James Kinneavy’s Aims of Discourse

James makes an outline for different types of writing. He starts off with three main categories situated in a triangle which are decoder, encoder, and reality. In the middle of this triangle is the word, style which encompasses all different types of writing such as: short story, novel, lyric, ballad, drama, and movie. This is saying that decoder, encoder, and reality can all be put in these different types of forms. Decoder being to make something of code into something interpretable. Encoder is then converting a message into code. Reality is something put in front of you that just is straight forward and makes complete sense. For example, a decoder piece of work may be Shakespeare, taking something that we don't clearly understand word for word and breaking it down in to what makes sense for us. An encoder piece would be taking a work that you write and creating a way of demonstrating this information without being clearly straight forward, one can do this through a poem, leaving the interpretation up to the reader. The third, reality would then be a book like Twilight that really anyone can read and where interpretation is not needed at all. He then goes to breaking down these three general categories down. He breaks encoder down to individual and social; which would then be putting a message into code for oneself or for other people around. He only gives one category for decoder which is persuasive since when you break something down it is persuaded from the symbolism that person intended to the symbolism you see in that work of writing. He breaks reality into three categories: exploratory, scientific, and informative. All these are not left up to interpretation. When you explore something you clearly write out what it is you see, science is very straight forward and never left up to interpretation, it is giving facts and what is found within research, and finally informative is being completely straight forward and saying something so clearly to an avoidance so as to give clear information. The chart that is laid out by James makes complete sense to me and I am able to clearly decipher it and clearly understand what he is trying to convey, especially in the form of a chart which is very clear, you could say the category of reality. But, I do think there are many other categories besides the three points on the triangle where you could display your writing in different styles.