‘Boat people’, a phrase heard all too often, has come under the spotlight once more following the Christmas Island tragedy.I feel like this is just not the right tone for a language analysis... A little too coulorfull. Perhaps start by introducing the article and the author, the issue requires less of an introduction Andrew Bolt addresses this issue with an opinion piece entitled ‘Don’t blame me, blame Julia Gillard’ published in the Herald Sun on the 17th of December 2010. Straightforward in language and aggressive in tone, Bolt establishes the main contention that it is not too early to blame the Gillard Government for this foreseeable and for the most part, avoidable disaster.
remember the target audience. Also, I would have said 'the christmas island boating accident' or something less opinionative than 'foreseeable and avoidable disaster' unless you quote Bolt for that bit. I know that some people won't care about that though.The headline of the piece ‘Don't blame me, blame Julia Gillard’, encapsulates Bolt’s argument, using a
cliché expression
is it? and the same
blame game tactics wouldn't use this phrase either, too conversational. However once agian, that is a minor little thing as the Gillard Government to emphasise his point of view.
it is good to analyse more than one technique in one paragraph, and it's good to do it in the manner you have but you have to link the two together somehow. Chose two techniques that work together (which you have) to form the paragraph and comment on how they work together and perhaps use a linking word to join the two bits of the paragraph together. Otherwise it can be a bit jumpy when reading the paragraph Placed prominently on the page, an image of a boat involved in the tragedy immediately raises concern in the reader’s mind; putting forward the idea the people pictured may not have survived. The subheading, ‘It’s too early to blame the Gillard Government for these Christmas Island deaths, we're told’, uses factual evidence
not factual evidence to provide Bolt with the basis for his argument, when will it be the right time?
Bolt begins by resorting to rhetorical questioning aimed towards the Gillard Government
things are always aimed towards the reader, Gillard is just a convenient vessel to house the underlying technique ‘But why? And if not now, when?’ immediately encouraging the reader to critically consider Bolt’s brutally clear point of view
I like this sentence, but I wouldn't mix my evidence with my topic sentence too much. Ive always been taught that a topic sentence should be as short as possible. Bolt then moves on to dispassionately accuse and attack the Gillard Government ‘But they lie, of course, these pious Leftists…’
try to integrate your quotesfollowing with emotive imagery ‘…the deaths… of these men, women and - God rest them - children’ Using this amalgamation of language to his advantage, Bolt invokes a sense of outrage in the reader whilst possibly kindling an emotional response knowing children would have perished. ‘It's never been the right time...No, too early…Too soon…’
integrate your quotes! Bolt uses repetition throughout his entire piece to subtly influence the reader to memorably ponder Bolt’s point of view. Bolt then shares the opinions of refugees ‘The (Australian) Government has changed now… Kevin Rudd - he's changed everything about refugee…’ appealing to the reader’s sense of sympathy by depicting the issue through the perspective of a refugee. Bolt lends considerable weight to his argument through the use of statistics ‘Within months of these "reforms"...the boats were back - soaring from three a year over the previous six years, to almost 200 this year alone’. Further use of emotive imagery ‘Once again people were being tempted into the boats -- and to their deaths at sea’ paints a distressing picture in the readers mind while portraying the Gillard Government in a hostile manner. Bolt then emphasises the reality of this issue ‘…even though the dead included Afghan Norooz Ali Iqbal and his nine-year-old son, Mounir, both of whom had been interviewed by the ABC's Unleashed seven weeks earlier…’ immediately causing the reader to stop consider the lives lost. The Gillard Government is further belittled and a horrific image is placed in the readers mind after Bolt refers to the events of a previous boat incident ‘...the Government's harvest of bodies in April last year, when five Afghans died in blowing up their boat...’ Bolt then highlights the complete lack of concern demonstrated by the Gillard Government ‘a Government that would rather have boat people die in their dozens than admit it was wrong’ serving as a wake up call to anybody who by now wasn’t on the same page as Bolt. Following Julia Gillard’s statement ‘These conversations are best had when they are fully informed by the facts’ Bolt causes the reader to realise Julia Gillard was only beating around the bush ‘To make sure those full facts would take weeks, even months, to arrive, she announced four separate inquiries into the disaster, not one of which was specifically into those policies of hers.’ Bolt concludes his piece by further reinforcing his point of view that it is simply not too late for the Gillard Government to take the blame ‘So, no, it's not too soon for such folk to fling blame for this disaster on you, me...But it's always too soon to blame what's already killed so many -- Gillard's weak laws’
This paragraph is too long. There is too much going on and not enough space to let an idea develop or to go deeply into the causes or effects of the language. Also, it is realy realy hard to read if there is a very long paragraph. My english teacher last year told our class every lesson to use as many paragraphs as we liked becasue they're free Andrew Bolt has used a vast number of persuasive techniques to his advantage.
Clearly and comprehensively
don't eveluate, Bolt concludes that it is most definitely not too early for the Gillard Government to take responsibility for this latest ‘boat people’, an event that could have been avoidable, provided the appropriate laws were in place.
Righty-o, it wasn't too bad. If you fixed up just a small couple of things then it would be a lot better. 1) integrate your quotes (make them part of the sentence and make the sentence flow) 2) smaller paragraphs. 3) nice short quotes (this also makes integration much easier). Your quotes should contain just the important bit. There's no need to include other bits.
one more thing, watch your tone and conversational language. Be more formal.