Purpose and Audience Analysis

This exercise asks you to apply what you learned in the textbook chapters by analyzing real$-$world documents for purpose and audience. For each document you will consider the purpose or goal of the correspondence and whether the way it is written helps or hinders the achievement of that goal or purpose. By analyzing correspondence that was actually circulated in a professional context, you also can see how decisions about purpose and audience have real consequences.

Read each of the following correspondences and then address the questions below.

Preview$/$download: "Jelly belly" memo darr

Preview$/$download: SunTrust letter ${?}_{(})ubrace(darrubrace)$

For each work, analyze the purpose:

What do you think the purpose is$?$ What is the goal of the correspondence?

What specific text or elements of the work suggest the purpose you have identified?

For each work, analyze the audience:

Identify the primary audience. Be as specific as you can.

What does the audience need from the correspondence? What are they supposed to do with the information?

Does the way the correspondence was written help or hinder the audience in understanding the goal? How is the audience helped$/$hindered$?$

How would you respond to the message if you were the audience? Why or why not?

Pick one of the correspondences and describe how you would write it to better achieve the purpose for the target audience.

Fun fact: Decisions about purpose and audience have real consequences. Read the CNN article attached below to learn about the impacts of rhetorical choices in the real world. As you think through your own