Paper 1 - Textual analysis (SL) [Correction]

The text is an article published in The observer. Located in a contemporary context where the idea of a globalized world is present in all forms. With this context in mind the author states a clear criticism towards British people and their “failure to speak foreign languages”, as is written in the title article; with this is clear that the authors intended audience, more than being just the “The Observer” readers is addressing British people.

The text starts with an introduction, in short words is a context to what the text is going to be about an relate with. This present a starting point to the reader and writer, because in the title the writer makes use of the possessive adjective “our”, with this he is creating a common relationship, directly related with a sense of belonging, with the audience, they are British; therefore part of the same group.

This idea of being part of the same group gives the author the opportunity to criticize their “failure to speak foreign languages”, more over he is using the ideas of “shame” and “It's not civilised”, these words convey a powerful meaning to the audience, because it's appealing to their emotions, and more to their sense of belonging to the British community, this is also referring to the fact hat England is well known for being an old but refined and cult country, so being “not civilised” make an impact to the reader.

The second paragraph, as well as the title, is make an allusion to this civilised (“gentleman” Stereotype of British people) aspect of them, by saying “what greater disrespect can there be than no speaking to others in their languages?... How can you hope to understand others while requiring them to speak to you in their English” a powerful criticism is made, because they don't speak other languages the author is implying that the others that speak their language (English) are more respectful and civilised than they are.

The next paragraph and the fifth one make a direct reference to picture presented in the text, because it talks about the “loss of possibility” when you don't know languages. In the picture the fish in the little bowl would be the British or the people that only know one language, while the others (on the big tank) are different species of fish coexisting together making an allusion to the idea that you can mix and get more of other group of individuals if you know more languages. In the text this is presented as “you are not making enough of your individual potential if you allow yourself to be enclosed by one language”, again, the writer is making a critic, now more in an inner personal level, to just staying in one language.

In sixth paragraph the author uses logos to add credibility to his argumentation as well as irony. It says that English as a first language is only spoken by 7% of the world while 75% don't speak English. These numbers, as they are presented make an impact on the reader. The 7% (instead of 93%) is used to make first language English users feel insignificant in comparison to the rest of the world, the same is true for the 75%. With this the author is trying to create consciousness about the limitations of staying, only, with the English language.

Last but not least in the text the text the first lines of the seventh paragraph, are making an allusion to the historical importance of language, since it is one “of the oldest, deepest, uncanniest, most thoughtful human inventions”, with this the criticism the author is making gets empower, because avoiding learning languages would be avoiding one of the most basic human inventions.

As it could be seen this article shows a vivid criticism to the lack of interest and failure to speak foreign languages, making an allusion to the “not civilised” and ”not gentleman” ideas. Is important to discuss this topics of learning languages, because now days is a very important an essential way to communicate with each other, specially in our globalize XXI century society.

Written task assesment Carlos Jimenez Work

Criterion A - Rationale - (-/2)

No rationale.

Criterion B – Task and content - (6/8)

It shows understanding of the course topics, how stereotypes are shown and make good and coherent. The text follows, almost, all the blog-text type characteristics; except of using another social media like twitter or faceboook or youtube, that are usually used by bloggers (or any know person over the Internet). The last thing to mention is that the mention of two examples made the analysis weaker, it would be better to do only one example but going in more details of the stereotypes presented and their effects on the persons, children and adults.

Criterion C – Organization – (4/5)

The text is coherent and it follows a typical organization of any written text, the “problem” is the lack of analysis with the examples, as mention abvoe, the pee structure is not so clear in some cases;For example, in Cinderella example about evil stepmother it goes from (sort of example to) point to example to, kind of another example, to the explanation, and in relation with Criterion B it lacks a bit of analysis.

Criterion D – Language and style - (3/5)

The style of the text is in coherent with the idea of a blog, it refer to the reader and previous post. With the language there are some grammatical/typing mistakes, like “ayes” or “For example p,”.

"Atonement" questions in reading session chapters 11-12

1) How would the book be different if Briony were a boy (and later a man) rather than a girl(and later woman)?

The book would be totally different, because the main conflict, or better said what created the main conflict for Robbie was created because Briony saw the letter that he wrote to Briony sister, Cecilia, in that letter (by mistake) it was written the word “cunt”, that made an impact on Briony that cause that she found Robbie as a sex maniac, with that Robbie's destiny and the hole story development started. So if Briony were a boy “she” wouldn't care about that it would be like “cool” or something like that, or maybe “she” wouldn't care a about the letter and wouldn't see it, such as she did.

2) Is Atonment a war novel? Why or not?

Atonement is not a war novel, because the conflict is not about the war, just the context of the book is during the war, this can be easily seen on the consequences on the conflict, related with the meaning of the war for the conflict and novel.

The consequences of the conflict are the following, the novel it self is a representation of how just saying one wrong thing you can modify reality, and destroy and change the whole life of a person; in this case Cecilia, Briony and, most of all,Robbie; this last one is the one who suffer the most, he was send to war; so the war is depicting how mess up and the level of destruction in Robbie's life.

That's way Atonment is not a war novel, at all.

3) Ian McEwan has sometimes been nicknamed Ian Macabre - macabre, meaning horrifying, disturbing, or weird. McEwan dislikes the nickname – but are there parts of Atonement that are macabre? What are they, and do you think they're necessary to the novel?

