Converging letter

Dear Mr and Mrs ****

I regret to inform you that your son is not performing to what I believe is the best of his ability. This is such a shame considering his incredible achievments prior to this academic year. I must ask that you as a parent will talk to him about the effort he is putting into his schooling so we, as a team can help him to achieve his potential.

Kind regards
Joseph Cruse


diverging letter

Dear Mr and Mrs ****

I am extremely pissed off with your son! I have have never been treated with so much disrespect and at times the though of smashing his head through the classroom window has been more than just apparent in my sub-conscious, how you could've brought your son up this way is thoroughly above me and if you dont attempt to sort out this excuse for a boy I swear I will violently take matters into my own hands. I've had enough of all your son's shit so I leave you with this as ultimatum; you sort him...or I do.
Fuck you.

Language and power

Not in any of our papers but things we learn terms from this which we can apply to other aspects of the syllabus

What is power?

Power is dynamic because it changes due to the different scenarios we are in
Why is an individual allowed power in a certain enviroment?

- Physical setting or enviroment is relevant
- There can be power online

Basic terms
- power in discourse is the ways in which power is manifested in language
- power behind discourse is the contextual reasons for the enactment of language
- instrumental power is power used to maintain and enforce authority
- influential power used to persuade or influene others
- political power is power held by government, the police, the law...
- personal power is power held by people as a result of their occupation
- social group power is power held as a result of social variables such as social class

Power in discourse

Constraints - language strategies used to assert power

oppressive discourse strategy- blatant ways to control people like shouting or swearing

repressive discourse strategy - more subtle ways of exerting power e.g. asking quesions which press a subject.

Paragraphs on Gender Theories

Tannen

Tannen’s ‘difference theory’ differs from Lakoff’s theory in a few was but has a lot of similar ideas, I would agree with many of her ideas such as ‘advice versus understanding’ however I would strongly challenge ‘status versus support’. ‘Advice versus understanding’ relates to the idea that men see complaints as a challenge however; women would prefer to just give sympathy. I would strongly agree with this point. However, my view might be affected by the fact that I am a male so would naturally be better suited to advice from another male whereas a female would only be able to give sympathy. The idea I disagree with is ‘status versus support’ I actually don’t agree with either of the sides of this argument; I think the idea of male dominance is out of date and therefore it solely depends on the personality of the participants even with stereotypes taken into account. The word ‘support’ (despite perhaps having more female connotations attached to it) does not apply in my opinion in the context in which Tannen describes it. She says that women look for a type of confirmation that what they’re saying is correct. Again this statement is extremely general and in my opinion untrue as a female who is confident in what they are saying would not seek support. It could be argued that it is in fact down to more dispositional factors.

Lakoff

Lakoff’s ‘deficit theory’ states many things that women do that men don’t (or do less of). Things such as the idea that women hedge more correlate with Tannen’s idea ‘order versus proposals’ as they both interpret the idea that women are not as direct as men. The idea that women have a special lexicon for colour is interesting and in my opinion, true. Women are stereotypically more creative and arty from birth and personally I think this is why they have a special lexicon for colour. Lakoff continues to say that women generally speak less. I don’t believe this to be true and I think she only found this because of the size, ethnicity and time at which she took her sample. If she did a bigger sample nowadays I believe this would not be the case. This is because now, women are looked at as being more equal than they once were.   

Language and Gender

Male and female speech
paper 2

language varieties
- with gender you will be given data- this could be a trascript, table of turn lengths, chart etc...
- respond to the data and tell all you know about the topic. This is a discursive essay.

Moving on...

Lakoff's deficit theory

In 1975 Robin Lakoff- a white, middle class woman a sample. Because of her ethnicity and social class and because of the time it was written, this was a very small sample so cannot apply to that many people. Lakoff came up with the deficit theory, this theory said a lot about the way women speak (from her small sample).

Lakoff said:
- women hedge more
- they are more polite
- they use more tag questions 'don't they?'
- they 'speak in italics'
- use empty adjectives such as 'cute' and 'adorable'
- they use more hypercorrect grammar and pronunciation: English prestige grammar and clear enunciatiation
- they use more direct quotation 
- They have a special lexicon- women use words for colours, men for sport
- Women use intonation in declaritive statements to make things sound like a question
- They use 'wh' imperatives eg 'would you open the window'
- women generally speak less frequently
-  

Jennifer Lawrence- 'Why Do I Make Less Than My Male Co-Stars'

What is the purpose of the text?


The purpose of this text is to inform the reader about gender equality, it could also be argued that the text has a persuasive purpose too; the way she talks about this as if she's trying to make a point shows a persuasive tone e.g. 'found out how much less I was being paid than lucky people...'. However, the persuasive nature of the text is rather abstract and it could be argued that she is just passionate about the subject as appose to trying to persuade. This purpose is relevant to the target audience because it plays on the enthusiastic opinionated nature of young people and specifically the females she is appealing.


Make a list of the 'male' and 'female' language features in this text. what is their effect on the reader.


Some of the language with male connotations includes the taboo language e.g. 'fuck that'. This is more associated with males because of the competitive, more harsh tone of the language and would not traditionally be considered to be feminine. The fact the she uses this language is effective because it's a way of showing her stubborn nature and is a way of rebelling through her language towards what she believes to be an injustice. There is also language that is more associated with females in the text, for example, adjectives such as 'adorable' might have more of an effect of innocence and might make the readers feel guilt which helps them to understand her point of view.


Do you agree with her conclusion?

I do agree with the conclusion, the word 'brat' does stereotypically have more female connotations and therefore she is correct in what she says. However, there are insults directed towards men which wouldn't necessarily be directed to females. Therefore, with this point taken into account her conclusion losses some level of validity.