English Language essay submission and marking

[dannynips]

Did you write exactly the above essay in your SAC?

[dannynips]

Did you write exactly the above essay in your SAC?

Also thanks heaps for your feedback. I particularly like your wider reading examples

[aqple]

Word for word. Full stop for full stop

I would take your teacher's mark and comments, she goes through all the essays in your class and would have a better idea.

I think what would really improve your essay is to use examples. You focus a bit on the past of Australia, and not contemporary Australia, as implied by the 'today' in the essay question. For example, 'larrikin' is somewhat outdated. Some unique expressions that demonstrate mateship today are 'good on you' and 'no worries'. Good luck 

[sparklingwater]

Not a bad essay.

A few quick things:

- It's too short. 600 words is pretty short, especially if it was written un-timed but even if it was written under exam conditions you could probably hit 700-800 at least. Quality>Quantity, true, but I feel like you're limiting yourself in what you can discuss and the complexity of your discussion if it's this short.

- I don't feel like you've addressed the essay topic particularly well. The topic is about attitudes surrounding PC language, as well as its role in contemporary Australian society. You've addressed its role in the first paragraph, and kind of addressed attitudes in your third paragraph by looking at how the one comment can be perceived from different perspectives, but ultimately I feel like there's a lot you more you could've addressed. Attitudes towards political correctness itself for example -- you're basically contending that "political correctness is good" without offering an alternative viewpoint or perspective on the issue. While it is perfectly fine to agree with an essay topic, in a topic that like this that actually wants you to talk about attitudes it is definitely better to look at both sides of the coin.

- Interesting examples, which is good.

But really, just make sure you understand what the topic is arguing and that every single point you bring up is relevant and has a purpose in developing your argumentation.

Thanks for the feedback (: lol, obviously I have a lot to work on in terms of essay :/

[sparklingwater]

Because I'm bored, I'll mark one essay. This isn't going to happen normally so don't hope for it.
Be as brutal as possible? You're going to regret saying that

Thank you for the feedback. It's much much much better than what my teacher ever gives. I will take that into account for my future essays (:

[sparklingwater]

Hello again. Would somebody be kind enough to mark my analytical commentary please? It will be highly appreciated!

I really want to improve on my English Language skills but it is hard to do so when my teacher takes 10 years to mark my work and when she does get to them, she only gives one to two sentences of feedback.

The text is Emma Watson's HeForShe speech and I've also attached the text for reference.

The text is a formal speech delivered by United Nations Goodwill ambassador and renowned actress Emma Watson in regards to a human equality campaign titled ‘HeForShe’. The speech was delivered at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on the 20th of September 2014 in front of an audience which consisted of United Nations members. In addition, the speech was broadcast across YouTube and other video-streaming sites with people across the world being able to hear the speech. The purpose of the speech is to promote the HeForShe campaign as well as to raise awareness towards gender inequality while the social purpose is to enforce a sense of social closeness with the audience.

The lexis used in this speech highlights the purpose to promote for awareness regarding the issue of gender inequality. This is done through the use of nouns such as “feminism” (line 7), “woman” (line 23) and “daughter” (line 30), which all belong to the same semantic field of the female gender. As such, it not only creates cohesion through their shared idea of female inequality, but the frequent use is also vital to highlighting the stereotypical roles that women are expected to play in society, specifically, a mother and childbearer which is conveyed through the connotations that these lexemes hold. Men inequality is also stressed upon through the use of nouns such as “young men” (line 47) and “sons” (line 61) which belong to the semantic field of the male gender. This specifically targets the male component of the audience to view that gender inequality is, despite stereotypical views, a serious issues that also concerns them. By using lexis from both the semantic fields of the female gender and male gender, it enables both the female and male from the audience to see how gender inequality is a social problem that affects them and their future generations. In addition, it supports the purpose because the use of such lexis continually links back to the theme for the speech.

Furthermore, the use of pronouns plays a very important role in addressing the social purpose. Watson makes repetitive use of the first person singular subject pronoun “I” such as when she says “I am from Britain and think it is right” (line 23) and “I’ve seen my father’s role as a parent” (line 45) which creates for the audience that Watson being is an ordinary global citizen like them. It therefore exemplifies social closeness with the audience as they are able to feel as they know Watson personally through their shared identity as a global citizen.  As such, when she goes on to say “All I know is I care about this problem. And I want to make it better” (line 65), the audience is compelled to view that if she can take a stance against this issue, they can also do the same. While the speech is quite the formal, the use of this pronoun does not decrease the formality because it aids Watson to develop her storytelling of her experience in regards to gender inequality. Watson also makes use of the second personal plural pronoun “you”, such as when she says “If you believe in equality, you might be one of those inadvertent feminists I spoke of earlier” (line 76), allowing her to provoke the audience to see the seriousness about this issue and pass to them the responsibility to make a change to gender inequality.

