Lesson 1
• Introduce LangChang as taught module for next; two pieces of c/w –
investigation & media text.
• Slide 2: overview of c/w pieces, with some examples.
• Slide 3: Simple examples of “transformation” from investigation to media
text (emphasize that effectiveness of “transformation” is written into
marking criteria); show students some examples of c/w folders.
• Slide 4: overview of work, now to Sept. Short H/W task at bottom of slide.
• Slide 5: introduction to LangChang and period of study (Late Modern –
C1700-present day).
• Slides 6-10: Drivers of lang change – in order to understand how lang
changes, we need to know about some of the “drivers” of change. Talk
through these slides fairly quickly; students can listen or take notes –
inform them there will be a quick-fire text afterwards.
• Short break – they can do an unrelated activity, or just have a chat; but
they should have 2-3 mins of not doing LangChang work.
• Rest of the slides repeat 6-10, but answers are, initially, hidden.
Language Investigation
Media Text
• Detailed study of an aspect of
language use and/or change.
• A journalistic piece, to inform.
• Must have a link with your
investigation, but should be a
mere repetition/retelling.
– How is gender represented in, e.g.,
makeup adverts (at one moment in
time, or across time)?
– How has the language of politics
changed over time/how does it
differ between the political
parties?
– Language strategies used by
teachers/a teacher when teaching
one/different year groups.
– How have attitudes to taboo
language changed over time?
– How has the language of [genre of
writing/TV show/children’s
literature] changed over time?
• Investigation is academic –
technical and highly formal in
style.
• Media text is for a nonspecialist readership.
For Example
Investigation into teacher language
Tips on lang./behaviour strategies for new teachers
Investigation into taboo language in [TV show]
“What’s so bad about swearing?” – informative
Guardian article, on nature/history of obscenity
This half term
• Introduction to LangChang
• Attitudes towards language change and use
• “Mini” investigations and media texts, based
on attitudes towards language change/use; to
be handed in after summer.
H/W: Look up the terms “linguistic
prescriptivism” and “linguistic descriptivism.”
Write out brief definitions of each term. For
tomorrow/next lesson.
Language Change
• Studies language change from 1700
(eighteenth century) to present...
• The “Late Modern” period, when there is a
concerted effort at standardization (e.g.,
proliferation of dictionaries & grammars,
helped by emergence of printing presses)
• However, this is the not the first/last attempt
to stabilize/set norms of the English language
• Standardization: the fixing of norms/standards to
English (grammar, spelling, lexis etc.) and its variations
• Synchronic change: change occurring at a fixed “point”
or “moment” in time (this moment, though, is
theoretical or imaginary – we might be taking “the
eighteenth century” as our “moment”)
• Diachronic change: Change occurring across historical
time
“Drivers” of Change: Science &
Technology
• New words (often Greek/Latin in derivation) borrowed
or coined as needed
• Scientific innovation during the Renaissance (roughly
C14-mid C17) and the Enlightenment (roughly mid C17
– C18) required expansion of the lexicon; no language
for the new discoveries
• New inventions require new words (e.g., a machine
that washes the dishes is called... um... a dishwasher
[neologism; compound])
• Technical/specialist words often “borrowed” from Latin
– the lingua franca (before English), and the language
of scholarship (power/authority invested in Latin).
“Drivers” of Change: Travel
• Travel – because of war/colonialism, trade,
and emergence of tourism/leisure industries –
brings different languages and cultures into
contact with one another
• More borrowings/loan words (e.g., “curry”; in
C18 “currey,” when it was a neologism, &
therefore did not have a “standard” spelling)
“Drivers” of Change: Social, Political,
Ideological
• Changes in public attitudes (e.g., towards
gender/race) make certain lexical choices
more/less acceptable
• Political correctness exerts a pressure:
– some words undergo pejoration, & fall out of use;
– Coinages/neologisms replace older, now archaic
terms;
– changing attitudes can affect which registers will
be adopted in certain contexts
“Drivers” of Change: Media
• Might affect attitudes (& therefore register –
journalism more/less formal today that 100
years ago?)
