Monday 15 June 2015

Twitter feed analysis

Hypothesis: Do men use more jokes and women more serious language?

Tweet 6: Male
- Informal structure
- Laughter, jokey
- Casual tone
- Elipses used to add mystery
Summary <=> Men tend to use informal language, humorous language and gramatical structure, often with a casual tone. Minimal punctuation is used, often elipses is used to sound mysterious.

Tweet 7: Male
- Informal grammer
- Announce troubles, carefree attitude
- Displays concern
- See no evil emoji, symbolising detromental effect
Summary <=> See above, in addition, announce troubles with a carefree attitude, but displays concern, emoji used to demonstrate effect.

Tweet 8: Male
- "High heel emoji" => casual emoji
- Jokey language
- Tweet tags @thisisadapt and mentions nikeuk
- Exclamation mark "!" light-hearted tone

Summary <=> Men use punctuation and emojis to convey casual language
Tweet 9: Male
- Casual language
- Refrences a website
- Talks of situation, attempts to make best of it

Summary <=> Men will try to make the best of a bad situation by making themselves the centre of a joke.

Tweet 10: Male band

- Exaggeration
- Slang
- Symbol representating an emoji which isn't visible.
- Makes reader feel as if they don't need to know anyone elses opinion, shows men are dominant / powerful

Summary <=> Men often feel the need to be the more dominant in the situation and will often make those around them feel as if their opinions are inferior.

Method of selection used: choose the 5 consecutive middle tweets.

Monday 9 March 2015

Racism speech

We stand here today to change the history that racism has left its mark upon, crippling our society. A society that still allows many to be jobless and uneducated due to their race. A society that still accepts the loss of many innocent lives due to their race. Should we stand here, watching it in horror but letting it carry on? We are the ones that are here today with the power to do something. Let's take advantage of that. Let's look up to people like Nelson Mandela and Martin Luther King, who risked their lives or died for the cause. Let them be the inspiration for change. Let's change today.

Racism has always formed a large part in our behaviour as a society. Not so long ago, it decided everything in a persons life. From where they lived, to what job they had, even their societal status. However, in different parts of the world, attitudes varied. In 1945 Afro Americans stationed in Europe during World War Two were welcomed into the community. At home, they were segregated, leading increased calls for justice. There were echoes of the Nazis- the cause which the USA was fighting against, in their own society. This was demonstrated by the Ku Klux Klan which believed in white supremacy. For example, black teachers earned a mere average of $342 a year whilst white teachers earned $1107. One of the most tragic cases of racism was the case of Emmett Till, a fourteen year old boy. Raised in Chicago, a Northern city, he was used to slightly better treatment in the North. When visiting his uncle in Mississippi, a Southern city, he winked at a white woman. For that he was beaten and lynched by her relatives. Other ethnic groups were persecuted, but the worst attitude was towards black people, due to the slave trade and white supremacy. They were denied the vote until August 6th 1965, but slavery was abolished one hundred years earlier. But by law all Americans were given the vote ninety-five years earlier. This shows that although the laws changed, attitudes didn't.

Even though people of different ethnicities are more accepted today some people/ children still experience bullying just because they are of a different race. Many people are ignorant and still follow "stereotypes". For example, Muslims are now associated with bad people just because of the wrongdoings of the extremist group ISIS, when actually they aren't the ones doing wrong. Yet, Christians are never associated with wrong doing even though the Ku Klux Klan caused just as much terror, if not more.

We found that verbal abuse is the most common source of racism. We found that people of a darker tone have worse outcomes than those of a lighter shade of skin colour. We found that topics like home ownership can cause conflict due to the unfairness of assuming that certain ethnicities are and forever will be of a lower working class. We found that job interviews can vary in applicants and that how many applications are sent vary depending on a persons ethnicity. An example would be that a Chinese person must submit 68% more applications than an Italian person who would send 12% more applications. This isn't acceptable. We must make it equal for all races. And to do that we need commitment and participation.

We need you.

Wednesday 25 February 2015

Summary of lesson 1:


Political power - politicians, police and people who work in law courts.
Personal power - people in a position of power because of their jobs : teachers, employers.
Social group power - Hold power because of a social varibale e.g. class, gender, age. Typically middle class white men.

Instrumental/ influential power

Instrumental - power to assert dominance and authority through actions e.g. police, disciplinary.
Infuential power: Persuasive power e.g. media and advertising.

Summary of lesson 2:

Persuasive speech

Modal verbs: will, may, can, must. Shows determination and conviction, convinving audience of statement.

A modal verb is an auxilary verb that expresses necessity or possibility e.g. must.

Epistemic modality: when a modal verb is used to express the speakers opinion about a statement e.e. "it might be true".
Deontic modality: modal verb used to affect a situation e.g. giving permission, "you can go when you are finished".

Persuasive features used in speeches

Modal verbs, rhetorical question, direct adress, repition, special voacbulary and jargon, personal pronouns, facts, AFOREST, emotive language.

Parallelism: repeating things in a sentence or subsequent sentenceds e.g. verbs, phrases.

Synonymous parallelism: 2nd half of a sentemnce echoes the 1st half, or develops it. Shows ideas are equal in importance. Adds balance, rhythm and clarity. "Protect but not possess, to defend but not to conquer".

Anithesis: establishes clear, contrasting relationship between two ideas by joining them together or juxtapositioning them. Makes distinctions, clarifies ideas that may be overlooked. "Live together as brothers... or die together as fools." OR "He who lives by the sword shall die by the sword".

Anaphora: Repitition of the same word/ words at the beginning of successsive clauses or sentences. "To think on death it is a misery. To think on life it is a vanity".

Epistrophe: Repitition of the same word/ words at the end of successive clauses or sentences. "Reason is subdued, honesty is subdued, good will is subdued".

Other features

Alliteration, anology (story), metaphor.

Tuesday 24 February 2015

Grices Maxims:

Cooperative principal: people want to cooperate when they exchange meaning. Coordination regulated by means of cooperation.


  • Quality maxim, telling the truth. 
  • Quantity maximum, giving information with minimum effort. 
  • Relation maxim, be relevant and act accordingly. 
  • Manner maxim, be clear and not obscure. 
Applying maxims:

  • Violate them with being noticed - lying. 
  • Violate them deliberately - flouting. 
  • Refrain from cooperation - opting out. 
Brown and Levinson Face Theory:

Explains how and why we're polite to each other. 
-Linguistic and social identity = face. 
2 faces, positive (feeling loved and appreciated) and negative (right not to be imposed on). 
  • 1st strategy, bold on record. Do nothing to minimise threat to face. 
  • 2nd strategy, positive politeness, appreciate and love the person we're communicating with. Politeness markers and friendly behaviour. You appeal to the positive face. 
  • Negative face appeal. Apologise a lot, politeness markers, use negative politeness. 
  • Off record indirect strategy ~> hints (gestures, laughing) express what we want to communicate, get someone to do your work for you. 

Wednesday 15 October 2014

Style models ebola

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8094655.stm

Ebola research