my presentation, I was changing my presentation because of what the audience
was, I just never thought about the fact I was actually doing it.
So I would define my Theory of Writing as how different contexts affect the
outcome of a project. To be more specific I believe your audience is really central to
everything. Your audience is the influencing factor that determines what is being
presented, how it is being presented and why it is being presented. An audience of

board members at a company would influence the purpose, genre and the
knowledge. The way purpose would be defined in this scenario is to update or brief
these business leaders on a certain project or other aspect of a company. Another
way to think of this is what the purpose would not be and that is it would not have
the purpose of trying to make them laugh, it would not have the purpose of trying to
make them feel better. The audience demands that the purpose of the speech be
informing the board members of some aspect of the company. Furthermore, the
genre is also created out of the audience. Sticking with the previous example the
genre would be a professional one because that would make it appropriate to the
audience. For example, a PowerPoint would be appropriate that displays the
information in an organized manner, not a comedy sketch that tries to make jokes
out of the situation. Finally, the knowledge would be influenced by all of this. The
knowledge, or information, in the presentation is put there to inform the board
members, the amount of knowledge is dictated by the genre, and the specificity of it
is dictated by what you want the purpose of it to be.
The aspect of analyzing how information is transferred differently among
different contexts is what influenced my theory of writing the most. Looking at the
different projects we have done and the different genres we have looked at and see
what influences it. To expand on this, I really took notice how whenever an audience
is given all other aspects of the way your information will be transferred is decided.
When we did the project and used 3 different genres all my genres changed
depending on the intended audience. Trying to get the attention of an audience that
is on the move, I had to make a poster, to advertise for my supposed event of

presenting my research paper, that would seem pretty entertain and would catch
the eye. This is because my audience is everyone and I wanted to attract as many
people as possible. Then when my audience changed to a group of students who are
already interested in the topic of ophthalmology, I no longer created a genre that
was just seemed fun and entertaining. The genre was now a more professionalized
version and also because the audience changed the genre my information presented
changed. The information was more expansive and went into much, much more
detail than what was shown on just the poster meant for advertisement.
Some more reflections I did that contributed to my theory of writing included
looking back at previous works I have looked at. Two that always strongly come to
mind for me, are Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird. Looking back on
these two works and how their purpose and audience affected the outcomes of this
book helped me come to a fuller realization of my theory of writing. So, looking at
Huck Finn the story was meant to be a critic of the Southern Civilization. Everyone
in the South valued being civilized, except one character, Huck Finn, and he was
seen as an outcast and uncivilized. But Mark Twain showed that he was the only
person in this Tom Sawyer world, who treated the minority group blacks on equal
terms. His intended audience was all those people who clung to racial oppression
and his purpose to hopefully change their mind. He decided on a novel being the
best genre to convey his knowledge, which he had developed through experience
from his life. Looking at this book at a deeper level also showed me how rhetorical
situation has such an affect on the outcome of ones writing. Then there is To Kill A
Mockingbird, which had many moral statements and observations about human

nature, the over-arching one and the one most people are familiar with is her
statement on racial injustice in Alabama during the 1930s. But the one I want to
look at a bit more is her belief that humility is one of the greatest qualities a person
can hold. Quickly, I would like to remind the reader that Atticus Finch, the Father in
the novel, was seen by his children and a boring old dad. He wasnt cool like the
other dads. Then one day a vicious dog was on the loose and Atticus was handed a
rifle and shot the dog with one shot. This is when the kids learned that their father
was renowned as a greatest marksman in their area, but he would never brag about
it. The purpose of this message was to give whatever people ended up being the
audience a better moral character. Harper Lee had a rhetorical situation where she
wanted to make several statements on human nature, and decided she would
present it in the genre of a novel and through this she presented her knowledge of
how the world should work. This may have been a bit lengthy digression but I was
really trying to hit home the point that both these authors had intended audience,
which defined all other aspects of how they decided to display their knowledge.
Reflecting on these two novels that had a big impact on me was another large
contributor to my theory of knowledge.
The relationship between creating knowledge and the theory of writing is a
tricky one. Information can change into knowledge through assimilation. If a
person assimilates information into a deeper real world understanding then he has
turned that information into knowledge.(Walker, Journal 6) Thats how I previously
defined the relationship between knowledge and information. Following through on
this, I believe that assimilation process is affected by the theory of writing. When a

person presents information they specialize in to an audience, they will also give a
deeper real world understanding of how that information is applied. This is how the
knowledge is created and shown. Also, when you have a specific rhetorical situation,
which Bitzer defines a rhetorical situation as a complex of persons, events,
objects, and relations presenting an actual or potential exigence which can be
completely or partially removed if discourse, introduced into the situation, can so
constrain human decision or action as to bring about the significant modification of
the exigence(Walker, Journal 3). The knowledge you wish to display is affected by
that rhetorical situation. You will present your assimilated information differently
depending on the rhetorical situation. That situation always includes the audience,
purpose, and genre. These variables will define the knowledge you want to present
and in what way. So to summarize, I think the best way I could answer it is that the
way one writes and tries to present information, which is based on rhetorical
situation, determines the knowledge. Knowledge, being defined as information in a
certain format, then the way one writes and how different contexts affect the way it
is presented is what creates the knowledge out of information. The theory of writing
as I have stated it is how the knowledge is created from information because the
way one understands writing is how the format of that information is changed.
My theory of writing can be applied outside of this immediate context by
helping me create better platforms where I am sharing information. Now that I have
a deeper understanding of the process and how things are made I can be more exact
when I am making things. The reason for this is because since I have analyzed the
process of the factors that affect writing I will better understand how to use them at

a deeper level. Stated differently, you can do anything mechanically over and over,
but it isnt till you understand what is behind what you are doing that you can
execute your goal at a more sophisticated level. With my new theory of writing I will
be able to move forward and every time I wish to transfer information it will be
more effectively done because I understand what I am doing on a fundamental level
and not just an instinctual one.
I have decided that audience is really the linchpin to my theory of writing.
Others may disagree with this but I have at least convinced myself of it and it makes
sense to me. This was influenced by several factors, like reflecting on my own work
and reflecting on the works of others far more accomplished than me. It has also
showed me how knowledge is created depending on the audience and rhetorical
situation because audience and rhetorical situation is what allows a person to
decide what information they want to present and how they assimilate that
information into knowledge. This is all gong to be very beneficial to me because of
how a deeper understanding of what Im doing in future writing projects will allow
me to create a better project.