• Introduce coinages, initialisms, acronyms
• Slang/colloquialisms become part of
“standard” lexicon (e.g., “Gotcha”)
• Hyperbole [“hy-per-b(u)lly”] and abbreviation
(initialisms, acronyms, clippings) typical of
“journalese”
Short break
“Drivers” of Change: Science &
Technology
• New words (often Greek/Latin in derivation)
borrowed or coined as needed
• Scientific innovation during the Renaissance
(roughly C14-mid C17) and the Enlightenment
(roughly mid C17 – C18) required expansion of
the lexicon; no language for the new discoveries
• New inventions require new words (e.g., a
machine that washes the dishes is called... um... a
dishwasher [neologism; compound])
“Drivers” of Change: Travel
• Travel – because of trade and tourism/leisure
industry – brings different languages and
cultures into contact with one another
• More borrowings/loan words (e.g., “curry”; in
C18 “currey,” when it was a neologism
without standard spelling)
“Drivers” of Change: Social, Political,
Ideological
• Changes in public attitudes (e.g., towards
gender/race) make certain lexical choices
more/less acceptable
• Political correctness exerts a pressure:
– some words undergo pejoration, & fall out of use;
– Coinages/neologisms replace older, now archaic
terms;
– changing attitudes can affect which registers will
be adopted in certain contexts
“Drivers” of Change: Media
• Might affect attitudes (& therefore register –
journalism more/less formal today that 100
years ago?)
• Introduce coinages, initialisms, acronyms
• Slang/colloquialisms become part of
“standard” lexicon (e.g., “Gotcha”)
• Hyperbole [“hy-per-b(u)lly”] and abbreviation
(initialisms, acronyms, clippings) typical of
“journalese”
Terms Encountered Today
•
•
•
•
•
•
Standardization
Synchronic change
Diachronic change
Borrowings/loan words
Coinages/neologisms
Renaissance (roughly
C14-mid C17)
• Enlightenment (roughly
mid C17 – C18)
• Lexicon
• Lingua franca
• Political correctness
• Pejoration
• Amelioration
• Archaism
• Register
• Initialism
• Acronyms
• Slang/colloquialisms
• Hyperbole
• Abbreviation/clipping/
truncation
Lesson 2
• Review prescriptivism and descriptivism; use
definitions on slide 17 to add to/refine definitions
as necessary.
• Slide 18: talk through format of exam, re.
LangChang section, and brief summary of how to
approach an attitudes question if it comes up.
• Read handouts independently, to begin with;
answer questions through annotation – some
modelling/whole class examples if necessary.
• Slide 20: H/W task (research; resources have
been posted to website)
Attitudes towards language use and
language change
Prescriptivists…
view language as having long-established “rules”; concerned
with standards of “proper” English and “correct” grammar;
very often assume English now to be in a state of decline.
Sometimes called “language mavens” and/or
“grammaticasters” (as an insult). Both names suggest
someone with strong views on “proper English,” who is not
“qualified” to make such judgements.
Descriptivists…
attempt to record, document, and describe language as it is
actually used, rather than concerning themselves with notions
of “correct”/“proper” English.
• In the A2 exam, you will choose to answer one of
two questions.
• Sometimes, one of the questions will ask you to
read a text and discuss attitudes towards
language change.
• To answer the attitudes question, you need to
identify the type of attitude being expressed, and
then discuss the techniques being used to convey
the writer’s message.
Read the articles by John Humphrys
and David Crystal
• How would you describe their attitudes
towards language use and language change?
• Which driver(s) of language change are they
most concerned with?
• What techniques do Humphrys & Crystal use
to convey their messages?
• Ext: Do you think one could ever be entirely
non-prescriptivist? Why?
Homework
Use the “mini_coursework_projects_-_links” PPt
at olibelas.weebly.com (English Language AS
AS/A2 transition) to find the Jean Aitchison
article (last link on slide). Read the article; make
notes on the three types of prescriptivism she
outlines. Do you agree with these views?
