Writing for Whom? Cognition, Motivation, and a Writer's Audience

Magnifico, A.M.  “Writing for Whom?  Cognition, Motivation, and a Writer's Audience.”  Educational Psychologist Jul-Sep2010, Vol. 45 Issue 3, p167-184

“As a result of this visible shift in relationship between writers and readers of electronic media, it has become possible to see more clearly the dynamics of how writers think about and interact with their audiences.”  This quote represents many key ideas as to the changing dynamics of rhetoric and its application to shifting audiences.  Aleceia Magnifico’s lively pedagogical article addresses the current climate of teaching composition especially in light of today’s new media and how audiences should be addressed in specific genres and styles.  Magnifico sets out to “examine the history of audience within writing research” in order to observe and analyze “how conceptualizations of audience have shifted over time… and why, in this climate of rapid technological change, it is important to begin [to build] an understanding of writing that draws from several perspectives: the cognitive, the sociocultural, and the sociocognitive.”  Magnifico offers a review of literature dealing with the social and cognitive processes of writing, from motivations to conceptualizations.  She then addresses the affects of the examination of the role of audience in light of new media learning environments as a doorway to further reaches of composition inspirations. 

As this article is focused in pedagogy, it offers a sense of what might be at the heart of composition teaching in the next years as we address new media and its role.  As such, Magnifico touches on an area of rhetorical study that lends insight in to the analysis of travel writing in blog form.  The critique of existing texts regarding current composition studies can shed light on the interests of up-and-coming writers and the audiences they hope to reach. The research applies to the study of travel blogs in that it adds depth to the rhetorical concept of audience for persuasive purposes.