Analysis and Keywords

Task 1

Analysis of Text A corrected in Bluey-grey-greenish (because why not use this colour):

Text A is from Mumsnet and is a forum discussion about school Proms. The purpose of the discussion, initiated by the participant woollyideas, is to seek reassurance from other Mums about her view that school Proms and unnecessary and extreme.  The purpose of the website, Mumsnet is to promote the site and encourage other parents to join. Some affordances of using forums are that an individual can interact with many users, and they are distant from other participants, so they can afford to convey their opinions strongly.   However, some constraints of forums are that the absence of face-to-face conversation means that ideas mean that meanings can be misconstrued, mainly due to the fact that participants cannot use paralinguistic features, emphatic stress and intonation.   The overall representation of school Proms in text A is that they are ridiculous, extreme and unnecessary and Mumsnet is represented as authoritative, useful but also friendly. 

The participant woollyideas uses the stative verb “want” in the interrogative “What sane parent would want to pay an entry fee to go to a “Prom Fair”...?” This represents parents as emotionally involved in and passionate about school Proms which, as it is used within the interrogative shows that the efforts parents go to for their child’s Prom is ridiculous.  The expressing of strong opinions

like these represents Mumsnet as a place for debate. The mode of text A means that woollyideas

is distant from the group of parents whom she is targeting, so she can afford to convey her opinion more strongly without directly offending them. By attacking this group of parents, woollyideas positions herself above them.

Woollyideas goes on to target this group of parents even more later on in the response when she

groups them by using the determiner “these” in the interrogative “Who are these parents who think that this sort of expenditure... is ok?”. In the post, woollyideas  goes from saying “What parent” to “these parents”- in the earlier part of the response; she is being more general and using the singular form, then she later using the plural grouping “these” parents in order to target them more directly, which again puts them in a lower position than herself.  It represents such parents as ridiculous and conveys woollyideas’ disgust at the amount of money they spend.

The participant MuckyCarpet uses the subordinating conjunction “although” in her response:

“Don’t be a grump! Although the helicopter is way OTT!”

At first, she expresses her strong opinion about Proms but makes this more moderate by using the subordinating conjunction to contrast her view. This allows her to conform with the other

participants, perhaps because she wants to avoid starting an argument or causing offence. This

shows that whilst Mumsnet is a place for debate, it is still friendly. The use of the subordinating

conjunction shows that the participant has a balanced viewpoint.

Within the first paragraph of the text explaining the rules of the forum, a complex sentence is used: “Please bear in mind that whilst this topic does canvass opinions, it is not a fight club.” The conjunction  “whilst” is used to introduce the subordinate clause “whilst this topic does canvass opinions”. The fact that this clause is subordinate shows that the offering of opinions is not the most important thing about the forum. “It is not a fight club” is the main clause of the sentence, which shows that the most important thing to the creators of the website is that users stay safe and that the debate is friendly.   This represents Mumsnet as a safe place for debate that welcomes everyone. A constraint of an online message board is that if arguments occur, there is not a person there to mediate as the interaction is not face-to-face. Therefore, the use of sentence structure here almost acts as this mediator.   Furthermore, the positioning of this sentence right at the beginning of the forum makes it clear to participants the conventions of the debate in order to make them think before they post.

Task 2

Martin Joos' five levels of formality

1. Frozen;                                                                                                                                        Set phrases or conventional structures, language that never changes. e.g My father has deceased to join the heavenly choir
2. Formal;                                                                                                                                            Speaker and audience, no usual interruption or interaction, standard english. e.g My father has passed away
3. Consultative Level;                                                                                                                      Where interaction is normal to anyone, less standard form of english. e.g My father has died
4. Casual Level;                                                                                                                                An informal setting between friends, people who know each other well. e.g My dad has died
5. Intimate Level;                                                                                                                    Language reserved for close friends and family, may have shared context. e.g My old man just kicked the bucket

Task 3

Synthetic Personalisation: 

Fairclough's theory of Synthetic Personalisation is the use of a second person pronoun (e.g 'you') to treat a mass audience as though they were an individual - it's used in advertising and persuasion. 

e.g. 'Why don't you take a break and buy this new bubble bath'

Sources:

https://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?page=2&t=1282577

https://quizlet.com/126415282/martin-joos-5-levels-of-formality-flash-cards/

https://www.altalang.com/beyond-words/2012/05/01/how-did-that-register-five-levels-of-formality-in-language/

http://media.openonline.com.cn/media_file/rm/dongshi2004/yyyyxgl/CHAPTER8/chapter8-3.htm

Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus

Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus

Two different species, men and women, trying to communicate by one language, with varying success. The book 'Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus' by John Gray suggests this, and multiple people agree with it. But just how true is that statement?

