Context. The key to unraveling and anticipating readership is to take context into consideration. A writer should approach their subject matter, professional, fictional, story or research with an idea of how this information will be used and assimilated in the reader’s mind. Questions to ask yourself:

For writers working on personal storytelling:
Who will be reading this?
Are there parts of this story that seem to personal to share?
How can I convey my emotional experiences and responses through my story to my reader?
What are the mundane details that I have left out?
Are these details important to understanding my story?
If publishing, will I remain more true to factual storytelling or to communicating personal perceptions?

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As I was scanning the web for information on the outcome for U.S. Election 2008, I found an interesting headline, featuring an article by Gallup (a noted and reputable source of information obtained by polling and statistical research). The headline read “World Citizens Prefer Obama to McCain by More Than 3-to-1.”
Myself, being one who is ordinarily skeptical of vocabularic misrepresentation, decided to read further. I found the articles actual representation to be slightly more understandable - “among nations representing nearly three-quarters of the world’s population, 24% of citizens say they would personally rather see Obama elected president of the United States, compared with just 7% who say the same about McCain. At the same time, 69% of the world citizens surveyed did not have an opinion.” Sixty nine percent! Now that’s a more likely number in my mind. Beyond this, the article continues to point out that only about a quarter of those polled believe that the outcome of the U.S. Election makes a difference to their country.

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This past summer, I served a historian’s purpose in San Jose, Costa Rica for a team of volunteers working on a restoration project. I captured the adventure of the excursion through blog and photography. With quick and easy access to the internet, daily blogs made simple, friends and family of the team kept up with the progress and intentions of the trip in real time.

One specialized purpose of writing is to communicate in such a way that allows people to participate vicariously through others. In this way, family, friends and communities can all share in travel and experience. Writing for the purpose of capturing and preserving a story is an essential part of preservation. A culture or people’s history becomes a beacon of revelation for the future. It is important to capture moments of expression, emotional reactions, creative discoveries and more. As society moves, change happens. Writers publish stories. Publications record responses. Creative arts express descriptions of societal development. All create connectivity for human kind through barriers of time and space.

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Culture thrives on the expressive interpretation of both ordinary and extraordinary testimony by common people. An important part of cultural preservation happens through storytelling. While storytelling began orally, as materials became available, stories were captured by writers. There are lots of ways to find out how a past culture would preserve stories or information. One of the most common is through archeological excavation.

Through archeology, we learn about philosophies, technologies and language by digging up artifacts. I often wonder what the future would discover when observing the way we tell our stories today. Will technology preserve the millions of blogs and websites that thousands of people turn to for information? What about books? So many years after the invention of the printing press, books are published right and left and I wonder exactly which will be preserved to represent the whole of society.

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Americans are particularly proud of speaking a globally popularized language. Nearly every other country in the world has adopted the English language as a common speech. A writer must be clued into context, though, in order to appropriately use language and effectively communicate understanding. This includes a conscious awareness of not only what is said, or written, but what sort of meaning is contained in words and phrases. Taking a side trip to the world of basic grammar and syntax, remember that words have a commonly understood, or dictionary, meaning. This is called denotation. But words also carry an aspect of significance that represents another meaning, a connotation, or derived meaning.

Understanding the nature of language is vital to writing well. It is simply not enough to look up words in a thesaurus and substitute them in hopes for variance. A simple way to keep language in perspective is by creating a list of words that are overused. There are many reasons why a writer would use the same word or phrase over and over again. The most common is familiarity. The second most common is limited vocabulary. When making a list of words-not-to-use, keep in mind that using these words isn’t a crime. Using them repeatedly, and especially when other words could be more precise, is detrimental.

Allegory is one excellent way to preserve truth in a relative format. Storytelling appeals to everyone. The lure of an allegory is in expressive language and colorful imagery. Using words to paint a picture in the mind is the sign of a true creative. Using that imagery to express an idea is pure genius. Spirituality has offered an abundance of material for allegorical expression. Authors such as Calvin Miller, C.S. Lewis and John Bunyan wrote creatively to express a spiritual journey. Allegory is not exclusive to one faith or religious movement. Many authors seek to communicate an effective truth using the appeal of storytelling.

Stories of the hero or warrior have circulated in many parts of the world, many reflecting a significant journey of faith and belief in the supernatural. American culture presents a sort of spiritual journey in comic book mythology. Many superheroes have embarked on a journey of self discovery, pertaining to a human element within them. The stories of such journeys serve as an access point to relation for humanity. It is through storytelling that the reader engages with a character and finds themselves in a place of empathetic response. It is as if the reader participates in a journey they would otherwise never experience and comes to learn the lesson of the character.

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It occurs to me that considering perception is the most important thing to remember in communication. It has been said that in a conversation between two people, one must never assume to be fully understood, nor to fully understand. In writing, this is a most distinct responsibility. It is a one way conversation in which the author must become responsible for managing misunderstanding. In the world of writing, the most broadly defined consideration for this idea is capture in two words: target audience. In coaching writers, a prerequisite topic of discussion is that of perception. How is your story presented? How will it be perceived? How should the author communicate presuppositions? These questions pound rhythmically in the mind of an editor. They can be learned by anyone.

As a person of faith and a professional editor, I meet many people who want to publish their faith experience. There is a great responsibility that comes with a testimony. That is to share it both freely and with discernment. Consider perception when crafting statements of purpose and communication. In the area of faith, perception presumes a more distinct role in communication. The process of human spirituality and divine authority is unique to individual ideals and cultural realities. While many belief systems default to one authority, it is truly a mystery when millions of people yield to a single interpretation. After all, any divine purpose laid in the hands of humanity is sure to cross a source of contention. And isn’t that a wonderful reason to write from a faith biased perspective; in order to share through the lens of unique human perception, spirituality.

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