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HL Essay From Start to Finish #1 Text Selection and Line of Inquiry Creation (1)

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The World's Wife -- Carol Ann Duffy -- Picador classics, London, 2015 -- Pan Macmillan UK -- 9781447275251 -- bbaece0c15b7784733dacd9b0cfbc297 -- Anna’s Archive

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1. What does the poem suggest about the experiences of a woman living in a world dominated by men:

Females have to constantly change themselves to suit and submit to the needs of Males in the one sided relationship. The Female changes and sometimes loses themselves while the male stays the same. this makes the relationship feel like a pet relationship where the Female and Male are not equal, Females being more of entertainment and disposable in the Male's point of view.

2. How would you describe 'masculinity' as presented in the poem:

The poem presents masculinity as oppressive, dominant and selfish, changing, or rather shaping, molding others to suit the needs and wants without them having to contribute to anything themselves.

3. Thetis is a being who is able to alter her appearance. to what extent does the poem suggest that she doesn't change her appearance. but her very identity.

The poem explores this in the last stanza as she makes her final change into a mother. this means that she has already to some extent, altered her own identity in order to change to her 'husband's' will, after many failed attempts at escaping and being herself. the poem suggests she eventually gave up altering her form and started to change herself internally, whether it is by submissiveness or something else.

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1.

The poem depicts the constant attempts to maintain a life within a patriarchal society through shifting her personality into one which allows her to survive. This is shown through her transformation into varying different animals of different types, yet all to no avail. The transformation to a songbird represents subservience, the transformation to a bird represents an attempt to maintain distance, the transformation to a snake represents seduction. Ultimately, the failure of each transformation represents how women all attempt to escape the grasp of patriarchy but fail.

2.

Masculinity in this poem is presented as unyeilding and always evolving, demonstrating how patriarchal societies develop new ways to control women, represented through the changing weapons from a fist to a crossbow to a gun, getting more advanced. The various transformations of personality, just to be continually dominated.

3.

The poem explores to a high extent that “Thetis’ alters how identity more than her appearance. The World’s Wife collection consistently draws allusions to modern patriarchal relationships, and modern women can’t shapeshift. Thetis’ shapeshifting of appearance reflects the shifting identities of women within relationships, but also throughout time, reflected through the evolving weaponry that “peleus” uses to capture Thetis.

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Q1. the poem suggests that no matter how hard you try to escape a man, or try to make a relationship work, patriarcal rules will change to side with the men, allowing them to do whatever they want, while the women has to conform to their needs.

Q2. Masculinity is described as power in this poem, as the man in the poem has control over her throughout the poem.

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The depiction of men's manifestation of masculinity through imageries and rhymes was done by Duffy in a rather insightful manner, as she renders not solely the strength and domination of man in patriarchal male-chauvinism via devices, but predominately the overwhelming suppressive nature of male sex in terms of weaponizing technologies in conquering the other sex, which Duffy metaphorically compares to (the elements of) nature.

Besides, the failure of all Thetis attempts of placating, outwitting and outrunning her designated husband demonstrates the prevailing patriarchy in Ancient Greek societies, wherein women are dehumanized to propel the narrative arch and underlie the wit of man without being regarded as legitimately independent. Hence, the disclosure of the long-neglected suppressive nature of Greek mythology is likely the idea of the poem.

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1. The poem never refers to Peleus by name, but rather as generic male figures. This represents the broader way in which a male-dominated society consistently limits women's freedom and the humble societal positions that woman are in. It also portrays how woman are strangled in a society that constantly shifts in order to employ oppression upon women.

2. Masculinity is depicted as an inescapable patriarchal authority that corners female autonomy, which reduces a powerful shape-shifting goddess into a passive object of domestic and reproductive fate.

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About "Thetis"

The collection of poems by Carol Ann Duffy entitled The World's Wife was first published in 1999 and presents stories, myths, fairy tales and characters in Western culture from the point of view of women, very often giving voice to the hitherto unsung women close to famous men. Traditionally these women have gone unnamed; many of the poems' titles follow a pattern (thus: 'Mrs Midas', 'Mrs Darwin') which starkly demonstrates the fact that, often, the only way of identifying real or implied women neglected by history and culture is by their husbands' name. Much of literature through the ages and even today is patriarchal, presenting the world from a male perspective. These poems were intended by Carol Ann Duffy to rectify that, to highlight the fact that women have long been ignored or silenced. The poems in the collection are witty, satirical, playful and complex.

In Greek mythology Thetis is a nereid or sea nymph, one of the daughters of Nereus the Titan. She is pursued by several men, including Zeus, the King of the gods, and Poseidon, the sea god, but neither will marry her once they discover The Fates' prediction that she will give birth to a child who will be greater than his father. Instead Thetis is promised to the mortal Peleus and has his baby. That child is Achilles, the hero of Homer's . Like her father, Thetis has the power of metamorphosis - that is, she has the ability to change herself into another form or incarnation.

It is interesting to note that Thetis was a protective mother, ambitious for her son. In the myth she attempts to render Achilles immortal by dipping him into the River Styx, but she fails to wet the part of his foot where she held him. Achilles was eventually killed by Paris from an arrow which penetrated his heel. This is the source of the anatomical name, the Achilles' tendon. The term 'Achilles' heel' is now an expression used to mean a fatal weakness in an otherwise strong person.

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I shrank myself / to the size of a bird in the hand / of a man. / Sweet, sweet, was the small song / that I sang, / till I felt the squeeze of his fist. / Then I did this

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The poem, Medusa has historical allusions in the poem towards existing Greek mythology. such as the way she is defeated in the myths by a hero with a mirror glass shield. which gives the last stanza much more meaning behind the mirror that is mentioned in the story the mirror can not only mean her reflection on her own state, but also her defeat due to context of the actual story. The poem also heavily uses consonance, which adds intensity, momentum and emphasis to the poem. The poem not only just uses reference to older media but also uses many literature features that ramp up the poem's emotion and momentum such as alliteration. Long runs of alliteration emphasize the speaker’s misery. foul mouthed, foul tongued and yellowed fanged. heavy imagery is also used throughout the poem. Regardless of whether one interprets the speaker as an actual gorgon or only a woman who sees herself reflected medusa's story, the imagery paints a picture the reader can see and feel. the use of metaphors can be interpreted in many ways. for example, the jealousy turned the hairs on her head to filthy snakes. this can be interpreted as her thoughts becoming repulsive and sour but also can mean in a literal sense that the medusa in the story is literally growing out snakes due to her thoughts. overall, the poem uses not only historical context, but also many uses of literature devices hidden within the poem to make the patriarchal system of the context, medusa's bitterness and anger towards her husband's betrayal and her slow transformation to really stand out to the reader of the poem.

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this poem displays how jealousy can manifest in a person through medusa. she is described as turning from a beautiful young bride into a murderous monster, with phrases such as 'foul mouth... foul fanged', shows the readers the destructive nature that she now has.

her grief is shown as dangerous, with 'bullet tears' and asking whether her husband is terrified, shows that she wants reassurance that there is still human in her, but then she says that he should be terrified, showing that the grief and jealousy has started to manifest, where she hates her husband more than what she has become.

she then starts to turn innocent animals into stone, showing that her anger isn't only towards the people who has wronged her anymore, but also towards everyone around her. if anyone wants to help her, it would be nearly impossible as she would turn them into stone with her deadly gaze.

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The poem illustrates the effect of jealousy and rage in a misogynist societal context. Medusa is depicted as a modern wife who suspects her husband of being unfaithful, eventually turning to a monster driven by suspicion. As described in the first stanza, Duffy uses a asyndeton of "suspicion", "doubt", and "jealousy" to show that Medusa is trapped in painful feelings, illustrating that Medusa is clearly suffering from the rapid transformation of both her inner self and physical appearance. Afterwards, when she "glanced", "looked", and "gazed" at objects and turning them into stones, a progression of bitterness and herself being aware of her power drives her to test her ability on larger entities. Despite this, her anger isn't directed at her unfaithful husband, and nobody can even comfort her due to the destructive force that she doesn't want to obtain at the first place. This further demonstrates female being single-handed and alone in a misogynist society. At the end of the poem, after she stared at her ugly figure in the mirror, the use of metaphor and imagery both points to the cruelty of her husband and how he is able to defend for his infidelity. She regards herself as a gorgon, which is often the one being slayed in ancient myths, depicting the roles woman are forced to play in the patriarchal imagination.