The syntax used reflects the formal register of this speech. Watson uses the parallelism “When at 14… When at 15… When at 18…” (lines 14-17), which is sophisticated in tone, creating a cohesion of ideas in that regardless of age, gender inequality affects everyone in society. It is also fronted in nature, further highlighting how age is not resistant to gender discrimination. Furthermore, formality can also be seen with the parallel, compound sentences “My life is a sheer privilege because my parents didn’t love me less” (lines 29-30), “My school did not limit me because I was a girl” (lines 30-31) and “My mentors didn’t assume I would go less far because I might give birth to a child one day” (lines 31-22) which shows careful planning and editing. In addition to being parallel and compound, the previously mentioned sentences are also end-weight, with the focus being about how she was not treated less fairly because of her gender as a female. This focus then leads her to say “These influencers were the gender equality ambassadors that made me who I am today” (lines 31-32) which indicates the aforementioned sentences belong together as the pronoun “there” is an anaphoric reference referring to the influencers that she spoke of earlier.

The discourse features play a very important role in addressing the mode and register of the text. Towards the end of the speech, Watson says “If we stop defining each other… and this is what HeForShe is about” (lines 58-59), which pushes forth the plans and changes for the future, which is a typical convention of speeches. Furthermore, through the use of the subordinating conjunction “if”, it binds the entire speech together as it elicits as “maybe” feeling for the future as opposed the certain sense that was previously evoked with the mention of events that had already happen and cannot be changed.

[Robert123]

Analytical commentary of text 4 from VCAA English Language (Specification and sample) at
http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&ved=0CCIQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vcaa.vic.edu.au%2Fdocuments%2Fexams%2Fenglishlanguage%2Feng-lang-samp.pdf&ei=yMtEVMnEGcGD8gXHj4DYCg&usg=AFQjCNEmiwqta6Khk69sZwhjSAjG5zZZ9Q&sig2=6jbm7hfjGBdJf9deF75tcg

Spoiler

This text is a formal speech given by a student in a public speaking competition. Its social purpose is to motivate and encourage the audience at the premier’s building, to buy Australian produce through the use of a myriad of persuasive devices.
To commence his speech, S utilises the interrogative, “Why should we buy Australian?” (1). By using this topic management tool, it complements the texts overall coherence by introducing the audience straight to the issue at hand, buying Australian products. Before answering this question, he continues with a discussion of the current situation our country is in. In doing so, he incorporates the similie “That’s like… more than half the cup” (6-7) to explain the current value of the Australian dollar in laymen’s terms.  This further builds his case of persuading his audience into buying Australian product which is then preceded by his first main argument, “If we buy Australian, our farmers, our land and our economy will be resurrected” (17-19). In doing so, it incorporates some unusual linguistic features that are strategically utilised to aid the social purpose of persuasion. This includes the use of parallelism to link three consecutive issues to one solution; fronting to place emphasis on “our farmers, our land and our economy”; repetition of the first plural possessive pronoun “our” to show that it is an issue for everyone, and the use of the modal verb “will” to indicate intent.
S continues his speech by cohesively linking buying Australian products to providing opportunity to Australian. He does this by discussing several, proud Australian products such as the Hills Hoist, penicillin, the retractable syringe, meat industry, and the wine industry. This evidence he provided further develops his argument thereby aiding the social purpose of persuading the audience to “Buy Australian” (92). This repeated imperative acts as a cohesive tie by linking his arguments together to the social purpose as well as instructing the audience in go buy Australian products.
Given that the speech is trying to persuade its audience into buying Australian products by linking that notion to Australian values, it features many lexemes regarding the current Australian society. This include jargon from the semantic field of economy such as “Australian businesses” (26), “exporting overseas” (28), “The Australian dollar” (4) and “industry” (85). These lexemes adds credibility to his argument by showing that he has thoroughly research the issue which in turns support the social purpose of this text. In contrast, Australian colloquial language such as “hard yakka” (76), “helping hand” (76) and “back on their feet” (10) are utilised to link his argument to values of our nation, once again building upon the social purpose of this speech.  Adjectives such as “remarkable” (35), “huge” (62), “worst” (2) and horrendous (3) are also frequently used throughout the text to allow the audience to create a vivid image of the ideas presented to them. This effect compels them to show their support to S speech thereby aiding the social purpose of persuading them into buying Australian products.
Since this text is obviously well rehearsed and scripted, there is a distinct lack of non-fluency for the entire text. This demonstrates that S was well prepared for his speech which in turn, point towards the context of this text, that is, a public speaking competition. Absence of non-fluency features also aids the social purpose of this text by demonstrating expertise and comfort in this topic which adds credibility and gravitas to the text.
 S also manipulates his prosodic features to add emotion and excitement to the text while allowing clarity in his speech. In line 1 (“Why should we (.) buy (.) Australian(…)), he uses short pauses create a dramatic effect in his interrogative, and a long pause to allow the audience time to contemplate the question. In line 19 (“Will be resurrected”), he emphatically emphasis “will” to stress the intent of the restoration of our society if we buy Australian products. Furthermore, he incorporate stress and prolongated sounds on line 47 and 48 (…mill:::ion… mill::ion) to indicate the huge benefit Australian products have on our society. This once again complements the social purpose of this text by highlighting the necessity of supporting Australian products for our society.

