Language change: a new view on borrowings.

Interesting post. Which borrowings do you think are used for prestige and which for the other reasons?

A-Level Language coursework support - investigations

Investigatives,

Here is the simplified version of the assessment objectives for the investigation component (which is marked out of 50):

AO1 What students do: their application of appropriate language methods, their analysis and their written expression. (15 marks)

 

AO2 What students understand about language study, including others’ ideas and research, along with an understanding of how to conduct a linguistic investigation. (15 marks)

 

AO3 What students interpret and understand from the language being used. In other words, the significance of the language in the data, its meanings and contexts.(20 marks)

 

Key factors:

 

AO3 is worth the most marks and you need to show an awareness of how the language features (which you get marks for exploring in AO1) are tailored to the specific context (GRAPE)  - how is the language of the producer understood by the receiver because of what happened earlier, shared pragmatic understanding, expectations about tone, sociolect, dialect, formality etc, how well-disposed the reciever is towards the producer or text etc, asymmetrical power, roles of the participants etc?

 

You must include a (Harvard referenced) bibliography and make reference to your theory reading throughout the analysis, as well as in the intro, using footnotes - find out how to do this if you don't already know. this will help you get high AO2 marks.

 

For your analysis, write using concise and focused analytical sentences, well-chosen subheadings and clear, contextualised examples from the data (data used in the analysis will not count towards the overall word count). 

 

You will need to include clean (unannotated) copies of your data for the final submission so photocopy another set to annotate as part of your analytical process.

 

Structure of the investigation:

 

Intro - a brief summary of relevant research ideas shouwing how you selected your hypothesis from them and how you are going to test it (how you chose what data to look at and which techniques you will focus on and why)

 

Methodology - how you made your data comparable, reliable, ethical (all your thoughtful considerations of how to collect suitable data - marks are given for this in AO2)

 

Analysis - a structured analysis using appropriate technique or theory sub-headings (not data piece one, two etc. - make sure you cover techniques from multiple frameworks over the course of the investigation) where you identify techniques in quoted data and explore how they suit the context and what relevant theory they might support/contradict (you can/should bring in other theories, not just the one your hypothesis is based on). Use tables of quantified data to identify what is worth exploring in depth and do a mini-intro for each sub-section to guide the reader, explaining why the following analysis is significant.

 

Conclusion - how far was your hypothesis supported/contradicted and why might that be (in context)? Be tentative.

 

Evaluation - what were the useful approaches and what was problematic? How could your investigation be fine-tuned or expanded?

A useful writing/reading site for Lang Lit and Lang doing 'storytelling'

Creatives,

some useful writing advice and some links to wider reading on the Litfic page of TVtropes.

AL2 (A-Level linear, year 2) Language (my AS class) final lesson of the year

Gorgeousnesses,

you are now AL2s, so get used to that terminology!

After our 'big fat quiz' in the classroom, you will be fired up to work hard over the summer :)

Please enrol yourselves on the old A2 Language page of Moodle where there are lots of resources to help you with the new key topics of CLA (child language acquisition) and LC (language change). I will tell you the enrolment key for self-enrolment when we get to the computer room or you can email me for it if you are reading this later. Beware - there are references to the old course, so you must constantly remember that you are not studying the course that it refers to.

Read through the green booklet if you haven't already and then please blog your current plans for your investigation (hypothesis, data and how you will collect it - use the headings of 'reliability', 'ethicality' and, if relevant, 'comparability'). What problems, issues, questions do you have? Put those on your blog too.

See what others are doing and comment on their blogs and do some wider reading around your topic area.

Don't forget that you can acces the textbook (Cambridge Elevate)!

Language summer task

Creatives,

over the summer, you need to read around your theory area and make sure you have the best hypothesis and plenty of theory to refer to in your analysis.

You could collect your data but you need to check your method of collecting it with me first - I will be checking my email periodically but am away 16th-23rd July.

You need to annotate your style model, spotting techniques across all the frameworks (lexis, grammar, discourse, phonology etc.) and all the relevant conventions you will have to use.

Plan your piece and your commentary by identifying techniques you will definitely use and discuss e.g. create a table to help with planning:

Lexical tech from SM    effect on aud because of GRAPE   my use of tech   why it's effective for GRAPE


Discourse tech...


Grammar tech...


You should plan and draft your piece and commentary (preferably redrafting several times) to bring in with you in Sept. We will do some peer assessment and redrafting before I mark a draft as I can only mark your work once before I take it in for final marking.

To recap: reading theory, annotating style model, planning and drafting creative piece and commentary for first lesson back.

Edit: please see my more recent 'choosing and annotating a style model' post.

A-Level Lang computer room lesson 28/6/16 commentaries

Wonderfulls,

I need to have discussions with everyone today about style models and investigations.

While I am doing that, please check that you understand the process of writing a commentary by writing one for one of the two pieces you wrote for homework (or an earlier written piece if you were not here). Pick the one that uses the most techniques from a style model.