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In Medusa by Carol Ann Duffy, the poem uses the myth of Medusa to draw an allegory to modern infidelity in patriarchal relationships. Through the asyndeton in the starting line, “a suspicion, a doubt, a jealousy” and the alliteration in “hairs on my head”, the poem portrays how jealousy and rage has transformed a woman into a gorgon. The poem underscores how her rage and jealousy harms parts of her life through the animals turning into stone, the transition from glance, to look, to stare, underscore her turning on her surroundings in rage. Furthermore, the references to her husband through positive terms like “Greek god” and “hero” despite his potential act of infidelity, nod towards the role women lead in the patriarchal imagination, as he still gets to play the hero. “Shield for a heart and a sword for a tongue”, depicts her husband as unkind and cruel with his words, and with the phrase “your girls, your girls”, act as evidence to the husband’s infidelity, as well as his lack of care towards his relationship with women. The poem’s unclear position allows readers to interpret it as the story of Medusa, or a person who identifies with Medusa, yet both highlight how jealousy and rage has destroyed a person.

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Bitesize Scotland Poetry Podcast: National 5 and Higher Scottish Set Texts: Carol Ann Duffy

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Bitesize Scotland Poetry Podcast: National 5 and Higher Scottish Set Texts: Carol Ann Duffy

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Podcasts - National 5 and Higher English Revision - Scottish Set Texts - Carol Ann Duffy - BBC Bitesize - BBC Bitesize

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Podcast episodes to help study the poems by Carol Ann Duffy: Scottish Poetry for National 5 and Higher English

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A suspicion, a doubt, a jealousygrew in my mind,which turned the hairs on my head to filthy snakes,as though my thoughtshissed and spat on my scalp.My bride’s breath soured, stankin the grey bags of my lungs.I’m foul mouthed now, foul tongued,yellow fanged.There are bullet tears in my eyes.Are you terrified?Be terrified.It’s you I love,perfect man, […]

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In the beginning, I thought the poem only describes Mrs. Aesop describes Mr. Aesop as weak, and how going out with him is boring as he takes his time to observe animals, criticizing male masculinity.

After doing research, I found that there is more depth to it. Carol Ann Duffy twists quotes and details from Aesop's fables to showcase moral lessons related to their relationship

After reading Ham's reflection, I found that it not only criticizes male masculinity, it also discusses stuffy moralising ideas

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When I first read “Mrs. Aesop,” I saw Mrs. Aesop as simply annoyed by her husband’s lack of companionship and constant storytelling. However, after researching the poem, my perspective changed: I now understand that she is deliberately undermining Aesop’s authority as a moral figure. Her mockery exposes the tedium of his endless moralizing and suggests that his supposed wisdom is partly a performance driven by fragile masculinity and wounded pride. Also, by silencing him with her own fable, Mrs. Aesop is showing challenges to the unquestioned authority.

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Reflection: My first impression of Mrs Aesop is that it's simply an imaginative sarcasm of Aesop by his wife that employs abundant twisting and inverted interpretation of proverbs and profanity about his sexual impotence.

After researching, I realized that this poem can be regarded as a criticism of the putative wit of man, especially for a storyteller like Aesop, who, according to Duffy's poem, can actually be a man with no sense of humor or real philosophical ideas, but jealous of the powerful, as the animal characters in his proverbs do.

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Originally, my opinion of the poem was that it was generally humourous, depicting a seperate perspective. Through some analysis and research, I was able to recognise the quantity of allusions to both modern and historical relationships, allusions to ideas such as fragile masculinity and narcissism, and how the poem doesn’t really focus on Aesop specifically, but is more a connection to existing types of toxic relationships. The conversational tone with language that exists after Mrs. Aesop’s existence (by christ) reinforce the idea that the poem was never really about Aesop in Greece, painting it as if is a friendly conversation in a modern setting, providing a powerful allusion that critiques fragile masculinity/false identities.

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https://literarydevices.net/mrs-aesop/

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The best Mrs Aesop study guide on the planet. The fastest way to understand the poem’s meaning, themes, form, rhyme scheme, meter, and poetic devices.

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For all enquiries, complaints, threats and hate mail visit pestcontroloffice.com. Banksy is not on Facebook, Twitter or represented by any other gallery or institution.

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A suburban neighborhood that is in the middle of a flood.

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Gradual decay of a suburban neighborhood. "gradual as glaciers."

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control over people, forcing them through societal stereotypes

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Ignorance = Fear / Silence = Death (1989) - Keith Haring

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Global Issue: Oppression

Image -

It is made to challenge the government’s inadequate response to the HIV/AIDS crisis

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Flood destroying a classic American suburb neighborhood

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"When the houses, capsized, will slide obliquely into the clay seas, gradual as glaciers that right now nobody notices"