Any critical feedback is welcome

[psyxwar]

This text is a formal speech given by a student in a public speaking competition. Its social purpose is to motivate and encourage the audience at the premier’s building, to buy Australian produce through the use of a myriad of persuasive devices. Sure, but you've missed that it's a public speaking competition. He's speaking to WIN the competition, and thus wants to portray himself as a capable public speaker

To commence his speech, S utilises the interrogative, “Why should we buy Australian?” (1). By using this topic management tool, it complements the texts overall coherence by introducing the audience straight to the issue at hand, buying Australian products. Before answering this question, he continues with a discussion of the current situation our country is in. In doing so, he incorporates the similie “That’s like… more than half the cup” (6-7) to explain the current value of the Australian dollar in laymen’s terms.  This further builds his case of persuading his audience into buying Australian product which is then preceded by his first main argument, “If we buy Australian, our farmers, our land and our economy will be resurrected” (17-19). How does it do this?In doing so, it incorporates some unusual linguistic features that are strategically utilised to aid the social purpose of persuasion. This includes the use of parallelism to link three consecutive issues to one solution; fronting to place emphasis on “our farmers, our land and our economy” cite line numbers; repetition of the first plural possessive pronoun “our” to show that it is an issue for everyone, and the use of the modal verb “will” to indicate intent.Intent for what? Analyse it in context; this sounds like you're just rattling off a definition of what "will" does.

S continues his speech by cohesively linking buying Australian products to providing opportunity to Australian. He does this by discussing several, proud Australian products such as the Hills Hoist, penicillin, the retractable syringe, meat industry, and the wine industry. Where does he say this? What is "Hills Hoist" for example?This evidence he provided further develops his argument thereby aiding the social purpose of persuading the audience to “Buy Australian” (92). This repeated imperative make sure its explicit you're referring to "Buy Australian" here. I'm also not sure why you chose to put this here, try and have a bit more structure in your commentaries. You sort of start of analysing it chronologically but then move onto lexis. You'd be better off just having a single paragraph on say, topic management or discourseacts as a cohesive tie by linking his arguments together to the social purpose as well as instructing the audience in go buy Australian products.

Given that the speech is trying to persuade its audience into buying Australian products by linking that notion to Australian values, it features many lexemes regarding the current Australian society. This include jargon from the semantic field of economy such as “Australian businesses” (26), “exporting overseas” (28), “The Australian dollar” (4) and “industry” (85). These lexemes adds credibility to his argument by showing that he has thoroughly research the issue which in turns support the social purpose of this text Well, not really. It certainly adds an air of credibility but this isn't necessarily because he researched anything. His use of the statistic regarding the Australian dollar however is definitely something you could talk about with respect to researching the issue. In contrast, Australian colloquial language such as “hard yakka” (76), “helping hand” (76) and “back on their feet” (10) are utilised to link his argument to values of our nation what values?, once again building upon the social purpose of this speech.  Adjectives such as “remarkable” (35), “huge” (62), “worst” (2) and horrendous (3) are also frequently used throughout the text to allow the audience to create a vivid image of the ideas presented to them what of the connotations of some of these adjectives? look at them in context; what are they accomplishing? for example, "we are in the middle of Australia's worst drought ever": here the superlative adjective "worst" underscores the severity of the drought that Australia is experiencing, and this helps set the stage for the speech; one where 'buying Australian' is painted as way for Australia to 'get back on our feet' despite these hardships -> this makes his argument more persuasive by providing a 'problem' which 'buying Australian' solves. This effect compels them to show their support to S speech thereby aiding the social purpose of persuading them into buying Australian products.

Since this text is obviously well rehearsed and scripted, there is a distinct lack of non-fluency for the entire text. This demonstrates that S was well prepared for his speech which in turn, point towards the context of this text, that is, a public speaking competition. Absence of non-fluency features also aids the social purpose of this text by demonstrating expertise and comfort in this topic which adds credibility and gravitas to the text. I'm not a huge fan of looking at what isn't there; there are definitely features indicative of the speech's planned nature that are present that you can analyse.

S also manipulates his prosodic features to add emotion and excitement to the text while allowing clarity in his speech. In line 1 (“Why should we (.) buy (.) Australian(…)), he uses short pauses create a dramatic effect in his interrogative slight nitpick, but this isn't prosody, and a long pause to allow the audience time to contemplate the question. In line 19 (“Will be resurrected”), he emphatically emphasis redundant and sounds bad, just go for 'emphasise' “will” to stress the intent of the restoration of our society if we buy Australian products I don't think this has to do with intent, rather 'will' is used to show certainty and confidence that this so called 'restoration of our society' is a consequence of 'buying Australian'. Furthermore, he incorporate stress and prolongated sounds on line 47 and 48 (…mill:::ion… mill::ion) to indicate the huge benefit Australian products have on our society. This once again complements the social purpose of this text by highlighting the necessity of supporting Australian products for our society.

