Half Term Homework Text I Exam Question

Language and Power Exam Question

How is power asserted through language?
The first type of that this text asserts power, is the occupation of the person speaking. As this is a school talking to their new year sevens, the headteacher will address them. This means that the headteacher has instrumental power because this is held by individuals or groups that enforce authority.

The second way that the headteacher asserts her power is through the concept on Brown and Levinson's politeness theory. As the headteacher is trying to make a good impression on her new students, she is trying to come across as nice approachable person. The headteacher does this by using a positive face by using phrases such as “we are delighted at that because that means we can retain our quality staff increase our resources further to provide the very best education and experience for your son or daughter”. The phrase “provide the very best education and experience for your son or daughter”,shows us that the headteacher has used positive words such as “best” to try to persuade the parents and students that this is the best choice for them.

The headteacher also uses all of Grice's maxims. Grice's maxim of quantity is used when the headteacher says “it's all about making sure they're happy here and er feel safe and secure”. This shows us that this is one of the main points that the headteacher would like to get across to those in the presentation. This is also a persuasive technique as these two things are reassuring to new students' parents. Grice's maxim of quality is used when the headteacher says “two hundred and eighty five people applied to as their first choice”. This shows us that the headteacher is giving us approximate figures to how many students applied which once again is also persuasive as no student would want to reapply for another school. Grice's maxim of relevance is used when the headteacher says “we're all about students making the progression from key stage two to key stage four”. This shows us that the headteacher is keeping to the relevant topics that need to be discussed at this presentation and is not going off topic just to fill time. Grice's maxim of manner is used when the headteacher says “ I'd like to welcome you all this evening”. This shows us that the headteacher is being polite and is avoiding using obscurity and ambiguity in order to give a good first impression to the people arriving at the presentation.

Half Term Homework

Task 1
The Theories:
Brown and Levinson's Face Theory-Politeness theory is the theory that accounts for the redressing of the affronts to face posed by face-threatening acts to addressees. These include positive and negative faces and face threatening acts (FTA).
Grice's Maxims-This looks at the principles that are used during conversation to keep the conversation from ending or going off topic. These maxims include the maxim of quality, whatever is said is seen to be accurate, maxim of quantity, whatever is said is not too informative, maxim of relation, whatever is said is relevant to the conversation and the maxim of manner, whatever is said avoids obscurity of expression.
Task 2
The Newsroom Analysis:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16K6m3Ua2nw
The Newsroom Analysis begins with agenda setting. Will, one of the candidate leaders, sets the agenda as he has complete control of the debate right from the very start. For framing the student who initially asks the question opens the discourse while Will closes the discourse after his rant. For turn taking, Will has the most turns and also has the longest turn as his turn lasts around a minute and a half. For interruptions, Will interrupts the opposing candidate to continue his rant about America. For politeness, there is none as Will uses an FTA within his rant and is moaning about society as a whole. Will's only hesitation is when he has reached the climax of his rant and is becoming more reflective about America's society. One of Will's prosidic  features that he uses is that he shouts the word "Belgium" when destroying his opponents opinion in America, and he uses all of Grice's maxims apart from manner.

For lexis he uses taboo language when swearing, factual support when he is ranting about America and he uses Unity and bonding when he says "we stood up for what we believed in".

For syntax Will uses lots of juxtaposition by contrasting his opinion of America to those of the opposing candidates, and he uses lots of rhetorical questions because he wants to be more persuasive and he knows that deep down the other candidates and the students may agree with him on some points.

For pragmatics Will uses assertion as his opinion is backed up by facts and statistics.

Task 3
Class Notes on Language and Power:
Two types of power Instrumental and Influential
Instrumental-When it is used by individuals or groups to maintain and enforce authority
Influential- When it is used to influence and persuade others.

Three types of power political, personal and social group
Examples
Political-Held by politicians, the police and those working in law courts
Personal-Those who hold a position of power as a result of their occupation or role such as teachers
Social Group-Those who hold power as a result of social variables such as class, gender and age. Typically (but not exclusively) white, middle-class men hold positions of power.

What does it mean to be powerful?
Respect
Assertive-to be "in charge"
Authority
Encouragement
Knowledge
Being a role model
Confidence
Leadership
Intimidating (in some cases)
Responsibility
Narcissism(in some cases)
Being decisive
Depending on context age, class and gender

Interviews
The interviewer has instrumental power
The interviewee has influential power
Expected to use formal language and lexis
Complete unfamiliarity in terms of discourse
Put on the spot
Use Maxim of manner, relevance
We project or try to project confidence in our body language-maintain eye contact
We try to control the way we speak (volume/tone/etc.)
Interviewer uses interrogative
We use declarative and model verbs
They have the power to give us the
-Assertive
-Decisive
-Higher position of power

TED Talk Analysis

Could your language affect your ability save money?
In this TED Talk,Keith Chen, an Asian American economist, talks about whether or not the language you speak has an effect on how much money you save in any given year. Keith Chen goes on to talk about future language speaking countries and those who do not use a future tense in their language.His findings show that the country with the highest GDP in the world is Luxembourg and the one with the lowest is Greece with the UK and USA the next two lowest.