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Take a drive through Margaret Atwood’s sinister suburban poem to find out who the City Planners are - and what they really want. This blog is illustrated by Alistair Hunt. If you would like to contact Alistair you can find him here on LinkedIn. Atwood is... acutely aware of the problem of alienation, the need for real human communication and the establishment of genuine human community—real as opposed to mechanical or manipulativeGloria Onley, West Coast Review. You may have heard of Margaret Atwood thanks to the success of the television adaptation of her most famous novel, The Handmaid’s Tale. This novel was published in 1985 and presaged the release of other works of speculative fiction exploring dystopian near-futures during and after environmental catastrophe: Oryx and Crake, The Year of the Flood, MaddAddam. This theme is at play in today’s poem too, in which the gridded, orderly blueprints of our towns and cities are designed by a sinister cabal of City Planners. While their built environments are superficially ‘perfect,’ laid out in straight rows and clean lines, they seem inimical to any sense of life, warmth, or community feeling. Atwood’s speaker, as she drives around one such city suburb with her family, feels like an unwelcome intruder. She doesn’t share the City Planners’ vision of urbanized utopia, the spreading of more and more concrete over the natural world. Buried far beneath the city’s solid veneer, Atwood’s speaker glimpses traces of the real, natural landscape that the City Planners are trying to hide. Suddenly her gaze shifts into the far future; after a huge environmental shift, the city has collapsed into the ground and a new ice age has returned. Yet still the City Planners pursue their mad quest to control not only the people who live in their dystopian cities, but the very landscape, the entirety of the natural world, as well: Cruising these residential Sunday
streets in dry August sunlight:
what offends us is
the sanities:
the houses in pedantic rows, the planted
sanitary trees, assert
levelness of surface like a rebuke
to the dent in our car door.
No shouting here, or
shatter of glass; nothing more abrupt
than the rational whine of a power mower
cutting a straight swathe in the discouraged grass. But though the driveways neatly sidestep hysteria
by being even, the roofs all display
the same slant of avoidance to the hot sky,
certain things;
the smell of spilt oil a faint
sickness lingering in the garages,
a splash of paint on brick surprising as a bruise,
a plastic hose poised in a vicious
coil; even the too-fixed stare of the wide windows give momentary access to
the landscape behind or under the future cracks in the plaster when the houses, capsized, will slide
obliquely into the clay seas, gradual as glaciers
that right now nobody notices. That is where the City Planners
with the insane faces of political conspirators
are scattered over unsurveyed
territories, concealed from each other,
each in his own private blizzard; guessing directions, they sketch
transitory lines rigid as wooden borders
on a wall in the white vanishing air tracing the panic of suburb
order in a bland madness of snows. The beginning of this poem could be the start of an Alfred Hitchcock thriller or an episode of The Twilight Zone, where all the residents of an ordinary small town turn out to be in a devil’s cult or perpetrators of a secret cloning experiment. Something’s wrong… but you’d be hard pressed to put your finger on precisely what it is. The speaker of the poem is driving with her family (she says us in line three and our in line eight) around the residential streets of an ordinary suburban area; white picket fences, tree lined streets, driveways, and mail-boxes set up by patches of lawn. Atwood is a Canadian poet, so imagine any North American-style suburban town and you should be able to visualise the setting quite well. The sun is out but it doesn’t provide any warmth, it’s crisp and dry and chilling. It should be a relaxing Sunday drive (cruising implies they’ve got nowhere particular to be, just driving around to pass the time) but something has got the speaker’s hackles up, a pervading feeling of wrongness that emanates from her surroundings. This kind of small town is supposed to represent wholesomeness, family, community, and belonging – but the speaker feels the opposite. To her the town is alienating and even hostile. She uses words such as offends and rebuke (meaning she’s being ‘scolded’ or ‘told off’) to make it clear that she feels like an outsider. For a thorough breakdown of all the images in the poem, and much more, visit the shop and download the Study Bundle for The City Planners. The bundle contains a detailed powerpoint, with all the notes you’ll need on the poetic and technical features of the poem - and you can edit it with your own annotations as well. Alongside this resource, you’ll find worksheets, a fun quiz, essay questions and more. If you need help with your analytical writing there’s an essay writing resource with advice on how to plan - and a complete, top-grade model essay for you to see how it’s done. The way Atwood describes the town makes it seem planned so rigidly and laid out so inflexibly, that it actually feels quite oppressive, transforming her casual weekend outing into a tour through a prison camp. An overly oppressive sense of order and control is developed through a series of visual images that depict straight lines and precise, co-ordinated shapes: pedantic rows, planted sanitary trees, levelness of surface, straight swathe and the way the roofs of the town all display the same slant. There’s a sense that everything is smoothed flat, all the sharp, messy edges of life smoothed away, implied by words such as levelness, rows and straight. Such rigid adherence to order and organisation psychically affects the speaker who intrudes into and disrupts the order of the town. Her family represent dis-order, symbolised by the dent in our car door. They are just a little too messy and, well… normal to fit in to such an artificially perfect place. The town not only antagonises the speaker, but also opposes the natural world: the grass is mown straight, the roofs angle themselves away from the hot sky; even the trees are purposefully planted to create the illusion of nature where none in fact exists. They are described as sanitary, an eerie sonic echo of sanities, as if the trees have been cleansed and sterilised and recruited onto the opposite side of a war against nature, which is too wild, free, and unpredictable for the City Planners to stomach. The word sanities is actually used ironically; ‘sanity’ is the opposite of insane and means ‘not crazy’ – conversely, the poem develops the theme that a too-fixed and overly pedantic obsession with rationality is its own kind of madness. The windows stare at the speaker threateningly - but they also provide her a reflected glimpse of the truth buried beneath the City Planners’ urban environment. The feeling of lifelessness in what should be a thriving town is enhanced when you realise, somewhere towards the end of the second verse, that there’s no people anywhere. The town is empty – but it’s an uncanny, B-movie emptiness, as if everybody is attending the same cult meeting, or have been mysteriously evacuated, or are purposely hiding themselves away for some sinister reason. To draw attention to this strange lack of flesh-and-blood inhabitants, Atwood uses personification so the town seem like it’s running itself; the power mower whines and is cutting a straight swathe through a perfectly manicured lawn, but nobody is described pushing it along. The driveways sidestep, the roofs avoid the sky, the trees assert and rebuke and the poor, over-managed grass feels discouraged. There seems to be a latent threat of violence hanging in the air and frequently Atwood uses diction that suggests hostility or threat: shouting, shatter, cutting, bruise, poised, vicious. At one point she describes the sound of a lawn mower as a whine, an onomatopoeia of the sound an animal makes when it’s afraid or in distress. The feeling is very unsettling. All this builds to the uncomfortable too-fixed stare of the wide windows, as if the buildings – or unseen figures lurking within – are watching her threateningly, judgementally. Sibilance and imagery combine to crate the impression of a hidden threat just below the surface of the town - symbolized by a hosepipe poised in a vicious coil like a snake waiting to attack. As being in the town is an unpleasant and even intimidating experience, Atwood arranges patterns of sound to help transmit this feeling to her readers. She frequently employs hard consonant sounds from every possible category: plosive P and B, dental D and T, and hard guttural C and K sounds. The poem opens with one of these gutturals that immediately undermines the relaxing connotations of cruising; what should be an easy afternoon’s drive is fraught with tension as they explore the hostile, deserted streets. Such hard sounds imply the threat of violence, also suggested through simile when a splash of brightly coloured paint marks the monotony of a blank brick wall like a bruise. Atwood foregrounds these sounds using alliteration (where words begin with the same letter, for instance, pedantic/planted… dent in our car door… plastic hose poised…) and consonance which repeats letters anywhere in a word: cutting a straight swathe in the discouraged grass. She presses hard consonants together so they clash unpleasantly: a splash of paint on brick surprising as a bruise compresses an impressive number of plosive sounds into a single line, and rebuke to the dent in our car door releases a cacophony of noises that jangles in the ear (cacophony is the clashing together of consonant sounds that do not blend or harmonise). Underneath everything hisses a sharp sibilance, insinuating itself into almost every line of the first two verses like a snake in the grass: Cruising these residential Sunday streets in dry August sunlight and sanitary trees assert levelness of surface are two lines that demonstrate the effectiveness of this sound, symbolically associated with snakes and therefore – thanks to the biblical story of a snake tempting Adam and Eve’s fall from paradise – evil, suggesting the underlying ‘wrongness’ of the town. At one moment she even describes a plastic hose poised in a vicious coil as if it really is a poisonous snake lying in wait for an unsuspecting intruder. The madness and futility of trying to impose such absolute order so inflexibly on the world is revealed through certain things the writer sees at the end of verse two. No matter how completely the City Planners try to erase anything that doesn’t conform to their idea of a perfect town, life is inherently messy, accidents happen all the time, and people’s spontaneous desires can’t be permanently repressed. Someone has spilt oil somewhere, there’s a random splash of paint on a wall, and a hose has been left lying around carelessly. All three of these instances symbolise the futility of the City Planner’s efforts to erase spontaneity, chaos and disorder from human lives. In this section of the poem, we start to realise that these certain things are not threatening to the speaker, although she certainly feels wary, but threatening to the minds behind the town’s design. From their point of view tiny deviations such as the smell of spilt oil are like a sickness, as if the town can be metaphorically ‘infected’ by carelessness, and no amount of frantic scrubbing can fully ‘cure’ the illness of clumsiness. Similarly, the splash of paint becomes a bruise turning an innocuous slip of the brush into an act of vandalism; the hose is poised on the edge of a vicious attack. To anyone inured to such a bland, grey vision of the world, these unexpected twists and splashes of colour must be surprising and shocking. But for the speaker, and for us, they reveal glimpses of the truth hidden behind the City Planner’s brutalist designs – they can’t keep the real world, with all the inherent messiness and chaos of life, walled up completely. At the end of verse two, the speaker’s attention is transfixed by the too-fixed stare of the wide windows – and the poem creates the effect of her being slowly drawn into the smoky glass. Once she’s penetrated beneath the illusion of solidity the City Planners have created, she’s granted momentary access to a vision of the real, living landscape that’s buried beneath the City Planner’s vulgar, dystopian town. I love what happens to the poem’s form when she begins to experience this vision. It’s like we’re watching that Twilight Zone episode again, and the camera zooms in on the actor’s face while the background remains bizarrely still. The way the vision hypnotically unfolds in the speaker’s mind is evoked through enjambment linking verse three to verse two seamlessly. There’s no full stop at the end of the second verse so the poem just keeps going, crossing over the intervening white space as if crossing a threshold between ‘now’ and what will be in the future. The third verse takes all the town’s straight lines and skews them, folding them up and screwing up the City Planners’ orderly blueprints with the phrase behind or under. Where the poem is frequently interrupted and truncated in verses one and two, as if lines of poetry are roads in the town that need controlling (caesura, deliberate breaks in lines of poetry, made with colons, semi-colons and short lines leaving plenty of blank space create this impression), verses three and four are fluid, with barely any interruption to the flow of words. Having felt so confined, suddenly the prison walls melt away as the world shifts into a new, post-human epoch. In an incredible vision of the future, the speaker sees the city destroyed by inevitable climate shifts - and the world engulfed in a new ice age. As we’re propelled forward in time, we see cracks in the plaster that break the City Planner’s spell and pretty soon the whole town is revealed to be a film-set sham hiding the real world behind its thin, pretend veneer. Where the fake, plastic town asserts levelness and order, we now see the natural world ‘reassert’ its own chaos. The cracks of entropy and decay are processes inherent to life that can be temporarily disguised, but not reversed or eradicated. Projecting into the far future, the speaker imagines a time when the houses… will slide obliquely into the clay seas, obliquely being a word that pointedly contrasts with the City Planners’ rigid adherence to straightness and order above all else. Where verbs were either absent, muted (like planted) or negated in the opening verse (no shouting here, or shatter of glass) now the poem presents a vivid image of powerful movement as the entire city slides into the ground. While the City Planners think their constructions and monuments are permanent, Atwood’s speaker suddenly presents them as flimsy and temporary, implied through the word capsized, as if the houses in the town are metaphorical boats; instead of standing on firm foundations, they merely float for a while before the natural and inevitable shift in the world’s climate drags them under a topographical tidal wave. She remembers that the earth is not immobile, but in constant motion – even the mountains grow and shrink over the centuries. Of course, these processes occur imperceptibly slowly, so the phrase gradual as glaciers reminds us that evolution is measured in geological time, over thousands and millions of years. While nobody notices, change is nevertheless inevitable and irresistible; the speaker is certainly gripped by the truth of her vision, as implied by the modal verb will, conveying a strong degree of certainty as to what is going to happen. Enjambment again comes to the fore in this middle section of the poem, crossing the white space between verses as if crossing eons of time and letting lines flow one into the other in mimicry of the houses slipping slowly-but-surely into the ground. Opposing sounds reinforce the conflict between human and natural worlds, the former accompanied by a weak sounding N (now nobody notices), the latter by powerful, guttural alliteration (capsized, clay, gradual, glaciers) throughout this verse. Despite what they might like to think, the City Planners are lost in the snow, crazily pursuing their mad quest to control nature and people both. Finally, in verse five, Atwood brings the titular City Planners into the poem. These people symbolise forces of urbanisation which, by definition, encroach on our remaining natural spaces. They are authority figures who control our cities and towns, urban planners who make decisions about our built environments, determining where and how we can live. However, in a clever twist on the name Planners, which implies organisation, forethought, and an ability to work together as a team, they are instead depicted as disorganised, frantic, and incoherent. They are lost, scattered over unsurveyed territories (a phrase implying the natural world is just a development opportunity to them) and instead of following a proper plan, they are guessing directions. They are concealed from each other, every individual marooned inside his or her own private blizzard with no way of seeing beyond the ends of their own noses, let alone communicating and coordinating with others in their team. Atwood’s decision to write her poem in free verse really pays off here, as the absence of any underlying rhythm or rhyme scheme reflects the total lack of coherence in their designs. They are constantly described using diction from the lexical field of ‘mania’ (hysteria, insane, panic, madness) leaving us in no doubt that, in the opinion of the poet, these people are motivated as much by their own insecurities and fears as they are by lust for control. She uses metaphor to describe their faces in a way that renames them political conspirators; Atwood believes these people have no real interest in landscaping, city planning or design, rather they manipulate our physical environments as a way of exerting control over our lives and staving off their existential fear of destruction as the world spins inevitably into the future and massive climate change exposes the insignificance of our short-sighted human civilisations. The ultimate futility of the City Planners’ war against nature is highlighted through a series of impossible contrasts and paradoxical images: transitory lines are described as rigid; a solid wall vanishes into thin air; order contrasts with panic; bland madness is an oxymoron (a kind of juxtaposition where contrasting words are paired improbably together). Despite their efforts to build permanently over the natural landscape, snow and ice become the defining motifs (a motif is a symbol that keeps recurring in a text) of the last half of the poem, as if the world has been plunged into a new ice age: glaciers, blizzard, white vanishing air, madness of snows. These powerful elemental forces engulf the City Planners so that the speaker sees them only from a distance, a perspective that makes them appear small and powerless, their frantic attempts to continue their mad work under these conditions just looks pathetic. As the illusion of authority is stripped from her – and our – eyes, we are all freed to question the right of the City Planners to dictate how our present-day world should look and feel. Suggested poems for comparison: The Moment by Margaret Atwood In this lovely poem by the same writer, a woman feels close to nature - so close she feels she owns parts of it. But then the natural world begins to withdraw, and she is forced to reassess her relationship to the natural world. The Second Coming by William Butler Yeats If you enjoy post-apocalyptic poetry, you might like this famous poem by Yeats, who imagines the destruction of the world by a terrifying beast representing all the forces of nature. This poem is where the famous line ‘Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold’ comes from. The Planners by Boey Kim Chung A perfect companion for Atwood’s poem, Boey Kim Chung writes about the expansion of his home, Singapore, in a similar way. In this poem, City Planners are like dentists, anaesthetising you against any reaction to the pain they cause as they plan, demolish, rebuild, expand, in a never-ending cycle of relentless urbanisation. Additional Resources If you are teaching or studying The City Planners at school or college, or if you simply enjoyed this analysis of the poem and would like to discover more, you might like to purchase our bespoke study bundle for this poem. So that you can see for yourself how effective our resources are, for now, this bundle is free in the store. The Study Bundle is full of well-designed activities, like this page from the revision booklet, to help you or your students come to and record a deep understanding of poetry. Study Questions with guidance on how to answer in full paragraphs. A sample ‘Point-Evidence-Explanation-Analysis’ paragraph to model analytical essay writing. An interactive and editable powerpoint, giving line-by-line analysis of all the poetic and technical features of the poem. An in-depth worksheet with a focus on explaining figurative imagery in poetry. A fun crossword quiz, perfect for a starter activity, revision or a recap – now with answers provided separately. A four-page activity booklet that can be printed and folded into a handout – ideal for self study or revision. 4 practice Essay Questions – and one complete Model Essay for you to use as a style guide. Download Study Bundle And… discuss! Did you enjoy this breakdown of Margaret Atwood’s poem? What did you feel when you first followed the speaker through the sinister suburb? Do you think it’s a dystopian poem as well? Why not share your ideas, ask a question, or leave a comment for others to read below.