Deficit

In 1975, Robin Lakoff conducted a study comparing men and women's speech. She concluded that women are more polite, and use more specific linguistic techniques (such as; hedges, empty adjectives, and tag questions), but that men have a better sense of humour, and that their language was superior and more desirable. Her theory was published as "The Deficit Model", since women's speech was deficient to men's. Considering the context of 1975, this is understandable, where ladies were meant to be lady-like, and submit to what men told them. However, this theory can be argued obsolete, since times have changed in the 43 years since this study.

Dominance

Zimmerman and West conducted a similar study, comparing the amount of times men and women interrupt each other, studying both same-sex and mixed-sex conversations. They concluded that men interrupt more often than women. However, the validity of this theory is questionable, since the theory was published in 1975 and it was never specified what, exactly, an interruption was, since an interruption could be polite, a sign of interest in the subject. The theory was christened "The Dominance Model", since it claimed men dominate a conversation. A study by Beattie countered this model, describing men and women to interrupt equally in conversation. 

Difference

More recently (and thus arguably the more reliable of the three) "The Difference Model" was published in by Deborah Tannen 1989, she is credited for her book "You just don't understand". This model simply suggests that men and women belong to different sub-cultures and preferences. Tannen believes that men see a complaint as a challenge, and talking as information with a practical purpose; And that women hedge their orders (to slyly manipulate men), and are reluctant to openly oppose others. Her model has been expanded by several throughout the years; Jenifer Coates in 1989 stated how all female-talk is co-operative; Koenraad Kuiper in 1991 put forward his study of a rugby team, concluding that men see 'saving face' with less importance; Jane Pilkington in 1992 built on this further, suggesting men are less supportive to each other.

These theories can all be argued old-fashioned but despite the changes in society, parts of all the models have held up. So, Are men from Mars and women from Venus?

Language Investigation

3rd October 2016 - 14th November 2016

The language of gaming. 

        This will be the analysis of a forum post on Frontier's website, where people can complain about the difficulty of finding "the elusive Datamined Wake":
https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/276997-Any-tips-on-finding-the-elusive-Datamined-Wake

This particular forum includes; fairly everyday language, consciousness when spelling (With only one typo - which unfortunately has been corrected so I can't quote), and words which haven't been shortened to 'barely understandable' status. But this does include plenty of specific lexis (specific to Elite dangerous) and pragmatics, and some informal slang, "dunno". The correction of misspelled words in the Frontier forums is voluntary, but normally the system will auto-correct spelling mistakes, unless totally wrong - e.g "dunno"

In the world of the forums everybody expects you to know what they are on about. I imagine "Datamined Wake" means literally nothing outside of Elite Dangerous - my area of study.

The use of language in this forum post includes:

• Specific lexis "Datamined Wake"
• Mostly concrete nouns "'Conda" - A shorter version of Anaconda (A vehicle in the game)
• Some use of slang to shorten words. "dunno"
• Informal language - capital letters and punctuation unimportant e.g. the lack of full stops.
• Written by a collection of people (script-like), sophisticated vocabulary can be found "elusive"

In terms of GRAMPS

Genre       - Conversation, script-like.

Register   - Informal

Audience - Elite Dangerous enthusiasts

Mode       - Transcript
Purpose   - Answer the questions of the community
Subject    - The elusive datamined wake

Side note: Remember Foxtype.com a website that breaks down a sentence into it's components.

A creative fake forum post on the frontier forum pages.
The subject of Yttrium:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

ThisIsMe: Posted a question
Anyone know how to get Yttrium? i need it to upgrade my vulture


ThatGuy: Posted
It can only be mined on planets, I find it more common in metallic meteorites and mesodrites

                 ThisIsMe: Posted
                 Thanks              

                 ThenHim: Posted
                 I found it in an astroid belt
                                 
                                 ThatGuy: Posted
                                 Really? where?

HiThere: Posted
Planets. Look for planets with a high percentage. Yttrium is rare, you'll only find 2-3% on a good planet. I tend to go to Deciat 3 A. That has 2.3%

                 ThatGuy: Posted
                 Yeah you can hardly break a rock without finding it

                 WhyMe: Posted
                 I've found all mine on Timbalderis 5 A C

                                ThisIsMe: Posted
                                Thanks for the replies, will go out there now.


HowAreYou: Posted
dunno

RandomPerson: Posted
Try Deciat, I heard it was common there

TheOneOverThere: Posted
What do u need it for? FSD upgrade?

IKnowWhereULive: Posted
Ask someone who has it nicely?

