12Q and 12X Written Language and Power Homework from Mrs Williams

Use the work we have done on the exam notice as a guide and write an analysis of this text.

Remember the targets you set yourselves for AO2 and AO3, and when you have finished your analysis, comment on what you have done to address these targets.

Your analysis should be no more than 500 words and should be attached to your blog by Wednesday 4th December.

Any questions - ask!

12Q - Language and Power Homework - Mr Skirrow's Example

 

For your homework, I'd like you to embed a YouTube video onto your blog featuring two characters/speakers who have an asymmetrical power relationship - these should be on your blogs for Wednesday 27th November. There's a button in the 'Post' section of your blog that allows you to insert a video from YouTube! Here, I've gone with the climax of The Empire Strikes Back (apologies for spoiler alerts...) and I've produced three paragraphs on the language and power in this text. (BE CAREFUL TO ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOUR TEXT IS REPRESENTED)


Star Wars - The Empire Strikes Back

In this scene, Darth Vader is battling Luke Skywalker and trying to convince him to join the Empire rather than continue to side with the rebels.

Darth Vader's firm use of declaratives in the scene help him to assert power over Luke - firm statements like "you are beaten" and "it is useless to resist" with their indisputable nature give him power over Luke at this moment. As this is a represented speech, perhaps the screenwriter gave Darth Vader these lines to help him appear more forceful - the use of "beaten" and "useless" help to portray him as confident and arrogant to the film audience.

When Darth Vader is trying to convince Luke to join him, he presents this as an ultimatum, with the line "Join me and I will complete your training" - the use of the strong modal verb "will" here shows the certainty of what Vader's proposing happening, and his use of the first person plural pronoun "we" helps to convince Luke that they are already a team. Having injured Luke gives Vader power here, and he offers his hand as a way of convincing Luke, who appears to be in an impossible scenario.

Finally, Darth Vader's use of imperatives at the end of the extract are also an attempt to exert  power over Luke with "Search your feelings" commanding Luke to follow Vader's instructions. The screenwriter here again presents Vader as a commanding and confident presence, who ignores Luke's attempts to gain power through declaratives and instead continues to give orders to Luke.

Categorising Texts #1

The following text is taken from a National Trust leaflet entitled '50 things to do before you're 11 3/4'.

Your challenge is to find two other texts that could form a group with this text - upload the texts to your blog, along with an explanation of the linguistic reasons for your choices. You've already done some work on different approaches to categorising texts in this way - this could be done by audience, purpose, graphology features, type of text etc.

We've also made an example of what this might look like on our model blog here in case you're not sure what we're asking for here!

We'd like to see responses on your blog by Monday October 14th. Please get in touch or ask your teacher if you're not sure of what to do or where to start.

Good hunting!

AS English Language Holiday Homework

 

We’d like you to use your Language Blog to create a virtual scrapbook of language in action.

 

You need to collect a series of varied and interesting examples of language in the daily world and upload them to your blog. See our example blog for the different ways you could approach this!

 

You must annotate each text you include. Use these questions to help you.

•      Who is the audience in terms of gender, age and interests? How does that influence the text?

•      What are the purpose(s)? E.g. To persuade, inform, entertain, instruct. How does that influence how the text is written?

•      What is the format? Layout? How have images been used?

•      What aspects of language stand out to you?  How does this text achieve its purpose? You might look at things like: use of verbs, complex sentences, use of adjectives, slogans, persuasive techniques, pronouns.

 

You also need to make sure that at least one of your texts is SPOKEN in nature. E.g. a transcript of a short conversation, a text message which does not fit expectations for standard written English – this could be an excerpt from a script, a link to a YouTube video with your thoughts written up on the blog, or an example of your own transcription.

 

 

You should also comment on one of these questions for each of your texts:

•      How has technology influenced this text?

•      Has the gender of the audience or producer influence the text?

•      How does this text or speaker exert power?

 

We also want you to comment on other blogs!

Using our page ‘Links to Student Blogs’, we’d like you to make FIVE COMMENTS on the texts that other people have uploaded. Perhaps you’ve seen a language feature in their text that’s worth highlighting, or you’d like to comment further on how their text appeals to their audience. Get commenting!

 

Minimum 15 texts with detailed annotations – use your imagination and collect real data (or language!) from the world around you.

 

This should be uploaded onto your blog as a series of posts before your first lesson in September.

Categorising: Example Task

Below you can find the first text that I'd like you to categorise. You will need to find TWO other texts that could connect with this in a particular way, and write a blog post explaining your choices. Try to give linguistic reasons where possible.

Happy Categorising!

Text A
The following text is a resignation letter submitted to Burger King by one of its employees.

Remember: there are many ways to group texts together. You might consider audience, purpose or a specific language feature to get you started.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Gordano English Language blog! We're really hopeful that this will be a useful resource for pointing at interesting Language articles and resources to support you as English Language students, as well as being the place where we'll publish the Categorising Texts homeworks throughout the year.

Welcome aboard!