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Model Essay & Free Resources: The City Planners by Margaret Atwood - Taughtly

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Model essay for The City Planners for IGCSE Literature in English 0475, plus four free lessons and a fifteen-page worksheet. Access for free!

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The Guardia-Ben Jennings - BPS Iran's War Profit

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The Guardia-Ben Jennings - BPS Iran's War Profit

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https://www.theguardian.com/international

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In his song “Alright,” Kendrick Lamar uses direct address towards the listener to represent resistance against racial discrimination. For Example, when he raps “ Wouldn't you know
We been hurt, been down before, When our pride was low, Lookin' at the world like, "Where do we go?” The technique of directly addressing the audience and using first person plural suggests that the lyrics accuses the white audience of being ignorant of the past “wouldn’t you know” and also connecting to black audience with the use of ‘we’ in the lyrics. This connects to the global issue of racial discrimination because of the use of the language in the lyrics.

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In his song, Lamar uses repetition to represent resistance against racism and systemic discrimination. For example, when he raps "we're gonna be alright" at the finale of the performance before the eventual soliloquy and being shot down by the white police officer's "handgun" from the light pole, the technique suggest that the plausible motif of "Alright" and repeated reassurance of "we're gonna be alright" isn't true at all, but the exact opposite of being exerted upon police violence is the ultimate ending for African American individuals on the streets. This connects the global issue of racism as the reassurance contradicts the reality-reflecting visuals being played dramatically.

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In his song “alright”, Kendrick Lamar uses contrast to represent resistance against police brutality and racial segregation. For example, when he raps “And we hate Po-Po (police), wann shoot us dead in the street fo sho”, followed closely by the chorus: “we gon be alright”. Lamar contrasts the suffering of black Americans from police brutality to hope, spreading the belief that the situation of black Americans will improve, that despite the violence and segregation of their race, they’re able to remain hopeful. This connects to the global issue of police brutality because it ties to the ongoing Black Lives Matter protests at the time, where Black Americans rioted against police violence and racial segregation in modern day America.