Lesson 3
• Ask questions on slide 23; field responses from students (first
question should be easy-ish; second may be more challenging)
• Talk through slides 23-25 as necessary; emphasize that these are
prescriptivist stances that Aitchison herself criticizes.
• Slide 26: Problem with Aitchison? Is it possible, based on personal
experience, to think of instances when our linguistic behaviours are
not matters of choice but are “infections”/habits? (E.g., use of
“y’know,” “like,” “a’right” phatically/as fillers etc.)
• Slides 27-29: Talk through techniques (with focus on register) that
Humphrys uses to make his points; this leads to
upwards/downwards convergence/divergence on 29. Humphrys
uses upwards divergence to set himself apart from the “crowd,” and
also uses downwards convergence ironically, to mock the habits he
so dislikes.
Varieties of Prescriptivism
• What are the metaphors that Aitchison uses
to characterize three widespread types of
prescriptivism?
• Can you summarize these prescriptivisms?
The Damp Spoon View
‘The “damp spoon” image comes from a newspaper
writer, who has a “queasy distaste” for the
“vulgarity” of some current usages, “precisely the
kind of distaste I feel at seeing a damp spoon
dipped in the sugar bowl or butter spread with the
breadknife”. She implies that sloppiness and
laziness cause much of language change.’ However,
Aitchison goes on, ‘[t]he only truly lazy speech is
drunken speech, where alcohol affects coordination, and English is not getting like drunken
speech.’
The Crumbling Castle View
‘This treats the English language as a beautiful old building with gargoyles and
pinnacles which need to be preserved intact, as implied in statements by the
writer John Simon: Language, he argues, should be treated like “parks,
national forests, monuments, and public utilities . . . available for properly
respectful use but not for defacement or destruction”.
‘This view itself crumbles when examined carefully. It implies that the castle
of English was gradually and lovingly assembled until it reached a point of
maximum splendour at some unspecified time in the past. Yet no year can be
found when language achieved some peak of perfection, like a vintage wine.
Nor have those who claim that English is declining ever suggested what this
date might have been.’
The ‘beautiful building’ view is part of this ‘crumbling castle’ stance. The
beautiful building view ‘presupposes that rigid systems, once assembled, are
better than changing ones.’
The Infectious Disease View
‘In an article entitled “Polluting Our Language,” the writer
expressed a widespread view that we somehow “catch”
changes from those around us, and that we ought to fight
such diseases: “The wholesale spread of corruption may
surely be ascribed to mere infection, to the careless,
unthinking assimilation of the floating germs which
envelop us.” Change is indeed brought about through
social contact, so the catching notion is not entirely
wrong. But the “disease” metaphor falls down. People
pick up changes because they want to. They want to fit in
with social groups, and they adapt their hairstyle, clothes,
and language, to those of people they admire.’
• Do you agree with what Aitchison says,
particularly of the “infectious disease” view?
How would you describe Humphrys’s language/style/register here?
Relatively high level of
formality.
Lexical choice of “fine”:
- used in slightly
archaic/narrower &
stronger sense of
“excellent”/“wonderful,”
rather than “just OK.”
Literary/frozen register:
- idiom: “I yield to no
man…” (or “no one”)
- Use of zeugma to
construct metaphor: “as
close to my heart as… to
my desk” (close = near
geographically/spatially
and fond of/intimate
with)
A good dictionary is a fine thing - I yield to no
man in my love for one. If I stretch out my right
arm as I type, I can pluck from my shelves the
two volumes of the Shorter Oxford English
Dictionary.
They are as close to my heart as they are to my
desk because they are so much more than a
useful tool.
Zeugma: When a word(s) refers to
two things in two different ways (e.g.,
literally and metaphorically).
As close to my heart as to my desk.
(“close” = fond + near)
She went home in a taxi and a bad
mood. (“in” = inside + state of
mind/attitude)
Who speaks like this?
