What's Wrong Ong?

The Complexities of a Fictional Audience

Ong’s The Writer’s Audience is Always Fiction offers a keen analysis of the complex relationship between written and oral communication. He works to fully dissect the models by which they are most often represented and, in doing so, casts light on many facets of communication I had not known prior to the assignment.

“For the speaker, the audience is in front of him. For the writer, the audience is further away in time space or both.” (pg. 10)

            This statement is common sense right? When I get on stage to perform, my content is tailored directly to the human beings under the sound of my voice – both in my vocal inflection and diction. As I am writing this response, I am bearing first in mind the grader and regard my classmates as a close second. Neither Dr. Graban nor my classmates are in my room as I type furiously away this morning, however, it is for their eyes that I desperately piece this together.

By this logic, I’ve constructed the formula:

Communication = time x sound

So, Communication may occur insofar as spoken words are heard and/or written words are seen.

                However, Ong complicates the “audience” structure with the introduction of space. To paraphrase his explanation, written communication allows for the inscription of symbols into substrate which may last eternally and also the transportation of that message far beyond sound’s limitation on oral expression. So, I can write a letter to my mother from my imaginary French estate and send it by pigeon to Tampa, and it may rest on the refrigerator for the remaining 200 years of her life! But if I were to offer that same message orally on my visit home this weekend, it would be erased as quickly as I transmitted it.

So the formula has become this:

Communication = time x sound
                                      space

Now, our formula acknowledges the existence of existential space or distance, which poses an exponential limitation to aforementioned notions of written and verbal communication.

                Unfortunately, Ong could not account for the advent of the internet, which adds an entirely new dimension to that formula. In reality, when I step on stage to perform – though I am conducting oral communication which has long been bound by the strength of sound – I will focus my attention on the audience I have amassed on my Instagram account! My content is designed to win them over more than anyone physically present in the room. They are more plentiful, more interactive overtime, and easily measured.

            The same is true for Nike’s “Girl Effect” ad campaign. Though the narrator is conducting oral communication, his audience is not the sound engineer tweaking his vocals or the intern holding his coffee. He is presenting his message in a way that is comprehensible for the millions of potential viewers worldwide. Although, Ong hints at this when he mentions his ambition for an audience of thousands, he was not aware of the instantaneous outreach made accessible by internet capability.

            The multimodal message(s) presented in all three of the videos is clearly intended to reach a literate, critically-thinking, English-speaking audience. Words are shown tactically on the screen in extremely quick bouts of movement, requiring that the viewer is capable of above-average readership and attentiveness. This implies age as well. Above all else, because of the medium through which the message is presented, Nike’s “Girl Effect” campaign has reached their target market on a global scale. It is very likely that the literate, critically thinking individuals whom they are trying to reach are computer owners with internet access.

Which leaves us with the formula for modern Communication – which can also be called Mass Communication due to the accessibility of the internet and global networks.

Communication = time x sound x space²