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In his song “Alright,” Kendrick Lamar uses repetition to represent resistance against systemic racism and police violence. For example, when he repeats the line “We gon’ be alright,” the repetition suggests an insistence that survival and dignity can be maintained even in conditions designed to threaten Black life. This connects to the global issue of racism and violence because it transforms the hook into a steady form of resistance, emphasizing that hope is not naively optimistic but a response to violence occured.

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In the middle of a song that uses direct address to unite listeners, the silence where “po-po” would normally appear is striking Rather than blending into the music, the beat is interrupted in a way that draws attention to the limits of what can be said in a mainstream broadcast context. It reshapes the emotional force of the protest, making the censored gap feel like the most memorable part of the delivery.

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Although the tight competition between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals was the main attraction on Sunday night, one of the highlights of Super Bowl LVI was undoubtedly the 2022 Halftime Show. Three years after the culturally out-of-tune Atlanta Halftime Show that featured Maroon 5 as headliners, the Roc Nation-produced event brought viewers to a full-fledged Hip-Hop concert, led by Dr. Dre and a handful of his most notable protégés and collaborators. And it was one hell of a show.

The halftime festivities kicked off with Dr. Dre emerging from the top of a massive all-white house as the instrumental to "The Next Episode" started to fill SoFi Stadium, and just moments after the crowd showered the legendary producer with applause, Snoop Dogg had everyone's heads bobbing as he performed his classic verse from the record. Snoop and Dre soon met in the middle of the massive set to perform "California Love," and immediately after, viewers were treated with a surprise guest performance from 50 Cent. While his recreation of the "In Da Club" music video likely flew over many young fans' heads, the excitement that 50's cameo created was palpable. Once Mary J. Blige took over from there to perform the Dr. Dre-produced "Family Affair" and her 2001 hit single "No More Drama," it was clear that this Super Bowl Halftime Show was unlike any other that Hip-Hop fans had witnessed before. From Snoop Dogg being in extreme Crip mode to the fact that four Hip-Hop and R&B legends had already taken the stage just halfway through the show, it was already shaping up to be one for the books.

Ronald Martinez/Getty Images

An uncontrollable excitement had been established during this year's halftime spectacle, but once the show shifted to Kendrick Lamar's "m.A.A.d. city"/"Alright" medley, fans were reminded that the Super Bowl Halftime Show is still an NFL-sanctioned event. In fact, viewers were made aware of that on two separate occasions during Kendrick Lamar's solo performance. The first reminder came at the start of "m.A.A.d. City," when the classic chant "If Pirus and Crips all got along" was heavily censored to block out any mention of either gang. While the decision to censor that line took a little steam out of K. Dot's intro, it wasn't necessarily a bad call given the fact that no corporation would likely feel comfortable name-dropping two of the most notorious gangs on one of the most-watched broadcasts of the year. However, as previously stated, Snoop Dogg didn't seem to care about that rule in the slightest, as he proudly chucked up his C's throughout the show and yelled "Crip" during his performance of "The Next Episode." Despite that strange - and admittedly funny - disconnect between Snoop Dogg and Kendrick Lamar, the second reminder of the NFL's longstanding attitude about racism and injustice came during Kendrick Lamar's performance of "Alright," and that one was significantly harder to stomach.

After powering through "m.A.A.d city" and the first verse of "Alright," the intro track "Blood." But beyond Kendrick Lamar's legacy or personal motives behind not rapping the word "po-po" on Sunday night, that unnecessary censorship hurts even more in February. During Black History Month, To Pimp A Butterfly artist butchered one of his most infamous and most relatable lines: "Nigga, and we hate po-po/Wanna kill us dead in the street fo sho'." Instead, Kendrick rapped, "We hate...Wanna kill us dead in the street fo sho." For viewers unfamiliar with the Compton-bred artist's catalog, the censoring of "po-po" likely didn't even stand out to them. However, for Hip-Hop fans who have thoroughly studied Kendrick Lamar's work, hearing K. Dot refrain from rapping "po-po" hurt. Sure, the drummer - whether it was Anderson .Paak or one of the other percussionists on-stage - did deliver two loud hits in its place, but in the midst of such as important historical moment for Hip-Hop, Kendrick's brief silence was deafening. On one hand, Kendrick has ridiculed Fox Reporters Eric Bolling & Kimberly Guilfoyle in the past for slamming that line - and in turn, reducing a traumatizing Black experience - on live television, as evidenced by his Damn Black Future Month, or whatever you wish to call it. And just weeks after the highly publicized and scrutinized police shooting of 22-year-old Amir Locke in Minneapolis.

Steph Chambers/Getty Images

While Kendrick Lamar's decision to refrain from saying "and we hate po-po" during an event hosted by the same sports organization that blackballed Black person slain by police over the internet, they got two drum hits. The situation is reminiscent of a line from Colin Kaepernick for similarly speaking up about police brutality will undoubtedly be a topic of debate for weeks, months, and years to come, this essay isn't meant to criticize the "family ties" artist or any of his fellow performers from Sunday night. It just has to be said that instances like these hurt. Black culture was being touted as top-tier entertainment throughout the Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show, yet when Black Hip-Hop fans, and Black viewers in general, could have benefitted from hearing the unfiltered version of Kendrick Lamar's now-timeless protest anthem to help cope with the ongoing trauma of seeing another Macklemore - of all people - on 2016's "White Privilege II," in which the controversial Seattle-bred rapper said, "We take all we want from black culture, but will we show up for black lives?"

So regardless of whether the censorship of "po-po" is a reflection of the NFL's strict censorship over artists, a decision independently made by Kendrick Lamar, or the byproduct of an extremely criticized partnership between the NFL and Jay-Z 's Roc Nation, it doesn't matter - moments like that are painful. Now, whenever Black fans remember what was otherwise a phenomenal Super Bowl Halftime Show, we'll remember the stacked line-up of Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, and Eminem as well as the untimely butchering of one of Kendrick Lamar's most uplifting songs.

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Kendrick Lamar's Censorship Of "Po-Po" Line At Super Bowl Is A Painful Reminder

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During the star-studded Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show, Kendrick Lamar didn't rap the infamous "Alright" line, "we hate po-po," and the brief silence from that moment was deafening.

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Lamar's the "wrong guy" to lead the revolution

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Lamar's the "wrong guy" to lead the revolution

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It discusses whether Kendrick Lamar could be the right person to advocate for respect, rights, and egalitarianism. On the other hand, he isn't willing to sacrifice his reputation and stardom to criticize white suprematist elites and being black-listed by the NFL

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Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show Exposed the Limitations of Subversive Messaging During the ‘Great American Game’

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The Compton MC took several big swings with his record-breaking halftime show performance, but did any of them pay off?

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displays the chaos mid-riot, yet also simultaneously generating a feeling of hope. This stems from the raised fist, as well as the expression of the person within the image, looking forward.

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The censorship of po-po in the Super Bowl performace changes the original meaning of song of not being in someone's control. by censoring the words po po, it contradicts the original meaning of freedom.

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by Gil Scott-Heron

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The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron - Songfacts

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The Revolution Will Not Be Televised by Gil Scott-Heron song meaning, lyric interpretation, video and chart position

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From Pete Seeger to Billie Holiday to Rage Against the Machine to Kendrick Lamar, musicians of all genres have spoken truth to power

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A Closer Look at “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” by Gil Scott-Heron

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A Closer Look at “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” by Gil Scott-Heron

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A Closer Look at “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” by Gil Scott-Heron

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“The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” is a spoken-word song written and performed by Gil Scott-Heron that looks to personal awakening as the means of bringing about a revolutionary cultural change. In it, there are truths Christians can affirm, but the longing for justice and restoration the song expresses will only come about through Christ and his kingdom.

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Gil Scott-Heron - Home Is Where the Hatred Is (Official Audio)

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Gil Scott-Heron - Home Is Where the Hatred Is (Official Audio)

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"I am a native-born Californian who grew up on the south side of Los Angeles. On 27 May, I had just finished documenting the first active protest in downtown LA when later that evening, I saw on the news that the city of Minneapolis was bracing itself for a second night of vast protesting. I booked a flight and flew out the next morning.