In the quotations below, Humphrys is
being ironic. How?
• I h8 txt msgs
• The spell-check (sorry: spellcheck) on my
computer is happy with both. But that's not why I
feel betrayed by my precious OED.
• Have you ever heard anything quite so daft? No
time to make one tiny key-stroke (sorry: key
stroke).
• To the editor of the OED I will simply say: For
many years you've been GR8. Don't spoil it now.
Tks.
• Convergence: When the differences between speech
patterns/habits are minimized/lessened/reduced
(when people’s speech becomes more alike)
• Divergence: When the differences between speech
patterns/habits are increased/maximized
• Upwards: In the “direction” of “standard” English and
received pronunciation
• Downwards: Towards regional dialect/“non-standard”
English
• Therefore, we can speak of upwards/downwards
convergence, and upwards/downwards divergence.
How do these terms apply to the Humphrys extracts?
And finally…
Which of Aitchison’s metaphors best applies to
Humphrys?
Look at the first definition we wrote of
“prescriptivism”: what terms other than
“prescriptivist” might Aitchison use to describe
Humphrys?
Lesson 4
• Informalization/conversationalization
• Prediction – are we more/less prescriptive now than
200/300 years ago? Explain your predictions; predictions
might include strategies/techniques used in pre-/descriptivist accounts
• Write up prediction
• Swift and Johnson
• Summary exercise and annotation
• Were predictions correct, based on evidence? Write this up
as short statement
• H/W: read, summarize, annotate two more short texts,
using links PPt from website
How has language changed over the
last two- or three-hundred years?
Make a prediction:
- Do you think “Society” has become more or
less linguistically prescriptive since 1700?
- Give possible reasons for your prediction.
Do the following points affect your
predictions?
• Although there were numerous attempts to standardize English before the
eighteenth century (1700s), it is from the eighteenth century on (or the Late
Modern period) that English begins to stabilize and become the language we
recognize today.
• Reasons for this include:
– Before standardization, greater orthographic variation, based partly on regional
accent/pronunciation; mechanization & mass production (thanks to printing presses)
mean there are gradually fewer orthographic variations.
– Proliferation of grammars and dictionaries (e.g., Lowth’s A Short Introduction to English
Grammar [1762]; Dr. Johnson’s A Dictionary of the English Language [1755])
– Syntax: C18 – often longer constructions than we might expect/be comfortable with
today; often multi-clausal, with clauses demarcated by frequent commas and/or
semicolons. Over the next 200 years or so, syntax tends towards the more direct,
shorter, and “simpler” construction. E.g., use of “do” to construct questions and
negatives becomes more widespread and more common (e.g., “do you want…?” “No, I
do not/don’t want…”)
– Use of commas & semicolons becomes more rigid.
– People often suggest that English today is more conversational & more informal. We can
talk about the informalization and conversationalization of English.
Return to your prediction; make any
adjustments necessary, and write up this form:
Write up in this form:
I predict/hypothesise that evidence will suggest
that we have become … since 1700. I think that
contributing factors to these changes will
include…
Read the Swift and Johnson extracts
• What broad points does each writer offer? Summarize in one sentence per
extract. “In text A, Swift adopts a … stance, arguing that… In text B,
Johnson adopts a … stance, arguing that…”
• How would you describe the attitude of each writer?
• Based on this evidence, and the Crystal and Humphrys extracts, is your
prediction correct?
• Are the four extracts sufficient evidence for firm conclusions?
• Write up your findings: Based on my evidence, my prediction appears to
be… We can see that [summarize attitude each of the four writers –
prescriptive/descriptive; “crumbling castle” etc.]. From this, we can
tentatively suggest that attitudes towards the English language have
– remained as prescriptive/descriptive as…
– become more/less … over time
However, before firm conclusions could be reached, we would need
to…
H/W
• Read & summarize two more short texts,
using links PPt from website
Lesson 5
• Choosing “mini” investigation topic
• How to set out introductory sections
• Write intro., hypothesis, methodology in
class
• Begin annotation of texts in preparation for
Lesson 6
• Note: predictions might be along lines of
more/less prescriptive, or certain rhetorical
strategies used by pre-/de-scriptivists
Choosing an investigation topic/title
Based on the evidence we’ve considered in class,
and that you’ve considered for homework, there
are three obvious approaches you might take:
1. How have attitudes towards language use and
language change developed over time?
