Hi guys, can you please have a glance at this- I wrote the full thing under exam conditions but cbf typing it *all* up. Cheers.
2009 proved to be a year of ups and downs with major economic, environmental and political issues coming to the fore. These times of rapid social change and upheaval provoked debate within the Melbourne media about the need for strong leadership and heroes to act as role models. In her opinion piece, Nola Keith adopts a dismissive and lamenting tone to contend that modern society is devoid of such figures to its own detriment. In the accompanying graphic, cartoonist JOB partially supports this contention, positing that hero figures should originate from everyday life rather than the gloss of the mass media. Writer John Getty, however, totally dismisses the notion of the hero; he asserts in a pragmatic voice that the concept should be completely disregarded.
Throughout Keith’s piece there is an acceptance of the fact that there no longer exist ‘traditional’ heroes. However, Getty disputes this argument, positing that there are in fact too many heroes and that this impacts negatively on those within society. Nola Keith commences by employing the Latin descriptive ‘annus horribilius’ to convey her dissatisfaction towards the events of the year 2009. The reader, able to decipher the meaning of the phrase as meaning ‘horrible year’, understands this formal labelling as awarding a sense of authority to Keith’s words. Her emphatic rhetorical question ‘remember the headlines?’ demands that the reader review the unsavoury events of the past years. The directive verb ‘remember’ not only acts to provoke reader reflection, but also to command the reader to accept that the year has been an unfavourable one. This is reinforced by the short-paragraph structure of her piece; as each anecdote is assigned to each paragraph, the ‘gloom’ and ‘insecurity’ are constructed to appear pervasive and indefinite. In establishing the horrendous nature of the previous year, Keith aims to link it to a lack of strong moral leadership. Her employment of sibilance in the statement ‘motivation, diversion and reassurance’ evokes feels of comfort in the reader’s mind. However, when juxtaposed with the ‘annus horribilius’ it thus becomes clear that such rewarding sentiments are being denied to the reader. Keith’s repetition of the imperative commands ‘Don’t look’, ‘Don’t expect’ and ‘Don’t look their either’ work to create a sense of desperation, as their overuse implies that there is simply no-one or nowhere to ‘look to’ for moral guidance. The reader is thus convinced that there is a severe shortage of heroic individuals within society in a time of desperate need. John Getty, however, disputes this apparent drought, instead asserting that modern culture has an oversupply of ‘heroes’. His decision to structure his piece so that it commences with two quotes of important writers and intellectuals positions the reader to accept that his argument is grounded in modern intelligent thought, as they provide a visual springboard into his own thoughts. Getty’s employment of the conjunctive ‘so’ to introduce John Howard’s naming of his heroes implies a sense of déjà vu and blitheness. The reader therefore understands that the PM is only the latest victim to a fad-like ‘age’ that idolises heroes. His use of the encompassing pronoun ‘everything’ when detailing this culture invites the reader to share his lack of enthusiasm, as it implies that an inordinate amount of individuals have been, perhaps not rightly so, designated to be heroes. Hence the reader is positioned to view the concept of heroes as simply an unnecessary folly, rather than a crucial social need as Keith argues.
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