In the real creative section of your coursework (that you are drafting over the summer), you should plan the piece and the commentary side-by-side so that you definitely use techniques from the style model actross a range of frameworks (see below). Your commentary must show how the style model used a technique and how you adapted that same technique for your content. You could also consider the drafting process e.g. the possible effects of choices you discarded and how/why your final choice was more effective.

Commentaries should allow you to make comments across a range of frameworks e.g. lexis (emotive, lexical field, metaphorical language etc.), discourse (ways of attracting and engaging the audience, use of discourse markers, fist/second/third person etc.), grammar (use of sentence mood, ellipsis, sentence fragments, abstract nouns etc.), phonology (alliteration/assonance/consonance, onomatopoeia, puns etc.) and other frameworks e.g. explore the pragmatic understanding needed for references you make, jargon you use etc. These are just examples and you should select the significant/clever/suitable techniques you used (as long as they cover a range of at least three frameworks).

 Tips:

•  Consider GRAPE in every paragraph, particularly during the explanation of the effect(s) of the style model's and your own piece's techniques (PEE) on your audience(s) – link to purpose(s) and how you have used the conventions of your form.

• Always use a quote (or multiple quotes to show patterns of use) but keep it as short as possible – sometimes one word is enough, if you explore the connotations, lexical field, implicature etc.
• Use as much detail as possible about the possible meanings created by the  techniques on the particular target audience or sub-audiences
• Show how techniques worked together to achieve purposes

• Refer to what you learned from your style model in every paragraph
• Consider how and why you make particular representations 
• Cover a range of frameworks but show how aspects from different frameworks work together

• Meet the word count (750 words) as closely as possible but don’t go over or under by more than 75 words (10%)

• Proofread for accurate, clear, concise writing and a clear structure that guides the reader

Basic paragraph structure (double PEE!):

POINT say what effective technique the style model writer used and how it might have affected the target audience

EVIDENCE quote or give an example – keep it as short as possible (sometimes one word will do)

EXPLANATION explore the techniques in the quote, looking at exactly how they make meaning for the audience in that context (e.g. because of what the audience knows, because of what was said earlier, because of what is expected in that text type, other GRAPE aspect etc.)

LINKING POINT say how that led to a decision that you made in your writing

EVIDENCE quote (or multiple quotes to show a pattern of use) or give an example – keep it as short as possible (sometimes one word will do but sometimes you need to show how a single technique e.g. the use of the second person pronoun works in a longer quote to explore its effect properly)

EXPLANATION explore the techniques in the quote, looking at exactly how they make meaning for the audience in that context (e.g. because of what the audience knows, because of what was said earlier, because of what is expected in that text type etc.). Be tentative. Link back to and contrast with the style model.

Good example:
 In Popular Mechanics, Carver uses words from the lexical field of dirt to show that  the relationship between the couple has got worse. The "snow" turns to "dirty water"; the pre-modifying adjective has connotations that the pure snow has become disappointing and disgusting. Carver also uses "streaks", "slushed" and "dark" to continue this lexical field and indicate that everything is in the same state, including the people. This is a use of pathetic fallacy where the environment of filth reflects the characters' lack of pure morality. I chose to create pathetic fallacy in a similar way with a lexical field of electricity. The "lightning" that arcs across the sky and the noun in "the shock she felt" are used to give a sense of my main character's jumpy behaviour and the lexical field is evident in those choices and in "charged" and "current" to hopefully give a sense of anticipation and curiosity about why she is so nervous/excited and cause sophisticated readers to wonder what is going to happen in the same way that Carver creates a sense of doom with his lexical field because his characters' world is descending into dirt and darkness.

Aspirational example:

In Popular Mechanics, Carver uses words from the lexical field of dirt, perhaps to show how the relationship between the couple has become tarnished so that the reader is prepared to judge the conflict that follows as a result of neglect and treat this as a cautionary tale. The lexical choice of the noun "snow" with its pristine connotations of purity, bright whiteness etc. is juxtaposed with the adjective "dirty" to show how the environment is getting tarnished. This is then followed by "streaks", "slushed"  and "dark on the inside" where it becomes clear that the dirt outside is meant to be pathetic fallacy symbolising the darkness of the couple's hearts. In my own story, I used pathetic fallacy in a similar way by using the lexical field of electricity to create a sense of the protagonist's frenetic mindset. The "lightning" that arcs across the sky is described in a short sentence to add to the sense of freneticism and pace. The noun in "the shock she felt" is used metaphorically but the literal sense is created too in her jumpy behaviour and in the context of the lexical field that is evident in those choices and in "charged" and "current". The semantic field is used to create a sense of danger and even allude to Frankenstein in the change that is about to happen to her. This should play on the sophisticated audience's pragmatic understanding of other texts and enhance their sense of anticipation and curiosity about what is going to happen in the same way that Carver creates a sense of doom with his lexical field because their world is descending into darkness.

Lang Lit summer task

Wonderfulls,

here are the sheets for the summer task in case you are not in for the last week or misplace them:

task sheet

notes sheet

Good luck and it has been such a pleasure working with you!