2. What techniques and methods do linguists and
commentators use when discussing language
use and/or change?
3. Have linguists become more or less prescriptive
about language use and change over time?
The type of study
• If you decide to use the selection of texts we have
considered, which span the C18 until (more or less) the
present day, then you will be conducting a diachronic
analysis. Diachronic studies investigate changes over
time.
• If you decide to do task 2, and to restrict your analyses
to texts from one period, then you will be conducting a
synchronic analysis. Synchronic studies investigate
changes at a fixed point in time. If you decide to do a
synchronic version of task 2, you will need to find two
additional texts from the relevant time period (all the
“mini” investigations should cover 6 texts).
• Choose a question/title, and write it
in your book as a title.
• Write your introduction, hypothesis,
and methodology.
Terminology:
- Prescriptive
- Descriptive
- Aitchison’s metaphors
- “Grammaticaster”/language
maven
- Synchronic/diachronic
- Rhetorical techniques
• Introduction: Outline the focus of
your project (“I will
consider/investigate…”); you will
probably restate the title, but say a
little more on what you will be doing
(“I will analyze a selection of texts,
by…; I will consider…”)
• Hypothesis: Make your prediction (as
last lesson, but re-write according to
the task you have chosen; remember,
it does not matter whether or not the
hypothesis turns out to be correct.
• Methodology: Synchronic/diachronic
analysis of techniques/methods etc.
used by writers
Start annotating texts for methods/techniques
Lesson 6
• Slides 42-44: Introduction, warning, guidance
on analyses
• Slides 45-46: How to tabulate/record analyses;
start to annotate and tabulate (begin written
analysis if additional time)Plan and begin
analyses in class
• Slide 47: Final task and H/W
Preparing the analyses
• The analyses will form the biggest part of the
investigation.
• How will organize the analyses?
– Text by text
– According to techniques/feature/methods
– According to prescriptivism/descriptivism, then
methods/techniques
– According to period, then pre-/de-scriptivism and/or
methods/techniques?
• Depending on how many texts you are analyzing, and
how much you have to say, you will analyze approx. 24 features in detail.
Warning:
• Text by text is probably the least effective; it will
probably seem the least well conceptualized to
the examiners.
• However, there are cases in which text by text
might work (e.g., an analysis of special interest
magazines might be organized according to those
interests).
• Often (but, again, not always), organizing
analyses by method will suggest a broad
understanding of the data as a whole.
Research
• You will be expected to show evidence of
further reading/research in your written
analyses.
• For example, a knowledge of Aitchison’s
metaphors might be relevant to a study of the
sort we’re doing. Theories/concepts of
language and power might also be relevant.
Recording, Arranging, & Presenting Data
• Before you can begin to “write up” your analyses,
you will need to record and arrange your data.
• You will need to decide which
methods/features/techniques you will consider in
your analyses.
• To do this, all texts need to be annotated in
detail; consider how
techniques/features/methods help the writers
achieve their purpose.
Recording, Arranging, & Presenting Data
Text
• Look for patterns in the data.
• For example:
– is a certain method
technique only used in C18;
– or, are certain techniques
only used by pre-/descriptivists;
– or, does the frequency of a
particular feature vary over
time?
– Think about how you will
decide which features to
comment on – e.g., will you
comment on semantic fields
only if a) they feature
figuratively; b) 3 or more
instances occur?
