Read Ball and Loewe, Bad Ideas About Writing, Wardle, “You Can Learn to Write In General” (p. 30-33)

Blog one post to determine the following things for today’s text (Miller; Wardle): 

1. Who is talking/writing?
2. Who is the primary audience for this text?
3. What does the text say (or imply) “genre” is?
4. What is the main argument or message of this text? How is this main argument different from Bitzer, Edbauer, OR Herndl & Brown?
5. What is the texts primary rhetorical purpose (i.e., what is the text trying to do)?

The author of this text is Elizabeth Wardle. The primary audience for this text seems to be students, or people trying to learn about writing. The text talks about how there is no such thing as writing in general. Everybody has a purpose when writing an essay or whatever it might be. There is always an audience or purpose of a writer. Wardle says, “context, audience, purpose, medium, history, and values of the community all impact what writing is and needs to be in each situation” (page 30). The author says that writing is always in particular. This kind of reminds me of rhetorical ecology and discourse community. Since everybody is writing to some audience, or to persuade some audience, they are in some sort of ecology or discourse community. This also relates to genre. The purpose of genre is to categorize certain writing to make it easier for readers to determine their interests. Different genres are technically different types of discourse communities. I feel like this text has the purpose of trying to inform people that all writing has a purpose. Although it might not seem like there is a purpose or meaning for some writing, there always is.