Surprisingly, when I hit the ground and began photographing, I felt a deep sense of acceptance. Everyone embraced me as if I were their own. Different men would say "Let this black man through", or "Go ahead black man." I felt that the community embraced the fact that I was a black man who genuinely desired to tell their story as a whole.

Although I was an independent photographer, community leaders gave me special access to photograph in intimate areas and spaces. Throughout the day, I was photographing: joy, mourning, and reflectance; and at the end of the night, I was photographing anger, frustration, and turmoil.

With a collection of photographs, I began telling the stories of the community in ways that portrayed its cry for change. Already feeling angry and grieved by the most recent killings of my people, I began to connect with the story on an even deeper level.

There have been many times where I've had to drop the viewfinder from my eye and wipe away the tears, so I could continue documenting. After hearing mother after mother get up and speak on how they lost their sons to police brutality, I couldn't help but to feel physically and emotionally drained.

Almost every night, when editing photos, I feel the tears welling up and I'm reminded of the many faces, cries and pleas I've seen and heard throughout the day. I will not stop documenting until I see the change, sought after, come to fruition."

"Images are like languages. While with different languages, many of us can hear and speak the words or extract the meanings, sometimes we still won't know how to translate things perfectly, sometimes our real accents will still be there. In those cases we look to a native speaker to translate, to teach us, to give us the correct pronunciation or best meaning. That's what I see black photographers and photojournalists to be at this moment, and for this movement. The translators of these times and the teachers of our stories.

We have studied inequality for centuries, to exist, to survive, to be successful in a world where black excellence is not normalised ... it meant we had to understand this difficult language. We've experienced it in ways our white counterparts have not and luckily for them probably will never have to.

The solidarity through marching or protesting is incredible, but understand that black creativity and expression was birthed out of mental marching and protesting to control our image and our narrative for years. When we wanted to express ourselves and struggles, we understood the necessity to visually communicate with each other, when no one else cared to look, listen or understand.

When you get that, when you see how deep it is, you understand why certain images and stories are not always yours to tell or to translate - there's a chance that you yourself could not fully understand that language. So now more than ever, images are acting as messages and it is critical to make sure those sharing the messages best understand the language and what needs to be said."

"Black communities across the country are facing the risk of losing their life to a deadly virus or a deadly system.

Detroit is an incredibly resilient city that's had its fair share of struggles yet remains fuelled by the most innovative, determined and passionate people you will ever come across. Protesters I spoke with are so tired of fighting for their mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, daughters, sons and everyone else who they love.

The exhaustion, fear, pain, and passion Detroiters are feeling could be felt as they chanted Breonna Taylor and George Floyd's names on the streets of the city.

I witnessed people in pain, people in love, and people whose strength and spirit inspired me to keep documenting. I also saw many quiet moments of love and tenderness that reminded me this is not a fight we can win alone.

Watching families in southwest Detroit neighbourhoods peeking out of their homes and venturing outside to watch hundreds of protesters march through their neighbourhoods, I felt it was representative of where many in our nation are at. More people are stepping out of the spaces they're familiar with to speak up for what they believe is right and witness something powerful.

Whether allies are supporting from a porch, or they're on the other side of the fence marching through the streets. To me these protests are a sign of real change. I've never seen people so tired, yet so determined to fight for change.

I think we've reached a critical point in time, really a breaking point and people can't take any more. People are simply sick and tired of seeing unarmed, black people being murdered. There's a palpable hunger for change in the air and they won't stop until they get it."

"Sharp bangs echo through the streets near the Hall of Justice. A foreign, astringent smell lingers through the air with a subtle burn that stings greater with each breath. White clouds hover over the scattering crowds, reflecting a blue and red pulse from the countless police vehicles that line the block.

This is the first night of civil unrest in Louisville, Kentucky. We are being attacked while killers walk free. The death of sleeping Breonna Taylor at the hands of Louisville Metro officers sparks outrage - only amplified by the more recent and televised police killing of George Floyd.

Daily, we flood the pavement with our bodies and commandeer an intersection. Next, we march through the streets, take over the following block, speak our truth, and move on. We lie flat on the street, we raise our open hands, and then form a single fist, and we kneel. We approach the thick black line of heavily armoured men blocking our path.

Looking down the lines of demonstrators, you notice the sea of scrunched faces anticipating the sudden pain of projectiles. Other faces are determined. Many more faces stare, eyebrows raised, below them, cloudy eyes welling with tears. We shall be heard.

Organisation among this newfound family in the movement takes place seemingly overnight. Supply tents are erected one morning, stocked with water bottles and snacks. Homemade tear gas neutraliser kits are handed out to those who will be holding the line. Supporters of the movement work diligently collecting donated goods to help sustain demonstrators on the frontlines. We wear gas masks, make shields, and prepare for the impending use of force once the sun sets behind the clock tower of City Hall. David McAtee is killed later this evening.

The following days are peaceful. Our demands now include retribution for McAtee, whose passing remains shrouded in mystery. Who will be the next name added to our chants? Through our anger, we also celebrate the life of Breonna Taylor just a few days later on what should have been her 27th birthday. We shout through tears of sorrow mixed with the sweat of long marches. We dance in commemoration of these lives lost. We aim to show a system that no longer serves us that we only need each other. The involuntary sacrifice of Breonna Taylor sparked a movement that will change the world as we know it. It is apparent that we are transforming Jefferson Square Park into a monument for this pivotal moment in world history. We continue to stand for justice, because without it, there can be no peace."

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Capturing the cry for change: photographers on the BLM protests

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Four black photographers write about their experiences covering the Black Lives Matter demonstrations, and what the protests mean to them

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MRS. H'S IB ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

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Whether you are a standard or higher level student, Paper 1 tests your ability to analyze unseen texts. If you are a standard level student, you will have to analyze one text out of a choice of two. If you are a higher level student you will be given the same two texts but you will have no choice: you must write an analysis of both texts. The texts will be unconnected - the topics and text types will be different - and you are not required to compare or contrast at all. You will essentially complete the same exercise twice. This is to reflect the greater number of lessons you will have had to explore a wider range of texts types, and the greater ability you should have when approaching texts by yourself. HL students will be given more time: 2 hours and 15 minutes compared to 1 hour and 15 minutes at standard level. All students will be given an optional guiding question that will focus your attention on important elements of the text, providing you with a 'way in' and helping you structure a worthwhile analysis.

There's no doubt that paper 1 is a challenging exam. It represents 35% of your grade at SL and 25% at HL. It will be impossible to predict the topics and exact texts that may appear in this exam paper. The range of possible text types is wide, as illustrated by the examples given in the IB syllabus guide. However, that doesn't mean you can't prepare for likely text types. In the past, comics and cartoons, advertisements, speeches, opinion pieces, infographics, magazine articles, news reports and travel writing have frequently appeared on this paper. Less common examples have been song lyrics, movie posters, letters and even texts from the past, such as an extract from Samuel Pepys' diary - he was an eyewitness to the Great Fire of London in 1666! Moreover, the IB subject guide is explicit in that you are not meant to exhaustively memorize features of different text types just in case one appears in your exam. Instead, you can learn approaches that are transferable to any text you are given and learn to recognize patterns of language that can help you analyze a text, ascertain its purpose and intended audience, and evaluate its success.

​Scroll down to find explainers and key conventions, along with sample papers and responses. All these answers would score highly if produced in this exam; perhaps even 20 out of 20. However, it is important to note that these responses demonstrate only one possible approach each time. Alternative responses can also be valid. Discuss the responses with your classmates and teacher as you go through the course, and revise before your assessments and exams. Once you have read and written a few sample responses, you'll be able to find strategies that work for you and will allow you to succeed in Paper 1, whatever text you may encounter.

The world of advertising is enormous, a classroom study of this text type might easily make up a good chunk of your course - and you'll still have only scratched the surface of what this wide and varied genre has to offer. Unsurprisingly, advertisement texts have been extremely popular in Paper 1. They tend to be persuasive and you can easily learn a few key features to look out for. Studying the language of advertising claims and investigating issues like representation are interesting in their own right, and improving your media literacy when it comes to analyzing images and knowing when you're being manipulated or conned is an important aim of the IB Lang and Lit course. Advertising can be extremely creative too, and striking the balance between recognizing effective writing and being skeptical about the things you read can make the difference between a good answer and a great one in Paper 1. Take a look through some of these examples to find common patterns of analysis that you can apply to your analysis of adverts you encounter:
SAMPLE RESPONSES: TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF ADVERTISEMENTS

Problem and benefit: also called "benefit and need," the success of any advert depends upon appealing to the desires of its readers.

