Writing Skills: Audience, Register & Formal Language
... you will need to use formal language. To choose when, think about your subject, and your audience. To show whether your language is formal or informal, consider the following: • Choice of vocabulary • Grammar *Formal language will often use more formal structures. For instance, it is important to use complete sentences Formal language means that one does not use contractions. No contractions Formal language also means that the second person pronoun is not used Don’t use “you” *Formal language uses more formal sentence structure. Informal writing often uses compound sentences—clauses joined together with”and,” “but” or “or,” like this: This is our new car and we are very pleased with it but we think there may be a small problem with the radio and we’ll have to get it checked. Formal writing often uses complex sentences, like this: Although the car is new, there seems to be a problem with it. The radio, which is proving unreliable, n...