Not a bad analysis, but I feel as if it's too shallow. You are covering a lot of breadth though, which is a plus.

[psyxwar]

Hello again. Would somebody be kind enough to mark my analytical commentary please? It will be highly appreciated!

I really want to improve on my English Language skills but it is hard to do so when my teacher takes 10 years to mark my work and when she does get to them, she only gives one to two sentences of feedback.

The text is Emma Watson's HeForShe speech and I've also attached the text for reference.

The text is a formal speech delivered by United Nations Goodwill ambassador and renowned actress Emma Watson in regards to a human equality campaign titled ‘HeForShe’. The speech was delivered at the United Nations Headquarters in New York on the 20th of September 2014 in front of an audience which consisted of United Nations members. In addition, the speech was broadcast across YouTube and other video-streaming sites with people across the world being able to hear the speech. The purpose of the speech is to promote the HeForShe campaign as well as to raise awareness towards gender inequality while the social purpose is to enforce a sense of social closeness with the audience.  not sure if I agree with this social purpose bit. I think the speech does create closeness with the audience, but this is for the sake of achieving her broader purpose of promoting HeForShe/ feminism, rather than the other way around. I also think rather than just say 'promoting the HeForShe movement' you should mention the significance of promoting this -- specifically, in trying to end gender equality and trying to both raise awareness of gender inequality as a pervasive issue in today's society and in trying to mobilise males around the world to join in the feminist movement

The lexis used in this speech highlights the purpose to promote for awareness regarding the issue of gender inequality. This is done through the use of nouns such as “feminism” (line 7), “woman” (line 23) and “daughter” (line 30), which all belong to the same semantic field of the female gender. As such, it not only creates cohesion through their shared idea of female inequality, but the frequent use is also vital to highlighting the stereotypical roles that women are expected to play in society, specifically, a mother and childbearer which is conveyed through the connotations that these lexemes hold what connotations? I'm not sure what you're getting at here; do you mean denotations? either way I don't see the point you're trying to make. Men inequality Male inequality? is also stressed upon through the use of nouns such as “young men” (line 47) and “sons” (line 61) which belong to the semantic field of the male gender. This specifically targets the male component of the audience to view that gender inequality is, despite stereotypical views, a serious issues that also concerns them. By using lexis from both the semantic fields of the female gender and male gender, it enables both the female and male from the audience to see how gender inequality is a social problem that affects them and their future generations. Good.In addition, it supports the purpose because the use of such lexis continually links back to the theme for the speech. I do not think hyponymy of the semantic fields of 'male' and 'female' is that strong of a point in supporting the social purpose. It definitely has a role to play, and you can definitely analyse it, but you want to be analysing it in tandem with other evidence because the hypoynms themselves don't have that much of an impact towards the social purpose.

Furthermore, the use of pronouns plays a very important role in addressing the social purpose. Watson makes repetitive use of the first person singular subject pronoun “I” good MLsuch as when she says “I am from Britain and think it is right” (line 23) and “I’ve seen my father’s role as a parent” (line 45) which creates for the audience the feelingthat Watson being is an ordinary global citizen like them. It therefore exemplifies reinforces, she is creating this closeness, it is not already theresocial closeness with the audience as they are able to feel as they know Watson personally through their shared identity as a global citizen. Explanation is a bit questionable; "through their shared identity as a global citizen"? Everybody is a global citizen after all. Maybe something like it helps to personalise the address -- using a first person pronoun such as "I" inherently makes her argument more real and compelling after all, because they stem from personal experience. This in turn lowers the social distance between Watson and her audience -- particularly to those watching her speech on the internet -- because it characterises her as a fellow human being who has experienced hardships just like the audience, rather than some famous actress who they'll probably never meet. As such, when she goes on to say “All I know is I care about this problem. And I want to make it better” (line 65), the audience is compelled to view that if she can take a stance against this issue, they can also do the same. Yup!While the speech is quite the formal, the use of this pronoun does not decrease the formality because it aids Watson to develop her storytelling of her experience in regards to gender inequality. Watson also makes use of the second personal plural pronoun “you”, such as when she says “If you believe in equality, you might be one of those inadvertent feminists I spoke of earlier” (line 76), allowing her to provoke the audience to see the seriousness about this issue and pass to them the responsibility to make a change to gender inequality. I think 'you' does more than just this. "You" also personalises the speech, making the audience feel like they are being addressed as an individual. For example "men, I extend your invitation" -- male viewers feel as if they are themselves being invited and that their own contribution matter, which in turn encourages them to join in the fight against gender inequality supporting the text's social purpose