Image: a major component of modern advertising, images often tell visual narratives, or employ tactics such as 'shock value' or 'sex sells.'

Advertising claims: favourites include the use of weasel words, scientific claims, vague language, or bandwagon claims. There are many more for you to look out for, and you might also keep an eye out for jargon which sounds impressive, but doesn't communicate meaning.

Persuasion: adverts are always persuasive. Even ads that are not trying to sell you a product or service might be asking you to think something, change your behaviour or help someone. Look out for any and all kinds of persuasive devices in advertising.

A sub-category of advertising, charity appeals attempt to recruit you on behalf of a good cause and often ask you to donate either time or money. They are extremely persuasive, and often rely on similar methods to conventional advertising and persuasive speaking, tending to have more copy than conventional adverts. Take a look at the sample analyses to different charity appeals here and notice the elements they have in common:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF CHARITY APPEALS

Persuasive: the purpose of charity adverts is to make the reader take action, probably in the form of money or time. Adjacent to this is the need to raise awareness of social problems. Therefore, look out for all kinds of persuasive rhetorical features in charity appeals.

Metonymy: social problems like hunger and poverty are too large for one person to help solve; so charity ads often introduce you to a single individual who represents all those who your donation goes towards helping.

Frequently associated with wartime propaganda, recruitment campaigns can be used in a variety of contexts to encourage people to support a cause. A hybrid category of advertising and persuasion, recruitment campaigns would traditionally have been waged with pamphlets, leaflets, brochures and posters. Increasingly, this text type is being driven online, although certain traditional features survive; in particular, you can look out for webpages being formatted in three parts, as if folded into a brochure. Take a look at a couple of these responses to recruitment texts, then have a go at writing your own:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF RECRUITMENT CAMPAIGNS

Visuals: can be wholly visual, but likely to have some accompanying text (multi-modal).

Card-stacking: a common feature of recruitment drives is they often fail to show the downsides of joining up! Ignoring parts of the argument that don't fit your agenda is called card-stacking.

Simplification:along with a host of other fallacies, recruitment campaigns reduce complex issues to simple solutions. They may also invoke stereotypes.

Symbolism: elements of the text will connote concepts that are integral to the writer's message. Look out for metonymy, where an individual is made to stand for the whole.

Learning the features of persuasion - and how persuasion and propaganda overlap - form a part of your lang and lit course. So if you happen to be given a persuasive speech in your final Paper 1 exam, you can count yourself lucky. Persuasive speeches are organised around clear formal frameworks, such as appeals to logic and emotional appeals, and also provide a chance for individual speakers to express themselves stylistically. Check the formal features of persuasive speeches opposite and, if you want to learn more, visit the course page for this unit of study. Then browse these sample responses to see how to put your learning into practice:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF SPEECHES

Persuasive: the speaker attempts to make his or her listener think in a certain way, believe something or take action.

Modality: modal verbs are small but important words (such as 'must', 'need', 'should', 'might,' and so on) that reveal the speaker's degree of certainty and strength of feeling. You can study modality here.

Rhetorical devices: all kinds of rhythmical, structural, auditory and linguistic tricks can be employed by a skilled speaker. They are too many to list here, but rhetorical strategies can be studied and learned.

​Often printed in newspapers or magazines, and sharing many of the features of persuasive speeches, the opinion piece is usually a thoughtfully considered argument about a controversial topic in which the writer takes a side or proposes a solution. Unlike other forms of text for mass consumption, the opinion piece does not pretend to be straight or unbiased. Although it may contain elements of concession or acknowledge the other side of the issue, the purpose of an opinion piece is to express an opinion in a convincing, persuasive or powerful way. An Op-Ed is a special type of opinion piece, normally shorter, which derived its name from its position opposite the editorial page. The op-ed carries the official position of the news institution on a topical issue of the day.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF OPINION COLUMNS

Perspective: as an expression of a personal viewpoint, the first person is most commonly adopted for opinion pieces. Look out for 'we' instead of 'I' - a clever way of implying the viewpoint is commonly held.

Solid Arguments: an opinion piece might open your eyes to the reality of an issue, providing facts, statistics and information to help convince you of the writer's viewpoint. Expect to see opinions backed up by studies, research or evidence of some kind. Keep an eye out for assertion, though, where a writer presents an opinion as if it were a fact.

Structure: the writer of an opinion piece is not trying to keep you in suspense and the opinion is often obvious from the title or first few lines of the article. The rest of the article should support or develop the writer's point in a number of ways. The ending should be strong and certain, perhaps reiterating the writer's position.

Register and tone: you should be especially alert to the writer's choices in this regard. Opinion pieces are often formal, but the writer may adopt an irreverent tone, be passionate, conversational, friendly, challenging, even sarcastic depending on the tactics used to convince you of a particular opinion.

You might study a graphic novel such as Persepolis or Maus as part of your literature course; you may also be presented with a comic strip or cartoon in Paper 1. Students enjoy comics and cartoons because they are engaging and colourful - but make no mistake. This text type can be as subtle and sophisticated as any novel (just check out the list of features opposite). If you want to become an expert in the comic book form, you might like to read Understanding Comics: the Invisible Art by Scott McCloud. Don't forget to check out one or two of the examples below, which demonstrate how this text type might be analysed in an exam:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF COMIC STRIPS

Exposition: text that tells the story is presented as captions.

Speech and thought bubbles: so you can read the internal and external dialogue of the characters.

Artistic style: comics are drawn purposefully and with intention. Are the pictures crisp, heavy, weighty, light, cartoony, realistic, bright, dark? Can you tell whether the artist used pencil, pen and ink, or brush? Words that describe mood and tone can be useful when analyzing graphic weight (shading and contrast) and saturation (brightness).

Punchline: especially apparent in four-panel comic strips, the joke is revealed in the last panel.

A wide ranging and popular text type, magazine articles differ from news articles in that they are not reporting recent events, but rather discussing events, issues, trends and topics that have a general, contemporary appeal. Increasingly, magazine articles are published online, as producers can reduce costs such as printing and distribution, and collect revenue through both subscriptions and advertising. There are many sub-categories of magazine article, such as the celebrity article, scientific article, interview and so on. Topics of a magazine article are wide, in truth it's possible to write about anything and publish it as an article; more common topics include fashion, entertainment, food, sport, and lifestyle.
SAMPLE RESPONSES: TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF SATIRICAL CARTOONS

Irony: meaning when one's actions contradict one's words. Look out for people in cartoons saying one thing and doing another.

Symbolism: objects, icons and even colors have specific associations. Sometimes items are labelled in the text to help the reader make associations.

Allusion: the cartoon may refer to historical or political events outside the text. The success of an allusion depends on the reader's ability to recognize it.

A wide ranging and popular text type, magazine articles differ from news articles in that they are not reporting recent events, but rather discussing events, issues, trends and topics that have a general, contemporary appeal. Increasingly, magazine articles are published online, as producers can reduce costs such as printing and distribution, and collect revenue through both subscriptions and advertising. There are many sub-categories of magazine article, such as the celebrity article, scientific article, interview and so on. Topics of a magazine article are wide, in truth it's possible to write about anything and publish it as an article; more common topics include fashion, entertainment, food, sport, and lifestyle.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF MAGAZINES

Layout: look out for box-outs, bullet points, ears and other kinds of layout features.

Often published in weekend magazines, and now increasingly online, interviews are the write-up of a conversation between a journalist (the interviewer) and an interviewee, normally a celebrity, expert in a field, or person in the public eye. Interviews are written to entertain or divert, but also fulfil the purpose of satisfying a reader's curiosity for information: whether about how a famous writer works, how an individual became successful, or simply the lifestyle of the rich and famous. When reading an interview, the focus is normally on the interviewee's thoughts and opinions. But look out for authorial intrusion, something you may have come across in your literary studies, where either directly or indirectly the writer of the article makes their opinions known as well.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF INTERVIEWS

Question-Answer: a recognisable feature of interviews in this format, which presents the questions asked and responses using quotations (direct speech).