Prescriptiv
ist
(P)/Descri
ptivist (D)
Figurative
language
(semantic
field)
Frequency
Examples
A
P
Colour
Nature
Music
6
3
8
[Short
quotations
from text]
B
D
War
3
[Short
quotations
from text]
Use of
statistical
informatio
n
Examples
Text
Prescriptiv
ist
(P)/Descri
ptivist (D)
A
P
No
B
D
Yes
[Examples
from text]
1. Annotate all texts
2. Select techniques/feature/frameworks for
analyses
3. Start to tabulate
Finish 1 & 2 for H/W
Lesson 7
• Tabulate data – use slide 46 as model; further
examples on board; use exemplar work.
Lesson 8
• Show examples of analyses in exemplar work
again
• Show examples of conclusions
• Time to draft analyses in class?
• Set write up as summer task – to be handed in
end wk 2/beginning wk 3 of autumn 2013
term.
Exemplar pieces:
Methodology
My data consisted of five pages of written up hair product
Introduction
In my investigation I will be analysing the language used in
advertising of hair products. This investigation will allow me
to discover how advertisements speak to their specific
audiences. I have chosen to investigate the language and
gender conventions within the beauty industry as these
industries have a significant impact on the people around my
age. It will be interesting to discover how, and more
importantly, why this industry is continually booming.
Perhaps we need all these products? Or maybe it’s the
language used in the adverts that makes us believe we need
them.
I hope to find a definite system whereby industries target
either men, or women in advertising. I believe certain
attributes are used to focus on men, for example, the idea of
“value” yet “difference making” and “obvious results” is a
factor that attracts men; they like to be financially cautious
but still look good in the process. Alternatively, women are
attracted by specialist terminology that sounds scientific.
This is due to women believing in scientific language,
chemicals and how it will drastically cure their supposed
‘imperfections’. This indicates to me that men and women
are still, very much affected by the media’s representation of
the “perfect” man or woman.
advertisements. Whilst using the exact advertisements ripped from
magazines, I have typed up the adverts so that I am able to purely
concentrate on analysing the language, and not allowing for the
graphological features, such as colour and facial expressions to tamper
and manipulate the lexical choices. Brands such as Herbal Essences and
Aussie are predominant in the female market, whilst Lynx, a known male
grooming brand may give interesting outcomes, due to previous distinct
marketing strategies.
The longitudinal research has been taken over a long period of time in
order to analyse advertisements and see whether advertisers change
their methods of targeting men and women. With equal amounts of
female orientated advertisements, as well as male, this allowed for an
equal judgement. I thought it would be a suitable topic when
investigating language and gender when aiming towards different sexes.
The evidence shown in my investigation supports Tannen’s theory of the
difference model as men and women are perceived as two different
cultures. My investigation and the evidence shown will embrace this
idea.
Discovering the way in which advertisers target either women or men
will obviously revolve around language and how it differs amongst the
two genders. Language and gender is an interesting area of
sociolinguistics as it allows us to understand the language embodied and
sustained by attitudes towards gender. Therefore, exploring into areas
of the media and how they equip and use these thoughts will be
interesting to critique. Through premodification and pragmatics found in
the selected advertisements, I aim to discover how advertisers attract
men and women effectively. Premodification will allow me to analyse
the adjectives used to “dress up” ordinary noun phrases. Whilst
pragmatics will reveal the underlying attitudes of gender conveyed to
females and males.
Premodification:
There is a significant variation in the use of premodification between male and female advertisements, revealing a greater difference with
how women are targeted, when compared to men.
