I’m going to post weekly notes about information, meaning, and writing. This week, I’m sharing four separate thoughts about context and the reader’s understanding.
Context changes reader understanding
To understand a text as the writer intended, we often need knowledge of the environment that the text came from. (That’s why Shakespeare’s jokes can be a struggle to understand.)
Recently, a transport company’s poster was shared on social media, stripped of all its contextual information. Nothing was said about who made it or why.
People criticised the poster for describing period products with a euphemism. It was seen as an example of outdated attitudes that encouraged shame about periods.
I looked the poster up. It was for train travellers who needed emergency period supplies. Quite understandably, many people aren’t comfortable talking about their menstrual flow in front of strangers. The euphemism was sensitive to this group of customers.
The poster was written to be understood in a busy and very public environment. Readers in a different context took a different meaning from it. There was little its designers could reasonably do about that.
A text can gain a new context
The 1930s version of King Kong illustrates the impact of context on audience understanding.
The movie came out in 1933, with a novelisation released beforehand. I’ve been listening to an audiobook narration of the novel.
I’ve been struck by the story’s outdated attitude to women and its racism towards the islanders. To me, it feels like a time capsule, a little snippet of history. When Kong first turned up, I barely registered his thrilling presence. The book’s old-fashioned attitudes have become the star – to me anyway.
When I was a small child, I thought the story was all about the colossal ape and the other giant creatures on Skull Island. I didn’t notice anything else. Back then, I didn’t know about colonialism or sexism.
The story has stayed the same but its meaning has shifted for me because I live in a different time now.
Arguing against imaginary readers
Being aware of reader contexts and viewpoints is a double-edged sword. While it’s good for writers to think about their readers’ minds, it can also cause overly defensive writing.
In this kind of writing, the writer openly shares their assumptions about the reader’s thoughts and experiences. Characteristic phrases include:
- You may think that …
- You might imagine that …
- You probably haven’t …
- It is not the case that … (used in a way that suggests the reader has assumed something is the case)
This approach tends to rub readers up the wrong way. People don’t like being told what they think.
I think of it as “tilting at scarecrows.” The writer seems to be arguing against an artificial man who supposedly believes this, that, and the other. I know this is rarely the writer’s actual intention.
You can edit this trait out of your writing by changing statements that overtly target the reader. Instead, place the focus on your own viewpoint and experience. You can also acknowledge that an argument has two sides, without stating that the reader is in the opposing camp. Here are some examples.
- I think that …
- I have heard people say that …
- Our company often encounters customers who …
- There are two sides to this argument …
And finally …
In my first note, I said there was little designers could reasonably do to prepare the train poster to be read out of context. The poster makes a simple statement about asking for period products and doesn’t try to cater for all social conversations about period shame.
I imagine that a poster that tried to cater for all possible readers would be far less accessible, especially to any train passengers who are panicking about bloodstains on their clothes.
Sometimes, a writer just has to choose a stance and stick with it.
(Photo by Erwan Grey on Pexels.com)
TIDE and CANUTE 