Paper 1 - 4
Link: https://www.vox.com/identities/2019/8/22/20812883/1619-slavery-project-anniversary
Text type: listicle, article in list form, from 2019
For who: American audience interested in slavery as an important part of American History and who want to inform themselves about slavery, without particular group age and gender
Subject: a list of historical misunderstandings about slavery
Purpose: presents historical facts about slavery in an easily digestible format
Visuals:
The pictures have captions. The image supports every bullet point, and the image is the first visual proof of the points
The third image illustrates the content of the paragraph
The fourth one is for identifying the opposing part of the audience.
The last picture illustrates the stereotypic slavery work taken not long ago, to support the argument presented in the section.
Serif fonts are commonly used in print, while sans serif fonts are used for the web because it is easier to read on the screen.
Warm colours, symmetrical shapes, and compositions generally look more visually appealing.
Structure:
The full content is not required to be read in order to get full information. That’s why the visuals and headers are present as much as possible.
The paragraphs are relatively long.
The first two paragraphs are meant to establish gravitas (like an important topic and we are serious and smart people that are going to inform intelligent people to make it look credible and trustworthy)
Have a lead paragraph, summary and then the actual content
Repeating the same sentence is one of the newspaper features, which creates an impression of an old trustworthy newspaper
The style is changed from point to point because five historians write it. The text is not edited, so the style is different and as close to the original words as possible.
All the references are cited but cited differently in different sections
The longest section has the smallest paragraphs
The fourth section might seem controversial, so she uses “we” to decrease this effect. The content is critical, but the language tries to make it softer and to convince people. Conciliatory in tone
No conclusion because it is not a necessity.
Language:
The language is attempted to be simple and digestible to make it more readable, memorable and engaging—the simplified version of an academic language.
“debunk” is an internet term commonly used for the debates
Not an everyday vocabulary
The reference to the 1619 project is quite specific and might not be understandable for the majority.
The shift of tone makes it easier to read.
The language is different in each part because different people write it.
Vocabulary is simplified to have a larger target audience and make it easier to read and understand.
No literal devices. The language is made easily digestible.
The format is made it look entertaining, so people can finish reading the text.
Balancing between the entertaining listicle thing, but at the same time, it is trying to rephrase history research.
What was wrong with it:
The analysis has to address the article's purpose (how does the text affect the audience). And all the points from the body paragraph should address the aim, but not the ways it is made accessible and so on
Examples should support every language device with quotation
To have better criteria A is to address the purpose of the text to how it affects the audience.
The audience should be a result of the authorial choices. “The image looks generally inviting because of warm colour, BUT the audience should identify with people on the picture, so the people in the picture look like people interested in American history and slavery in particular.”
Criteria B is how it affects the audience and how this contributes to the general purpose of the text. For every authorial choice, it should have an explanation of how it shapes the meaning.
For every observation. What is this, what is the effect on the audience, and how does it shape the purpose
The thesis should include how the purpose of the text is achieved
The key point of criteria D is readability and proper style. As few words as possible in the sentence.
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