The syntax used reflects the formal register of this speech. Watson uses the parallelism “When at 14… When at 15… When at 18…” (lines 14-17), which is sophisticated in tone, creating a cohesion of ideas in that regardless of age, gender inequality affects everyone in society.Good! It is also fronted in nature, further highlighting how age is not resistant to gender discrimination. Furthermore, formality can also be seen with the parallel, compound sentences “My life is a sheer privilege because my parents didn’t love me less” (lines 29-30), “My school did not limit me because I was a girl” (lines 30-31) and “My mentors didn’t assume I would go less far because I might give birth to a child one day” (lines 31-22) Good that you're referencing so many examples from the text, but honestly it's probably a waste of time to cite so many. Remember you only have 45 minutes to write this, and examiners are interested in your analysis. Spending too much time transcribing examples is using up valuable timewhich shows careful planning and editing. In addition to being parallel and compound, the previously mentioned sentences are also end-weight, with the focus being about how she was not treated less fairly because of her gender as a female. Yes, but what is the significance of it being end weight?This focus then leads her to say “These influencers were the gender equality ambassadors that made me who I am today” (lines 31-32) which indicates the aforementioned sentences belong together as the pronoun “there” is an anaphoric reference referring to the influencers that she spoke of earlier.

The discourse features play a very important role in addressing the mode and register of the text. Towards the end of the speech, Watson says “If we stop defining each other… and this is what HeForShe is about” (lines 58-59), which pushes forth the plans and changes for the future, which is a typical convention of speeches. Furthermore, through the use of the subordinating conjunction “if”, it binds the entire speech together as it elicits as “maybe” feeling for the future as opposed the certain sense that was previously evoked with the mention of events that had already happen and cannot be changed. I'm not convinced that it binds the whole speech together

feedback in red!

[sparklingwater]

feedback in red!

Thank you so much for the feedback! (: Good luck for the upcoming exams!

[Reus]

I did on on Watson about a week ago *shmoney dance LOL
If anyone can give me feedback or tips, please do! Thanks. 

UN’s Women Goodwill Ambassador Emma Watson delivered a formal speech at United Nations Headquarters, New York on the 20th of September 2014. Watson’s speech, in a formal tone regarded the launch of the human equality campaign ‘HeForShe’ targeting the audience of UN member state representatives present. Additionally the speech was recorded and broadcasted on video streaming platforms such as YouTube where the audience extends to all people across the globe. The surrounding context, being a UN summit facilitates the formal register expected. The renowned actor’s purpose is the promotion of the HeForShe campaign as well as to raise awareness towards the ethical issue of gender inequality.

Watson’s use of lexis reflects the formality and purpose of the speech. Lexemes pertaining to the lexical field of politics, (being a UN summit) for example “campaign” (line 4), “economic” (line 11) and “feminism” (line 10) allow Watson to express her expertise. This exemplified expertise leads to credibility and formality, thus supporting the function of the text. Furthermore the employment of nouns such as “feminism” (line 7), “woman” (line 23) and “daughter” (line 30), which all are hyponyms of the female sex or even “young men” (line 47) and “sons” (line 61) which belong to the semantic field of the male sex create cohesion for listeners. In doing so, Watson has targeted every age and form of gender specifically implying that they all are affected by gender inequality. The varied use of different nouns – especially ‘son’ and ‘daughter’ to describe the gender inequality add a sense of vulnerability and innocence where, the audience is expected to uphold morals and act upon the issue.

The stylistic feature of morphological patterning is employed throughout the speech. Nominalisation, the process in which the use of a verb, adjective or an adverb is transformed into a noun is apparent in Watson’s speech. For example as seen in line 12 “assumptions – to assume”, “expressions – to express” (line 20), “conversation – to converse” (line 42) and “invitation – to invite” (line 43) all serve to assist Watson in achieving her purpose. These cases of nominalisations elevate the sophistication of Watson’s lexicon, as they are predominant features of legal and authoritative documents. As a result, the emphatic message presented is conducted in a credible and formal manner as expected at the UN headquarters.

Syntactic patterning present throughout the text helps Watson to achieve her purpose. In lines 23 to 25 the actor repeats the phrase “I think it is right” four times in order to get her message through as repetition is a unique tool to get the listeners attention. In the same phrase the personal pronoun “I” or also in “I’ve seen my father’s role as a parent” (line 45) reduces the social distance between participants and demonstrates Watson’s direct view on the issue of gender inequality. This certainty and confidence Watson portrays by using “I” gives her authority, which influences the thoughts of the audience as declaratives exert professionalism. Watson uses the parallelism “When at 14… When at 15… When at 18…” (lines 14-17), which is personal in tone, reducing the social distance and also creating a cohesion of ideas. This example of parallelism emphasizes that at any age, one can experience gender inequality thus raising awareness. Moreover parallelism is evident in lines 67- 68 for example “All that is needed for the forces of evil to triumph is for enough good men and women to do nothing.” This functions as a scheme, which asserts the importance of the issue as it displays the negative consequences, if ignored. By employing these features, Watson not only assures the good will of HeForShe but also raises awareness.