I do think they are parts that are macabre in the novel Atonement, for example I can mention the part where Lola is assaulted (and later she marries the guy that did that to her), the tragic destiny of Robbie and Cecilia, their deaths and Brionys, apparently loneliness, future (how she is going to die).

I think they are necessary for the novel if we have in mind the main idea, and story, of the novel that, I think, is that there are things you can make and have terrible consequences; if we consider this novel, a sort of modern tragedy they absolutely necessary.

4) Attonement shows you the world from many different characters' point of view. How would the novel be different if it was all from Cecilia's perspective? Robbie's? Briony's? Lola's?

The novel would've absolutely different if it was only from one character, because the real and important point of the novel is how perspective change and how the consequences of our acts affect us, so if we would see it form Cecilia's perspective we wouldn't know what actually happen with Lola and we would never know this almost ironic/tragic destiny of Briony, and moreover why she said that Robbie assaulted Lola, when he didn't. For Robbie's point of view would be exactly the same, with the exception that Cecilia death and destiny would be unknown for us. For Briony's part we would actually see a distorted vision of reality, as it can be seen in different in different parts of the first part in the novel, she actually creates more than what she sees. And last if it's only Lola's side we would see how actually attacked her and we would never know why she actually lie and said that Robbie did the assault to Lola, and what at least for me would be a “good thing” we would only see the mind of a shocked girl and how, probably, modify her memories of what happen and created a sort of complex towards the aggressor (the reason of why she married him)[those things are just suppositions about what happen to Lola in relation of my psychological knowledges].

Atonment - Discussion Questions

3) Why does Briony denounce Robbie so forcefully and maintain that position with such determination?

Briony denounces Robbie so forcefully because she thought he was a thread for society, in a sexual way, because she read the letter that Robbie wrote to Cecilia, in wich the word "cunt" was written, that's way she thiugt he was a sexual maniac, and when she saw that someone attacked Lola (even though she saw who really attacked) she inmideatly thought, and made false memories, of what she saw.


8)Did the ending surprise you? In what ways?

It did surprise me because I never tjought that the novel we were reading was actually, almost, astory within a story, the story of Briony Tallis (the main character) that she herself wrote. Also I found this, almost, plot twist prettey interrsting, is the first time I've read a book were the story is about a story the main character wrote, I think it's a cool concept (and very difficult to predict).

Written task assesment sample

• Criterion A - Rationale (2/2)

The work word count is between the words limit. It, clearly, show that the work had a thought process;eg. It present an intended audience, source of publication. As well the overall purpose on the intended audience is presented. In relation of the formal aspect a justify paragraph is not presented, not deduction of points though.

• Criterion B - Task and content (5/8)

In relation of the text content itself there are clues of knowledge related with the part 1 of the course, and furthermore of other parts of the course there are mentions of language and mass media, in the Coca Cola and Pepsi campaigns examples. There is an attempt of reaching to one conclusion of how language works, it show some ideas related with the constant change in language. There is an opinion present in both indirect and direct way, this last one is a mistake, because on of the characteristics of the editorial, by excellence, is to not present and "I..." statement, because is the opinion of a newspaper, not of an individual. The last thing to reference is that the text makes reference to another texts and works, that, in it's principle, is not a bad thing,by the contrary is a good option to prove a point and persuade the reader, but the mistake in this case is that it mention another newspaper and news networks. It's very rare, for not saying impossible, that one of the networks mentions another for articles and news that they present to prove a point they are trying to make (it's a business after all).

• Criterion C – Organization (4/5)

In an overall the organization is pretty good, its coherent and make sense. It follows the editorial structure well (except of what is mention on Criterion B). The major mistake is in the starting ideas of paragraphs 5 and 6, they start with a question this brakes, a little bit, the sense of coherence; they are related with the topic, but are planted out of nowhere.

• Criterion D – Language and style (5/5)

It present an appropriate language to the nature of the selected text, as well it does not present a complex language; the most complex terms are explain, and it's in a formal way, this in coherence with the idea of an editorial, the opinion of the newspaper. As well there is presence of sophisticated language , such as “jargon” or “English-biased”, this goes in hand with the intended audience, a highly literate reader.

Rationale Written task

Rationale:

I wrote about why men and women talk and act in different ways, relating it with the role that stereotypes play on both of them. I chose this topic because it is related with one of the units in the course: Language and Gender, another reason for selecting this subject is that I'm motivated by everything that is related with gender and / or stereotypes

My target audience are teenagers, because they are the ones that are shaping there identity; they need to be in knowledge of the role that stereotypes play on them, also since they are the future of the world they need to know and be conscious about the effects of stereotypes in gender identity and language so, in the future, they can change that effect and the generations that are coming con grow “free”, with out the limitation of stereotypes in there lives.

Because the intended audience are teenagers I wrote this text as a blog, I think that, since they use lot social media is a good way to approach them. Also this type of text allow me to be more personal with them; like when I used “I'll tell you” or “we”, and I think that being more personal (saying “I'm also part of you”) helps the reception to the message, I believe emphasizing with the reader is very crucial and important.

For this work I used a neutral language (I didn't use “internet slang” or complex words) because the whole point of the text is to make the reader reflect and be conscious about how stereotypes affect him, and I believe that texts that are made to make you (as a reader) think need to be dense but simple; because if you don't understand what you are reading you can't think about it.

Educreations Atonement analysis recording

https://www.educreations.com/lesson/view/atonment/34662456/?ref=app