Writing Analytically, 6th Edition - Rosenwasser, David & Stephen, Jill [247]
CHOOSING WORDS: SOME RHETORICAL CONSIDERATIONS
We don’t wish to make too firm a distinction between writing to make things clear and writing that is considerate of the needs of an audience beyond just clarity. And yet it is the case that when you begin to imagine the response of an audience, an actual listener to or reader of your prose, some additional considerations do come into play. The most important of these is tone.
Tone
Tone is the implied attitude of a piece of language toward its subject and audience. Whenever you revise for style, your choices in syntax and diction affect the tone. There are no hard-and-fast rules to govern matters of tone, and your control of it depends on your sensitivity to the particular context—your understanding of your own intentions and your readers’ expectations.
Let’s consider, for example, the tonal implications of the warning signs in the subways of London as compared with New York.
London: Leaning out of the window may cause harm.
New York: Do not lean out of the window.
Initially, you may find the English injunction laughably indirect and verbose in comparison with the shoot-from-the-hip clarity of the American sign. But that is to ignore the very thing we are calling style. The American version appeals to authority, commanding readers what not to do without telling them why. The English version, by contrast, appeals to logic; it is more collegial toward its readers and assumes they are rational beings rather than children prone to misbehave.
In revising for tone, you need to ask yourself if the attitude suggested by your language is appropriate to the aim of your message and to your audience. Your goal is to keep the tone consistent with your rhetorical intentions. The following paragraph, from a college catalogue, offers a classic mismatch between the overtly stated aim and the tonal implications:
The student affairs staff believes that the college years provide a growth and development process for students. Students need to learn about themselves and others and to learn how to relate to individuals and groups of individuals with vastly different backgrounds, interests, attitudes and values. Not only is the tolerance of differences expected, but also an appreciation and a celebration of these differences must be an outcome of the student’s experience. In addition, the student must progress toward self-reliance and independence tempered by a concern for the social order.
The explicit content of this passage—what it says—concerns tolerance. The professed point of view is student-friendly, asserting that the college exists to allow students “to learn about themselves and others” and to support the individual in accord with the “appreciation … of … differences.” But note that the implicit tone—how the passage goes about saying what it says—is condescending and intolerant. Look at the verbs. An imperious authority lectures students about what they “need to learn,” that tolerance is “expected,” that “celebration … must be an outcome,” and that “the student must progress” along these lines. Presumably, the paragraph does not intend to adopt this high-handed manner, but its deafness to tone subverts its desired meaning.
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Try This 17.3: Analyzing Tone-Deaf Prose
Using the example from the college catalogue as a model, locate and bring to class examples of tonal inconsistency or inappropriateness that you encounter in your daily life. If you have difficulty finding examples, try memos from those in authority at your school or workplace, which often contain excruciating examples of officialese.