Overall, Watson’s speech reaches a high level of cohesion and coherence. Discourse features such as anaphoric referencing, information flow and hyponyms allow this text to be highly cohesive. For instance the anaphoric referencing of her past experiences mentioned in lines 29 to 31 as “These influencers” (line 32) and the front focus of “When at 14 …” (line 14) or “If you believe in equality,” (line 76) act as cohesive techniques which establish an organised speech and logical ordering. Furthermore Watson’s epigrammatic statement of “You might be thinking who is this Harry Potter girl?” (line 63) adds humour to her speech in which the audience is kept captivated and attentive. Finally the actor’s structured sentence types and laconic greeting and “Thank you.” allow the speech to become coherent.

[psyxwar]

I did on on Watson about a week ago *shmoney dance LOL
If anyone can give me feedback or tips, please do! Thanks. 

UN’s Women Goodwill Ambassador Emma Watson delivered a formal speech at United Nations Headquarters, New York on the 20th of September 2014. Watson’s speech, in a formal tone regardedwas about the launch of the human equality campaign ‘HeForShe’, targeting the audience of UN member state representatives present. Additionally the speech was recorded and broadcasted on video streaming platforms such as YouTube where the audience extends to all people across the globe. The surrounding context, being a UN summit facilitates the formal register expected. The renowned actor’s purpose is the promotion of the HeForShe campaign as well as to raise awareness towards the ethical issue of gender inequality. More than just raising awareness, she is also trying to drive social change. Your sentences don't read very well; commas are placed in the wrong spots. However it is otherwise a pretty solid intro

Watson’s use of lexis reflects the formality and purpose of the speech. Lexemes pertaining to the lexical field of politics, (being a UN summit) for example “campaign” (line 4), “economic” (line 11) and “feminism” (line 10) allow Watson to express her expertiseI don't see how these are really under the semantic field of politics. Supporting her expertise is also a pretty vague and generic thing to say; her expertise regarding what? How? I hardly think using words such as "campaign" and "economic" paints Watson as credible; these are pretty much everyday words. This exemplified expertise leads to credibility and formality, thus supporting the function of the text. Furthermore the employment of nouns such as “feminism” (line 7), “woman” (line 23) and “daughter” (line 30), which all are hyponyms of the female sex or even “young men” (line 47) and “sons” (line 61) which belong to the semantic field of the male sex create cohesion for listeners. In doing so, Watson has targeted every age and form of gender specifically implying that they all are affected by gender inequality. Good pointThe varied use of different nouns – especially ‘son’ and ‘daughter’ to describe the gender inequality add a sense of vulnerability and innocence where, the audience is expected to uphold morals and act upon the issue. Interesting point, but this needs more elaboration. Flesh this out a bit more; how does it add this sense of vulnerability and innocence?

The stylistic feature of morphological patterning is employed throughout the speech. Nominalisation Nominalisation is more of a syntactic feature, the process in which the use of a verb, adjective or an adverb is transformed into a noun you don't need to define it is apparent in Watson’s speech. For example as seen in line 12 “assumptions – to assume”, “expressions – to express” (line 20), “conversation – to converse” (line 42) and “invitation – to invite” (line 43) only quote what is actually from the text; if you want to give the unnominalised form put it in brackets, as in "invitations" (to invite) (line 43). all serve to assist Watson in achieving her purpose. These cases of nominalisations elevate the sophistication of Watson’s lexicon, as they are predominant features of legal and authoritative documents. As a result, the emphatic message presented is conducted in a credible and formal manner as expected at the UN headquarters. this could've just been combined into your syntax paragraph.

Syntactic patterning present throughout the text helps Watson to achieve her purpose again, nominalisation is actually listed under syntactic patterning. In lines 23 to 25 the actor repeats the phrase “I think it is right” four times in order to get her message through as repetition is a unique tool to get the listeners attention. this is actually parallelism In the same phrase the personal pronoun “I” or also in “I’ve seen my father’s role as a parent” (line 45) reduces the social distance between participants and demonstrates Watson’s direct view on the issue of gender inequality. This certainty and confidence Watson portrays by using “I” gives her authority, which influences the thoughts of the audience as declaratives exert professionalism. where did it being a declarative come from? it just seems you tacked this on at the end; it's not really an explanation or relevant to why "I" gives her authorityWatson uses the parallelism “When at 14… When at 15… When at 18…” (lines 14-17), which is personal in tone, reducing the social distance and also creating a cohesion of ideas. This example of parallelism emphasizes that at any age, one can experience gender inequality thus raising awareness. Good.Moreover parallelism is evident in lines 67- 68 for example “All that is needed for the forces of evil to triumph is for enough good men and women to do nothing.” I'm not sure how this is parallelism?This functions as a schemea scheme?, which asserts the importance of the issue as it displays the negative consequences, if ignored. By employing these features, Watson not only assures the good will of HeForShe but also raises awareness. I'd recommend having a read through the VCAA Metalanguage list for a quick refresher as to what falls under what.