With this information, he has worked out that countries without a future less language are more likely to save more money as a separate household. Luxembourg,who don't use a future tense saved around 45% on their GDP than Greece who barely managed 15%. However, although countries without a future tense save more on their GDP, those who do use it are 25% more likely to have saved more money over a life time.

My opinions on this TED Talk are positive ones as I found this particular video very interesting as it uses common knowledge about the GDP of countries around the world and puts an unusual hypothesis on the topic saying that certain language structures do effect how much money you will save in any given year. I defintely recommend watching this TED Talk.

Creative Writing Short Story:Cup Final Day

It was Friday evening, I was in my bedroom preparing for the big match the following day. It would be Broadwalk verses Whitchurch at Ironmould Lane a 1:00pm kick off. I would be playing for Broadwalk who had already wrapped up the league two weeks earlier.

The double was on!

Today was the day, the day where we would find out how good we really are. We had been tested on this cup run. A vital, yet thrilling win in the previous round against Warmley the euphria of that game was huge but now its back to reality for the biggest game of the season.

Kick off was imminent!

The shrill peep of the whistle rang around the ground, the red of Broadwalk in the left stand and the white of Whitchurch opposite. These teams, these two wonderful teams had great respect for each other or so I thought. This game made me realize that the rivalry was bigger than I'd expected. We went 1-0 up and the game heated up the tackles were getting harder and the pace quickening and then...they levelled.

Help me I thought as I wanted to leave the field of play even though we went 2-1 up, help me I don't want to be part of this but then again I did. It doesn't make sense how my mind said leave but my gut said play on and play well. After the second goal the game was a bit of a blur with a yellow card and six more goals as we won 6-2.

The game had been won!

The game had been won yes but the supposed war had only begun as we would meet again when we were promoted, only it was the same name but a different team a new challenge to embark on and one that we would be certain that we would win not only for ourselves but our devoted fans who were really just the parents.

The happiest day since playing at Broadwalk!

Coursework Style Models and ideas taken from them

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/manchester-united/11142345/Angel-Di-Maria-is-the-shining-light-of-new-look-Manchester-United-and-could-make-them-box-office-again.html

This link will take you to a football article on Manchester United new signing Angel Di Maria and how his impact could see them win silverware once again.

The main ideas that I am taking for my own coursework is the way this article outlines certain comments made by either the players or the managers. They have outlined these comments as they feel that these are very important to the article's reader. I will also use the way that it is set out , because they are set out in paragraphs it is easier to read that if it were a big long block of text. I may also decide to write a newspaper article for an online paper rather than an ordinary broadsheet.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travel-writing-competition/11135070/Just-Back-Chicken-run-Derbyshire.html

This link will take you to a travel writing competition on the telegraph website. This piece of travel writing was that particular weeks winner.

The idea that I am going to use if the fact that this piece of travel writing isn't about a glorious holiday to the Caribbean but just a normal village. I will take this idea an write about my trip to Llanelli, Wales to see the newest family member, which is my cousins baby son. I will set this out in paragraphs as it will be easier to read than a large text block and I will integrate lots of imagery to get across what Llanelli looked like while visiting their during a Thursday in the summer.

The Jesus Statue-by Calum Rogers

Geoffrey is sat in the church. He is alone, but the ominous statue of Jesus Christ behind the altar seems as if another person is there with him. He is sat in one of the pews on the left hand side, but near the middle of the section. He is in deep contemplation about the events that have happened while holding rosary beads.

Geoffrey: I never thought for a moment that Susan would have had so many issues to deal with. I know that life can be harsh but I never thought it would have effected her, not at all. She was strong y'know? Like many young wives but this caught me by surprise. I had my suspicions that something wasn't quite right but like Jesus said never pick out others flaws if you have a bigger flaw yourself, so I turned a blind eye, as a matter of fact I convinced myself that it would sort it self out...I knew I should have stepped in to help her. It was the same Susan that I had married all those years ago, but... something was a miss, a shell, a empty lifeless shell of a soul that has been corrupted by drink and sexual urges. It was something that caught me by surprise but once I caught on did not surprise me at all.