The effect of having premodification in an advertisement is to further describe the noun. The evidence shows that it is far more common in
women’s adverts, rather than men’s. In the Herbal Essence advert (no. 6), vivid imagery is accompanied by vivid language. Phrases such as,
“thrillingly fresh” with reference to the “Herbal Essence experience”, depicts Herbal Essence’s sensual experience. It is difficult to separate
the semantic field of nature, as nature is at the heart of the brand; “herb” being the root word and “al” being the derivational suffix that
changes the word class from “herb” to “herbal”. The semantic field of nature is built into the name; advertisers are aware of this and thus,
draw upon it in their advertisements. Nature can be found in the premodified phrases, “earthy delights” and “green essence”. The use of
natural imagery in “earthy” provides positive connotations; we see nature as a place of celebration. The semantic field of nature implies that
Herbal Essence is natural company, but alternatively, they aim to give their consumers an experience with the smells of herbs and flowers,
rather than chemically enhanced ‘Pearl proteins’ found in L’Oreal Elive Nutri-Gloss ad (no. 10). Herbal Essences use premodifiers to describe
the body’s senses, mostly with smell. For instance, Herbal Essence is a women’s marketed brand of shampoo, with the “essence” being
described as “green” triggers scents of flowers, grass and fruits. According to Lakoff, women are more comfortable with lexis denoting colour
and smell. This is due to their specialist lexicon revolving around words to do with colour, rather than the masculine special lexicons for sport.
Men feel that such discussions of colour are emasculating, and not relevant to ‘their’ real world. This is due to their sense of being the
dominant gender: they tend to relegate women’s things that aren’t a concern to them. Alternatively, It could be said that women are far
more inclined towards the aesthetic way of life; they are more “anxious” with the way they look. Herbal Essence embodies this aesthetically
pleasing quality through their “wild” scents. Furthermore, the word “mysterious” when describing the herbs could lend itself to being
mysterious in the sense of a coming from a mythical forest, or an alternative view that it is an unknown herb, used in the bottle of shampoo
to give this iconic “experience.” Both implicit meanings of “mysterious” provide positive connotations for the herbs as Herbal Essence pride
themselves on giving the, “most beautiful shampoo experience on earth.” It is impossible to talk solely about premodification in Herbal
Essence adverts, as semantic field has a great impact on the premodification used.
There is a distinction with the type of premodifiers used in male and female products. With female adverts using descriptions such as,
“beautiful” and “natural”, male premodifiers used adjectives such as, “long-lasting” and “valuable”. This difference in premodification reveals
that women look for attractiveness and appearance, while men differ, by being portrayed as looking for cost and value with lasting results.
Women monitor for appearance and “beauty” and men for value and cost efficiency. From the data, women are portrayed to be far more
concerned with their image, whereas men are always drawn to the specifics of a product, for example, 24 hour lasting freshness, as typically,
men are depicted with busy working lifestyles. Lynx also plays upon the assumption that all men are out working by using the declarative
active sentence, “Get the look that gets the girls” (no.1). The repeated irregular verb “to get” implies that using Lynx will ensure attraction
from women. This also has the effect of showing men to be active in their lifestyles as the verb “get” acts as an imperative, as well as a
declarative sentence. To further this convention, the premodification of “more” in “Get more done…” (no. 3) and the use of “fast-paced” as a
description to describe the lifestyle of “today’s man” (no. 8) shows the male sex to be far more advanced than women, in terms of job roles
and an occupied life. Advertisers draw towards active lifestyles in men, as this was the typical norm of the 1950s. Whilst women stayed at
home, minding the children and putting dinner on the table in time for their husband’s arrival, men were out in the city, working to provide
for their families. Women are perceived as being passive, when compared to the active man. Advertisers still draw upon this inequality
between men and women through their selective descriptions of their products. Freud as a gender roles and differences theorist believed
that men take on “emotional rivalry” against their fathers, and need to contest and become the greater male in the family. This then allows
for a males sense of identity to develop, thus resulting in the similar stereotypes and rooted convention put upon men, even now in the 21st
century. Freud dates back to the late 19th century, yet is sill relevant to advertisers with the use of minimalistic but “manly” language, when
targeting their male market.
Mini Investigation
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1500-2000 words total.
Introduction, methodology, hypothesis
Graphic presentation of data
Analyses (2-4 frameworks)
Conclusion – what did you discover? Was your
hypothesis/prediction correct?
• Evaluation – what would repeat, and what would you
change, if you were to do the investigation again?
• Due in Wed 17th September.