Overall, Watson’s speech reaches a high level of cohesion and coherence. Discourse features such as anaphoric referencing, information flow and hyponyms allow this text to be highly cohesive.okay you can't just mention stuff like 'information flow' then never cover it. I wouldn't even have this sentence here; just go straight into talking about anaphora For instance the anaphoric referencing of her past experiences mentioned in lines 29 to 31 as “These influencers” (line 32) and the front focus of “When at 14 …” (line 14) or “If you believe in equality,” (line 76) act as cohesive techniques which establish an organised speech and logical ordering. Furthermore Watson’s epigrammatic statement of “You might be thinking who is this Harry Potter girl?” (line 63) adds humour to her speech in which the audience is kept captivated and attentive. Why is this relevant to coherence and cohesion? Is it relevant to coherence and cohesion? Finally the actor’s structured sentence types and laconic greeting and “Thank you.” allow the speech to become coherent. How?

You're writing a good amount, but some of it seems to be fluff; definitions of metalanguage and things like 'renowned actor' don't really add much to the analysis and just take up time. Discourse paragraph was quite weak, but you do reference discourse throughout the commentary in terms of cohesion so that's a plus.

Keep it up!

[Reus]

You're writing a good amount, but some of it seems to be fluff; definitions of metalanguage and things like 'renowned actor' don't really add much to the analysis and just take up time. Discourse paragraph was quite weak, but you do reference discourse throughout the commentary in terms of cohesion so that's a plus.

Keep it up!

Thanks so much! 

[apreslapluie]

Hi everyone, it's a bit late to be new here but if anyone could be kind enough to look over my commentary (and give it some kind of grade), that'd be wonderful!
Edited after writing it under timed conditions. Text attached (it's from Engage, has occasionally painful spelling)

Thanks 

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Text 3 is a transcript of a conversation between American teenage producer Porter Robinson and Melburnian television presenter Marty. It is a highly informal interview that primarily serves a referential function to inform Australian teenage music fans about Porter’s career and inspiration. Its secondary purpose is to promote Porter as a musician and enhance his image. Porter is the dominant speaker in the conversation as he is the interviewee.

The prosodic features within the text are typical of a spontaneous television interview. Porter’s speech is replete with non-fluency features, including pause fillers like “umm” (16, 51), false starts, “it was- I’ve never” (50), and repetition, “It’s-it’s” (58). These features indicate the unscripted nature of Porter’s speech and allow him the opportunity to construct his thoughts and self-correct. Nonetheless, his speech has some elements of a scripted response, likely a result of his desire to promote himself as professional musician by delivering confident and fluent pre-prepared responses. This is illustrated in his articulation of his gratefulness towards his fans in “I’ve never been...tastes” (50-53), which lacks the frequency of non-fluency features present in the rest of his speech. Marty’s speech displays features of preparation as well, in alignment with his role as a television presenter expected to open, close, and direct the conversation. His formulaic closing “This has...Channel V/” (105) includes reduced pace when articulating “<L Porter Robinson L>”, in keeping with the convention of dramatic emphasis on the interviewee’s name during the closing sequence of radio or television interviews. Marty also employs numerous utterance-final rising intonations to indicate interrogatives, “Did you...video?” (23-24), as well as High Rising Terminals, as in “...Channel V/” (105), in order to invite Porter to take the floor and respond, fulfilling his role as the host.

The conversational strategies employed in the text are indicative of the roles and relationship in the conversation. As the subject of the interview, Porter is the dominant speaker, and Marty supports this allocation of roles by employing backchannelling minimal responses, such as “[yeah]” (27, 35) and [yep]” (42). This encourages Porter to speak more by enhancing his positive face needs as he is being attentively listened to by Marty. The interviewer-interviewee relationship is also supported by the high consideration conversational style maintained through the text. There are no interruptive or competitive overlaps as Marty waits for Porter to indicate he has ended his response with final intonations such as “...I really liked it.” (43) and “...thrilled by it.” (65). Marty then takes and returns the floor by initiating question-answer adjacency pairs, as in “did you...reception/” (44-49), allowing Porter to continue speaking by completing them. Adjacency pairs allow Marty to steer the conversation too by introducing topic changes in his initiating utterance, such as “Is there...moment?” (67-69), both supporting his role as a host and the referential function of the discourse by providing viewers with more information about Porter.

The social purposes of the text are served by the stylistic features and register of the interview as well. Syntactically, the use of declaratives, like “I did one last March” (15) and “I didn’t expect...it” (65), allows for efficient delivery of information to the audience about Porter’s opinions. The active voice, as in “...my age...gave me...advantages” (70-71) is used consistently to make Porter’s speech more direct and accessible to the viewers, supporting the informative purpose of the text as well. Porter employs the informal discourse particle “like” throughout the text, both as a hedging device, “I did like a small...tour” (12), and as an indicator of reported speech “I...was like” (103). Not only does it maintain the informal register, it also indexes his identity as a teenager, as it is a lexeme used most typically by teenagers in everyday discourse. This serves the secondary function of the text to enhance his image with the teenage audience by emphasising the shared social identity between him and them, making him seem more relatable. Reinforcing this notion is his use of the inclusive third-person personal pronoun “we” (77) to encompass himself within the same group as “high school kids” (76), his intended audience and fanbase. Alongside his reference to popular social networking website "Instagram" (38), Porter’s lexicology increases his social currency with prospective fans. By enhancing his image as such, he can ultimately enlarge his fanbase and thus increase his popularity and income as well.

