Recap
Writers’ perceptions of an audience’s beliefs, values, needs and background guide their choices of starting point, evidence, vocabulary, tone and handling of opposition. As a reader you explain how an argument shows that understanding; as a writer you demonstrate it. Common ground and concession are two reliable moves.
Key relationships
| Lens | Meaning | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Belief | What the audience holds true | Bikes are safer than cars for short trips |
| Value | What the audience cares about | Children’s safety, fairness, careful spending |
| Need | What it lacks, fears or wants | A defensible, costed proposal |
| Background | Experience and knowledge | Volunteer governors with business jobs |
Choices that follow from an analysis
- Starting point: begin from common ground.
- Evidence: match to what the audience trusts (figures, local stories, authorities).
- Vocabulary: repeat the audience’s terms, explain or avoid jargon.
- Tone: respectful, warm or urgent as the situation requires.
- Opposition: concede the reasonable part, then answer it.
- The ask: frame the request in the audience’s own values.
Common ground and concession
- Common ground: “Every governor wants pupils to arrive safely and dry.”
- Concession then refutation: “Governors are right to count every pound; but the survey suggests the shelter will be used.”
Worked mini-example
Lincoln, First Inaugural, 4 March 1861. Need: reassurance. “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists.” Common ground and shared past: “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies.” He names the audience’s fear, answers it, then appeals to shared bonds before pressing his central claim about the Union.
Marlbridge passage: a speaker says “I have been told that too” to an audience tired of the bus company’s promises, then offers three recent photographs rather than a promise. The choice of evidence follows from the audience’s distrust.
How to write the analysis in two minutes
- Name the audience as specifically as you can.
- Write one belief, one value and one need.
- Choose a detail in the text that answers each.
- Explain, in one sentence each, why that choice suits that belief, value or need.
Mistakes to avoid
- Saying “the audience is adults” without a belief, value or need.
- Treating flattery as audience awareness.
- Ignoring a concession or refutation in the text.
- Describing choices without linking them to the audience.
- Forgetting that the writer’s perception of the audience, even if wrong, still guides choices.
Quick self-check
- What is the difference between a belief and a value? A belief is about what is true; a value is about what matters.
- What is common ground? A belief, value or experience shared by writer and audience.
- Why concede a point to an opponent? It shows fairness and makes the writer more credible.
- Which Lincoln sentence answers the Southern audience’s fear? “I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists.”
- What makes an audience analysis weak? Vague labels that do not tie any choice in the text to a belief, value or need.
For the full explanation and worked examples, return to the study guide.