[Running the Rosary beads through his fingers]

I wanted to help her, I should of helped her. If someone close to your heart, who you have complete and utter love and passion for is in desperate need of help, well its obvious isn't it, you're going to want to help them... aren't you? Only in my case it was different I couldn't just step in and help because I hadn't caught onto it yet. What was I supposed to do? Confront my wife and say are you an alcoholic? Accuse her of improving her relations with a dashing Indian man? No, I’m better than that I won't go around forcing the truth out of others, it's not who I am. To be perfectly honest I knew something was up when see kept leaving early from my sermon's. I knew she'd heard them all before but it was constant for the last few months and now I know why she was leaving.

[Geoffrey, who has now moved to the church confessional box. Although nobody is there listening to him, he moves there for more privacy in case someone were to walk in while he was speaking to the Jesus statue.]

Susan, would always say 'nothing is wrong with me' or 'I've got nothing to hide' but of course she did. Going to a shop in Leeds for liquor and intercourse which is absolutely ridiculous. I mean I can understand the liquor but she didn't have to go behind my back that was what hurt the most, when you trust someone and they go behind your word y'know? As a matter of fact I didn't know how I managed to sum up the courage and the strength to forgive her and her Indian lover. Violence was not the answer so I prayed for them...three days worth of quiet contemplation and asking God to forgive there sins. Although Susan would always say 'don't pray for me as I'm not worth it'...but I love her despite her flaws and I want her sins to be forgiven. As for the Indian man well,although I was hurt I wanted him to know someone is looking out for him even if it is his lovers husband...and I hope that God can see my view on the matter.

[Leaving the confessional box and the church, Geoffrey turns to the Jesus statue and looks at the calm expression on his face. Just before leaving he says a short prayer...]

Dear Jesus, please find it in your heart to forgive Susan's and her lovers sins as they have gone against mine and your word. Give them the strength to confront their problems and help them progress in life as better people, Amen.

[Geoffrey says this prayer and drops the rosary beads on the aisle and as he is leaving the church all you can hear is complete stillness and the quiet sobs of the vicar himself.]

A Bed Among The Lentils Analysis

The opening stage directions suggest that Susan is in a pretty bad condition. A vicar’s wife Susan is described as “thin”; this could suggest that years of abuse towards herself from drinking could have made her ill. The opening stage directions also describe Susan as “nervous”. Again, probably due to her alcoholism see seems to be constantly on edge at being found out whilst describing her true emotions in her monologue. The last bit of information that the opening stage directions give us, is “probably smokes”. This is something that tends to be incorporated into an alcoholic’s life, as many deem that an alcoholic also smokes which give a visual image of the complete look of a troubled person.

The language that Susan uses reveals a lot about her age, social class and attitudes. Her attitudes towards Geoffrey’s sermons are one that seems to not care about. For example she describes the sermon on sex as “marriage gives the OK to sex is the gist of it”. The key part of the phrase is “gist of it”. This shows us Susan has very little or no interest in her husband’s sermons as she either doesn't like or have heard them before.  The phrase “keeps a bottle of cough mixture in his cupboard in case any of the choirboys get chesty”; suggests that she is older than many people think. This is because of the keyword of “choirboys”. Nowadays, there are many girls in church choirs but because it’s only boys it would suggest that women are not on an equal oath like the men in that time. Susan’s social class is also one that can be picked out. Although the vicar’s wife; who is regarded as very important but second only to the vicar, her social class is quite far down. Susan is not upper class or lower class but because of the alcoholism and her affair with Mr Ramesh,  she is considered a lower class person or a lowlife because she can’t be trusted with herself.

 The only bit of sadness that really can be heard in her voice is, on page 41 paragraph 2 on the transcript. Susan’s voice changes slightly to as if she is going to cry about Mr Ramesh leaving.  The phrase “I went down there on Sunday”, tells us that she really misses Mr Ramesh because even though he has packed up and moved to Preston she still can’t keep herself away from the shop where she met him. The other bit of sadness that is conveyed is her sarcastic response of “terrific”. Although it doesn’t seem as if Susan is sad the way she responded to her husband saying “that drunken flower arranger was my wife”, suggests that Susan would have rather not wanted her husband to do a sermon about her in front of everybody she knew in a place of holy worship.

All of the examples used, are not the most obvious ones to describe but they all link into each other. Susan’s attitudes suggest that she doesn't care, which is true but we see her care a little bit when Mr Ramesh has moved to Preston and when her husband, Geoffrey is conducting a sermon about her to those that she knows. Complied with her appearance in the opening stage directions this gives a visual image of a typical person with many problems in their life.