UNIVERSIDAD JOSE CARLOS MARIATEGUI

Facultad Ciencias Jurídicas, Empresariales y Pedagógicas.

Escuela Profesional de Educación

MODULE N° 6
THE ARGUMENT

The strength of any kind of argument rests on the ability of the writer to construct a
thesis and make valid supporting points. Plans an answer to the science and technology
question opposite. The writer must support their point of view or stance with evidence,
and explain how the evidence explains the point he is making. Having made a series of
valid points, it may be necessary for him to rearrange the supporting points into the best
order.

THE BIG IDEA

Point A
Evidence / example / explanation
Point B
Evidence / example / explanation
Point C
Evidence / example / explanation

This technique could also be used for:

• Identifying a problem and finding solutions
• Writing a short report on an issue
• Nominating a person for an award
Other technique to organize your ideas could be:

[Text]

[Text] [Text]

[Text]

[Text] [Text]

[Text]

WRITERS, AUDIENCE AND COMMUNICATIVE PURPOSE

Writing texts aimed at a specific audience is a very sophisticated task. Writing tasks in a second
language might sound difficult, every writing task, like every journey, can be broken down into
stages: once you realize that this task can be planned before you start writing, your
development will be much more manageable. Here, they can be some steps to follow.
Your role as a writer of the text
The audience you are writing to
The reasons for writing – the purpose of the text.

YOUR ROLE AS A WRITER

Writers are necessary in our everyday lives and are so easily overlooked. This quote, summarizes
it “The role of a writer is not to say what we can all say, but what we are unable to say”. There is
so much to learn with different authors writing. The saying, “Read between the lines” is an
expression we were brought up hearing, not always understanding what it meant at the time.
The role of a writer is challenging at times, it is very difficult to have a conversation with an
individual without losing their interest, much less writing a novel.
In a writing task require to pretend to be a specific character, an implied identity. For example,
you may write a letter or an email to complaint, a future article or a topical news report. In such
instances, you are asked to play a role. Your implied identity could be that of an angry member
of the public, a journalist, or a technical writer.
AUDIENCE
An audience is a group of readers who reads a particular piece of writing. As a writer, you should
anticipate the needs or expectations of your audience in order to convey information or argue
for a particular claim. Your audience might be your instructor, classmates, the president of an
organization, the staff of a management company, or any other number of possibilities. You
need to know your audience before you start writing.
Just as much assume an identity, you must write your text to an implied (imaginary) audience.
You need to choose the appropriate register to make your written English appropriate for your
audience.
No matter what type of writing you are doing, you should plan to write to someone—that is, you
should target an audience for your writing assignment. Audience analysis is crucial to
understanding what should go into each piece of writing. You should consider your audience’s
needs in your research; your content; the background information you provide; your tone, style,
and wording; and the frequency with which you define terminology. Analyzing your audience
will help you make the necessary decisions about what you will write.
Many students assume that the teacher is the primary audience for the writing. Although your
instructor may be your audience for an essay, he or she may also expect you to write for your
classmates or others in your field of study.

PURPOSE
A pivotal element of the composing process is when the writer determines the communicative
purpose of the text. This decision not only provides the inspiration for the story. This decision
unifies all of the rhetorical features the writer will exercise to present the meaning to the readers.
All messages have at least one communicative purpose. Make sure you understand the
purpose of the text you are writing. Here are some of the most obvious ones:
Advise on Explain
Apologise to Instruct
Comment on Narrate
Complaint about Persuade
Describe Request
Enquire about Suggest

Once you know your audience, you are ready to begin writing. Knowing your audience
enables you to select or reject details for that specific audience. In addition, different
audiences expect different types or formats for texts. Readers of Environmental Impact
Statements don't want to read rhyming poetry extolling the virtues of nature. Mothers
getting letters from children don't want to read a laboratory report about the events of
the past month.

Knowing the knowledge level of your audience will help you determine how to write, how
much information to include, how long to make your text, how subjective or objective
you should be, and how formal or informal your text should be.

Finally, writers need to consider both audience and purpose in writing because the two
elements affect writing significantly, and decisions about one affect the other, don’t forget
to consider WHY you are writing.

ACTIVITY

Identify the implied role of the writer, the implied audience and the communicative
purpose of each text to complete the chart below.
1. As part of your school activities, you designed a summer programme for your peers
that aims to create better understanding of the different cultures in your community. Write
a brochure in which you promote the programme and describe the different activities in
which students will be participating.
2. Your teacher has set this as the topic of your next English B class debate: “Works
of art represent their creators, not the culture in which they were created”. Write your
opening speech either agreeing or disagreeing with the statement.
3. You recently volunteered at a local hospital where you tended to children
recovering from long-term illnesses. Write a blog entry describing the experience and
explaining the factors other than medicine and medical treatment that, in your opinion,
helped those children recover.
4. You recently watched a documentary that you thought was both entertaining and
informative. As a junior reporter for your local newspaper, write a review of this
documentary describing it and explaining how it was both entertaining and informative.
5. To protect students from cyberbullying, your school introduced a surveillance
system that allows it to monitor everything students do online during school hours. As
the President of the Student Council, write an email to your school principal explaining
why senior students at your school oppose the use of this surveillance system, and
suggesting alternative ways in which the school can protect students from cyberbullying.
COMMUNICATIVE
TASK IMPLIED AUTHOR IMPLIED AUDIENCE
PURPOSE

BIBLIOGRAPHY:
• Askehave, I. (in press). ‘How Do We Account for the Purpose of Texts? – A Critical
View on Genre Theory’. Askehave, I. (1998).
• A Functional Interpretation of Company Brochures – from context to text. Ph.D.-
thesis. The Aarhus School of Business. Bhatia, V.K. (1993).
• Analysing Genre: language use in professional settings. Longman Biber, D.(1988).
Variation across Speech and Writing. Cambridge University Press.
• Eggins, S. (1994). An Introduction to Systemic Functional Linguistic. Pinter
• Oxford. (2014). Oxford IB Skills and Practice - English B for the IB Diploma.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Stephen Reid, Kate Kiefer, and Dawn Kowalski. (1994 - 2013). Adapting to Your
Audience. The WAC Clearinghouse. Colorado State University. Available at
https://innovationtest2.colostate.edu/resources/writing/guides/.