The Authorial Intent

1. You’re the author – what were your intentions? The Authorial Intent

2. What an Authorial Intent isn’t • A dot point outline of unrelated, random thoughts loosely connected to your writing • A plan for your Context response • A summary or description of your Context response • An informal, casually written discussion or reflection on what you wrote • A vague, thrown together, last minute piece of writing

3. What an Authorial Intent is • A sophisticated, formally written, coherent piece of writing that articulates the reasoning behind the choices/decisions you made as the author of your Context piece • Supports your Context response It should answer the question: How did you go about putting together an effective piece of writing?

4. What is an effective piece of writing? • A piece which combines FORM and LANGUAGE to best achieve the PURPOSE with the intended AUDIENCE • Your Authorial Intent should make it clear how you decided to do this

5. FLAP+CT • Form • Language • Audience • Purpose • Links to Context (i.e. the Prompt) • Links to specific elements of theText

6. Form • You should not only mention what form you chose (and why), but also the genre • Genre: persuasive, creative or expository • Forms: essay, narrative, script, article, speech, letter to the editor... • Forms have different conventions – e.g. essays use formal language, narratives use descriptive elements and so on – you should show that you understand these conventions in your Authorial Intention • It is imperative that you state WHY you chose the form you did – explain how it helped you achieve your purpose

7. Language • As an author, you should be conscious (thinking about) why you are making particular linguistic and structural choices: • To symbolise an idea? • To make the readers feel empathy? • To add a persuasive effect? • To instil an image in the readers’ minds? • To make the readers laugh? • To make a link with the author’s style of writing? • Also talk about the way you structured your piece (if this is significant) – tense, perspective, paragraphing, dialogue, linear/nonlinear...and so on • Think of this as doing a mini-language analysis on yourself – keeping your chosen audience and purpose in mind – language creates a link between audience and purpose (i.e. what were the intended effects of the choices you made?)

8. Language (continued) • Expository: • What you did to keep the reader interested? • What you did to make the explanation clear? • Why you used the examples you used? • Why you used the evidence you used? • Argumentative: • What persuasive techniques did you use and why? • How did you develop your argument? • Creative: • How did you create setting, narrative voice, use symbols, metaphor, structure, tense, point of view, imagery, dialogue and so on...

9. Language (continued) • You MUST discuss TONE – the ‘mood’ of the piece • Why have you chosen that tone? – what effect were you seeking? • How did you go about establishing this tone and maintaining it throughout your piece? • Tone doesn’t just happen – you need to be in control of it

10. Audience • Having a clear sense of who you are writing to (a particular, specified, well-defined audience), will shape what you write and how you write it (so that it is appropriate for your audience) • An audience is NOT: • People aged ___ to ___ (or just ‘teenagers’) • People who enjoy reading • People who have experienced conflict • The teacher • Australians • People who are interested in the issue • The audience needs to link to your purpose and language • Talk about audience in terms of their values, attitudes or feelings – rather than age, class or gender – be specific about this

11. Purpose • What are you trying to achieve in this piece of writing for your readers? • How did you keep your piece focused on achieving this prompt? • Generally three categories of purpose: • To inform (expository) • To persuade (argumentative) • To entertain (creative) • But there can be others or a combination • Try to have an overall moral/lesson in your piece – what is it important for people to learn/remember/take away from your piece of writing? • Link your purpose to your audience and discuss how your choices regarding form and language help you to achieve your purpose

12. Explaining ‘why’ • It can be difficult to explain why you have made particular choices as an author – especially because these reasons must be meaningful and thoughtful • Reasons are NOT: • Because it was easier • Because I think I’m good at it • Because I thought it would be the best way to reach the audience • Because I thought it would be more interesting • Because I couldn’t think of anything else • Because the alternatives were too hard • Because I had to • Because I like writing this way • Reasons must be directly linked to your audience and purpose • Make yourself sound professional and intelligent – don’t give me reasons that make you sound lazy! You must show passion, commitment and also convince me that you have something worthy to say

13. Links to Context (the prompt) • Explain how you explored the prompt in depth in your piece – be obvious and specific in explaining these links, especially if you wrote in a creative way as the links you made to the prompt might be quite subtle • Did you explore more than one interpretation of the prompt? Did you explore how it might relate to people/characters in different circumstances? What original, new insights did you come up with? What was the overall moral/lesson of your piece about the prompt?

14. Links to the Text (optional – outside examples as well) • Which specific examples did you draw on? Why did you choose these characters/events? What was it about them that revealed ideas about the prompt and helped you achieve your purpose? • Outside examples – how did they add to your ideas and discussion? • DO NOT just re-write Najaf’s story but call him something different – this is not a clever link • For creative writing in particular: Did you draw on the author’s writing style? How? Or did you deliberately try something different to gain a new insight into the characters? What similar themes/images/ideas are there between your response and the text?

15. Some tips • Authentic, meaningful, powerful – believable! • Use a sophisticated, formal, academic tone in your AI • You CAN say ‘I, me, my’ in this – as in ‘I chose to....because I...’ • Be conscious of your choices as an author as you write – don’t try to make up fake reasons later • Have a specific AUDIENCE and PURPOSE in mind before you begin writing – it’s really hard to make these up after you’ve written your response • Choose an audience that you know and understand – this might mean doing some research • 600 words (handwritten) – it’s a lot to say in a short amount of space, so don’t waffle or repeat yourself • Look at samples! (see booklet or ask me)