                 WhyMe: Posted
                 I have 54, I could be persuaded.

                                 RandomPerson: Posted
                                 Dear WhyMe, I do request 5 of your finest Yttrium to upgrade the shields on                                        my Courier. Could you provide?

                 HowAreYou: Posted
                 lol

Commentary:

When browsing the frontier forum pages, often simple answer questions that can be answered by 2 minutes of googling are asked. The question I chose 'where to find Yttrium' has an answer that can be found on the Elite Wikipedia. Despite this people feel the need to broadcast their problems to the world to receive some answers of varying value. Some answers may be unrelated to the question, avoiding the subject of discussion. For example, HowAreYou's posts ("dunno... lol"), on my fake forum page.

It is clear on any forum page you visit that capital letters are unnecessary and punctuation is optional, giving an informal register that has been replicated in my response. People do this to get the word across quickly, since the post only requires enough care to be understandable, not perfect. Similarly; shortened words, text language, and slang are all present on the frontier forums. Text language being the universal language of teenagers and shortened words being a characteristic of teenagers - laziness. I have somewhat represented this with "u" and "lol". Taking ideas from the page ("dunno" - Slang "'Conda" - Shortened words) and putting similar words in my response.

On the forum pages, specific lexis and pragmatics is what is done best. If you ask a game specific question, you'll get a game specific answer, using all of the words that mean nothing outside of the game (FSD, Mesodrites, Deciat or in this case, Yttrium). I have included pragmatics in my fake forum page. I have also gone far enough to replicate the discourse structure of the forum page (to the best of my ability), where replies shifted (indented) to the right of the post being replied to.

On the forums, People often use simple, declarative sentences, these are short and concise - brevity. Similarly Interrogative sentences followed by imperative sentences are another common find. e.g "Anyone know how to get Yttrium?" "Look for planets with a high percentage". Also, conversations can end abruptly and will likely be abandoned since one of members has lost the will to open the page, or have simply forgotten.


The names of the users ('RandomPerson', 'ThatGuy') are based off of names I've heard on similar forum posts, and, with over a million players of Elite Dangerous, It is likely some of these names are indeed used by real people.

'An ode to the hoody' analysis

English AS Language
Monday 19th September

Quick definitions
Implied Audience:
      Who the writer thinks is reading his piece of writing.

GRAMPS:

• Genre
• Register
• Audience
• Mode
• Purpose
• Subject

The grammar used in the article 'an ode to the hoody' is specifically selected to attract certain audiences and more easily persuade the readers. For instance, the word "we" is repeated several times throughout the article, this is a personal pronoun and helps position the audience with the reader, and can be more persuasive. Also, by using words only heard in the urban dictionary (e.g "chuff" and "buggers") the article appears informal, and would attract younger generations. But the article progressively becomes more formal, moving away from such words. The verb "shagging" further enforces the informal tone, and further appeals to younger generations. The verb "Arrrgh" (I take it that's a verb) also appears informal. Adjectives such as "pompous" (used with "politicians") also reflects this.  

The audience would be mostly younger generations who wish to find a reason that their teacher at school should not ban hoodys. But due to the words used (of which an older generation might not understand) it would likely be younger generations. And I imagine the implied audience would also have been younger generations/teenagers. Since the nouns; "nokia", "hoody", and "hangover". Last time I checked the internet, I couldn't find a 98 year old with a hangover.
The purpose of the text is to argue the side of the hoody, and persuade those who are planning on banning the hoody to re-think. The subject is hoodys.

My Response

I am very anti hoody, and I've found this article unable to convince me. Especially due to the rather poor arguments for. Firstly, "It is true that muggers and criminals wear hoodys" but there are endless options out there; balaaclavas, bandannas, hats, caps and masks, and besides -is banning hoodies (side note, the spelling of hoodys changes here) going to cause a drop in crime rate? No. While yes the only real way to totally eradicate crime is to put a ban on human life, banning hoodies would reduce crime rate, for none of the other options are as "simple yet ingenious in design, fair in cost, [or] widely available".

GRAMPS a summer task article:  

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-37198688
This article is purposed to persuade those who voted 'brexit' in the referendum that they made a bad decision. The subject is Britain's waters, where, under European law, they were made clean- As the article states; "By 2015, 97% of England's bathing waters had passed the commission's minimum standards, compared to only 27% in 1990." By giving statistics and by words it uses ("legislation... independent regulator") it can be easily argued the article retains a serious register. This also affects the audience, most likely being aimed at those who are old enough to vote, and older.
The grammar used isn't fun, or rhyming, it is of a very serious note. Probably specifically selected to attract older, wiser generations and to keep up the BBC's reputation.