[Robert123]

Here is a weak attempt at a section C essay, haha.  Any feedback and ideas for improvement is welcome. Cheers


Language can both establish a sense of solidarity and belonging as well as reinforce social distance and authority. How is this true in the current Australian context?

Spoiler

Language can both establish a sense of solidarity and belonging as well as reinforce social distance and authority. How is this true in the current Australian context?
Language can serve a myriad of indirect functions which are important in our current Australian context. Our identity as individuals, groups and as a nation is publicly expressed by our language choices. In doing so, it also create a sense of solidarity and belonging while also forming a sense of alienation and power to certain groups. This is evidently seen by members of authority who manipulate their language to reinforce social distance, such as in political speak. Furthermore, Australian English allows our country to portray a distinct national identity, creating a national sense of belong. In a similar manner, minority groups, such as ethnic and social groups, can use language to create a unique identity which in turn, reinforces solidarity.
To express their group identity, many social and ethnic groups make deliberate language choices to differentiate themselves from society. By doing so, it allows them to earn covert prestige within the ‘in-group’, resulting in the reinforcement of group solidarity. Users of teenspeak clearly illustrate this notion through their deliberate language choice. This is evident by their use of the elongated vowel sound in the adverb “so” for further emphasis as well as their frequent use of colloquial slang such as “soz” (sorry), “shweet” (intensifier for “sweet”) ,“cool” and a diminutive “selfie”. These language choices also demonstrate the value of being informal and easy going among teenagers which thus create intimacy between the users and thusly, a sense of belonging. Another social group that demonstrate the phenomena of the relationship between language and group identity is the online community known as speed cubers. These ‘cubers’, utilised jargon that is related to twisting puzzles such as the initialisms “OLL” (orientation of last layer) and “PLL” (Permutation of last layer), to show that they have similar knowledge in this unusual field of solving Rubik’s cube which create a strong connection between each of the members, again, demonstrating how language can develop rapport between individuals. Ethnic groups also acquire the use of non-standard language to allow them to integrate into contemporary society while maintaining their ethnical identity. In doing so, they create a new dialect that combines elements of both their native and new language which are referred to as ethnolects.  This is observed by the linguistic innovations of the ethnolect; Greek Australian English which contains a distinct lack of prepositions as evident by the phrase “come my house” (come to my house) as well as the use of epenthesis in their utterance such as the addition of the inflectional plural suffix ‘-s’ to form the non-standard, second person plural pronoun, ‘youse’. These non-standard language choice acts as a distinguishing marker of their social identity while displaying their unique culture and heritage which in turn, earn the user cover prestige among that speech community. All of these conscious, language choices made reiterate the value of language in earning fellowship among minority group.
Australian English has constantly been evolving to “… meet the social and psychological needs of [its] users” (Crystal) and in doing so, reflect our contemporary national identity. This unique dialect of English plays a quintessential role in uniting members of our society together in both troubled and peaceful times. Former Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, utilised the ability language has to bond our nation together by specifically incorporated a broad accent in her press conference that followed the tragic floods in question. Having this more stereotypical, Australian accent, it allow her to create a sense of unity for all Australians who were in distress and thus illustrate the power of Australian English in our society. This is again evident by Australian’s frequent use of the high rising terminal in our speech as well as our use of diminutives such as ‘g’ (Melbourne Cricket Grounds), “shep” (Shepparton), “brissy” (Brisbane), “uni” (university) and “bloody”. These unique features are “important indicator of ‘Australianness’ and of cultural values” (Burridge) such as friendliness, informality, laid-backness and mateship which shows the importance of language in our nation. In doing so, it illustrates how users can earn overt prestige in our society, allowing them to reaffirm their identity of being Australian and thus, develop a sense of belonging within our nation.
Even though language plays a key component in establishing identity as individuals and groups, it can also be manipulated so that it can be used to earn power in our society while alienating others. Both political language and political correct language provides evidence to this as they obfuscated and users can put their own individual desires in their language. The asylum seeker issue in our society has brought to light many examples that illustrate this. Titles such as “illegals” and “queue jumpers” which are frequently used by the press, has demonised these people and thus, separating them from the rest of our society. Furthermore, the politically correct noun, “homosexual”, has alienated that sexual orientation group from society by making their sexuality appear as a disorder, when compare to the more vernacular noun phrase, “gay people”. In doing so, it has resulted in the promotion of social distance between them and the rest of society and has thus, illustrate the subtle power language has in our society.
Language use is a two edged-sword when it comes to building relationship between different members in our society. On one hand, it can be used by minority groups to create a group identity that allows the members the privilege of earning an illusion of solidarity and belonging. This notion is again emphasis by how Australian English can empower our nation in creating proud, national identity that allows it user to connect through its unique features. On the other hand, language can also alienate individuals and groups while establish a hierarchy in relationship in our society. All of these subtle, yet important functions of language demonstrates the power it has.