So, what are you to do? As the title of this badge suggests, you should think about the craft of your writing — about the words you select, about the ways in which you design your sentences, about how you address a particular audience — as you consider the many options you have as a writer. When you wordsmith, you rewrite a sentence that doesn’t seem to work in your text to create a rich sense of options. Then, you reflect on those options and consider the kinds of questions provided below:

Wordsmithing is the activity of playing with your writing — trying to express an idea in a new way, reworking a sentence that just doesn’t sit well,  rethinking the words you build your sentences around — while you think about your purpose as a writer. So, wordsmithing means paying careful attention to the craft of your writing while you consider the situation and context that frame the work you are doing. Instead of trying to write the perfect sentence, you try to construct the perfect opening for your reader and purpose. Really, when you engage in wordsmithing, you are working to be rhetorical, to get things done with your writing that in ways that best fit your writing situation. As a result, you will consider the following:

For our purposes, we are using this word to refer to the work writers do as they fine tune and polish their writing. Wordsmithing is similar to proofreading, as most writers embark on this process once they have the content of their text well developed, but it is about more than just striving for correctness.

Just as we make assumptions about people based on appearances, we also do this with the way people use language. Listen to the clips found below. You will hear two different clips of women expressing their views towards styles of language use in the North and in the South.  As you listen, think about what assumptions the individuals are making about style and language, how it used, how it should be used, and the type of people that use language differently from themselves.

One of the most interesting parts of being a language user is that while we all speak a dialect, we all have command of a number of linguistic styles.  As we mentioned before, these styles can range from formal to more informal, and the ability to change these styles, even in the middle of a conversation, is called style shifting or sometimes code switching.  Speaking, though, is no different from writing in this way; we all shift the way that we write to meet the needs and expectations of our audience, just as we do when we are speaking. You may not remember learning different styles of speaking but may be more aware of the different styles of writing that you use.  You most likely acquired your various speaking styles from observing your family, friends, and teachers as you were growing up. Perhaps even your parents corrected your style when speaking with older relatives, their friends, or strangers.  You may recall them saying not to say particular words, or to speak louder, or to speak more clearly — all of these requests were requests for you to change your speech style to meet the expectations of your audience.

As a student of composition, you might feel like you are learning a lot about reading and writing. And hopefully you are. But it is important to keep in mind that you came to this class knowing a lot about language. Think of all the contexts you use language in effectively — at home, at school, on the field, at work, in the classroom. The settings you move between can be quite different and demand that you use English in ways that vary greatly. And you probably do this with ease. When you are chatting with coworkers and a regional manager walks in, you shift what you are saying and how you say it. Most of the time, you probably aren’t even aware of what you are doing, but you are shifting your style to fit a given setting, context, and audience. We all do this often unconscious shifting in our speech to meet what we believe to be the expectations of our audience, but we also do this in our writing.  Think about the various styles of writing that you do each day — text messages, Facebook posts, Moodle discussion board responses, academic papers and even to-do lists are just some of the different styles of writing that you are engaged in on a daily basis.  Most likely you do not think about the ways in which you change your writing or speech or the reasons why you change your style for each of these situations; you just do it.