Quotation: as an alternative to the question-answer format, you might see interviews written up as a magazine article. In this case you will see a mixture of direct quotation and indirect free speech.

Topics: the interview may be focused on one issue or may range across various topics. Look out for the interviewer asking leading questions to take the conversation in a particular direction.

Them-and-us: celebrity interviews tend to put interviewees on a pedestal. Look for ways in which the text creates a divide between celebrities and 'us', the reader, or represents the interviewee as special in some way.

It's difficult to imagine modern life without digital communication. Following the development of the internet, readers have been empowered to both consume and produce written and visual content at the same time. A popular form of online text type is the blogpost, normally shortened to 'blog.' In many ways, blogs have a lot in common with magazine articles and opinion pieces; but instead of media institutions deciding what we should read about, independent reader-writers decide the topics for themselves. For this reason, blogs can be quirky, niche, and carry counter-cultural messages. Have a look at a couple of these responses to the 'blog' text type:
TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF BLOGS

Viewpoint: blogs normally represent the interests and opinions of an individual, so are normally first person.

Visuals: blogs may illustrate the text with cartoons, images or photographs (perhaps illustrated or taken by the writers themselves).

Again, this is more a category of writing than a text type. Informational text range from cookbooks to technical manuals, encyclopedias to public service announcements. Informational texts are meant to appeal to your head rather than your heart. There may be some overlap between information texts and scientific articles. Moreover, infographics are a highly visual form of information text which you can study in detail (below). Take a look though one or two of these sample responses to see how you might analyse informational texts of different kinds.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF INFORMATION TEXTS

Typography: look for fonts, capitalizations, bold or italicized words, underlined words, or other features that help emphasize key points.

Short for information graphic, these little visual texts are designed to summarize and present complex information, knowledge and data. They might be posted on a wall, be printed in a magazine or textbook, be a feature in a magazine or, increasingly, spread online. Some brilliant designers work on creating infographics, and the best examples of this text type are almost works of art in themselves. Once you've studied the key features of infographics, try your hand at analyzing one or two of the samples below.
TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF INFOGRAPHICS

Audience: normally infographics are designed to reach as wide an audience as possible. As always look out for technical language that might indicate a niche audience.

Copy: infographics are multimodal, meaning there will be some brief text included. Look out for headlines, labels and snippets (brief chunks of text).

A sub-category of magazine articles and sharing features with information texts (above), general interest scientific articles can be drawn from publications such as National Geographic, New Scientist, Cosmos, Nature and more. There's an interesting investigation to be had in the study of language and literature into the tension between science and the arts and, by reading though the sample papers below, you'll notice how these two disciplines are not necessarily as different as you might think:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF SCIENTIFIC ARTICLES

Comparisons: some scientific concepts are quite abstract or complex, so writers of scientific articles might use similes and comparisons to make them easier for a wider readership to visualize.

Visuals: photographs, diagrams, charts and graphs are all likely to accompany and illustrate scientific concepts. Look out for more examples of simplification.

Structure: look out for both linear and non-linear structures and layouts, depending on the content. A text might provide a timeline or historical overview. Boxouts, summaries, explainers, glossaries can all help communicate complicated ideas.

Newspaper front pages and reports belong to broadly three categories: tabloid, broadsheet and online, each of which have their own particular conventions. You can study the news media in more depth by visiting the courses on journalism, bias, euphemism and the impact of technology on the news.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF NEWS WRITING

Headline: the choice of words in a headline is essential to the tone and angle of the story. There are many techniques involved in creating headlines and you should definitely learn: slammer; pun; alliteration; elliptical headlines (which only include the keywords).

Visuals: all newspapers make use of photographs to accompany stories. Tabloid papers are dominated by images while broadsheet papers tend to use smaller photographs. Look out for pictures of people's faces, which reveal emotion and create bias.

Figurative Language: anyone who still thinks the news is purely factual needs to go back to the start of the course! News reports are a rich source of metaphor, simile, hyperbole, and exaggeration, often distorting reality in some way.

Although descriptive writing is a major part of literary fiction, non-fiction writers may also write with the purpose of having you visualize a scene, event or person. Many forms of writing can be descriptive: autobiographies, travel articles, letters, diaries and blogs might all feature descriptive passages to one degree or another. Read through a sample response, then try your hand at analyzing a descriptive passage:
SAMPLE RESPONSES: TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF DESCRIPTIVE PASSAGES

Imagery: as writing which is drawn from direct experience, description always involves imagery. Humans perceive the world vividly using our visual sense - but don't forget about other ways of perception: sensory images can also be auditory, tactile, kinesthetic, and even olfactory (the sense of smell).

Modifiers: the function of adjectives and adverbs are to describe.

Arguably the most personal text type as the intended reader is usually... the writer him or herself. Almost since the advent of the written word, diaries have been kept by individuals to record daily events, reflect on personal experiences and try to make sense of the complex issues of society. A freeform text type, they tend to be more stylistic than formal, with each writer employing their own particular uses of language which reflects the way they see the world. That's not to say you can't prepare yourself for any eventuality - take a look at one or two of the responses below:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF DIARIES

Viewpoint: as one of the most personal text types, diaries are written in the first person and always express thoughts and feelings.

Perspective: diaries are written to be private as the reader and writer are the same person. Confessional is a particular form of diary writing that reveals a secret.

Colloquialism: the writer might write as if he or she is talking and may use figures of speech in an original or entertaining way.

It's not often you'll read a text that has a particular individual reader in mind, but letters are exactly that. Letters need reading carefully to discover the relationship between writer and reader and to uncover the purpose behind the writing. Here are ways to respond if you should encounter this text type:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF LETTERS

Purpose: people send letters for all kinds of reasons; to complain, to seek advice, to connect with a loved one or even to pass gossip. The purpose of this text type is completely flexible.

This kind of writing is less a text-type and more a category of writing. Travel writing can be as recognisable as a Lonely Planet or Rough Guide recommendation for a trip to a foreign country or city. Or it might take the form of an article, describing the experiences of the writer in a strange place, accompanied by photography, maps, or diagrams. It's possible for Travel Writing to be 'literary' in tone and mood, full of imagery, vivid descriptions, and figurative language, recreating the characters and situations the writer met along the way like a novelist. Common themes in travel writing include the search for the self or one's roots; curiosity about other people; the desire to be informed; the search for a religious, spiritual or abstract experience. If you want to find out much more about this genre, you can visit the course page for this unit of study. Or, simply browse this selection of Paper 1 materials from the category of Travel Writing:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF TRAVEL WRITING

Structure: look out for chronological timelines, past - present structures or a linear journey of discovery. Guidebooks will have clear headings and subheadings and will probably include box-outs and the like.

Information: travel writing often seeks to be informative and can present you with facts and figures, names and dates, historical or architectural or geographical information and more.

Since the 5th century BC, people have been giving each other advice in writing. Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote his advice on bamboo strips - now you can buy his collected works, The Art of War, in a bookstore. Newspapers and magazines feature advisory sections (in Britain, the writers of these columns are known as Agony Aunts or Agony Uncles). Elsewhere, institutions such as the medical practice, health services and even governments like to give advice. This means that advisory texts can take many forms: columns, articles, letters, posters or infographics are all text types that can give advice in one form or another. See for yourself by reading the sample responses to the papers listed here:
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF ADVISORY TEXTS

Tone: authoritative, reasonable, commanding or trustworthy. Look out for opinions presented as if they are facts.

Tense: the imperative tense (also called the command tense) can be recognized by the position of the verb at or near the start of the sentence.

Modality: modal verbs such as 'must', 'will', 'should' and 'ought' transmit strength of feelings.

Credibility: expert sources, research and scientific evidence might be used to establish credibility.

More a category of writing rather than a text type, texts produced for young people have distinctive features of their own that you may want to keep an eye on.
SAMPLE RESPONSES:TRY FOR YOURSELF:
KEY FEATURES OF TEXTS FOR CHILDREN

Allegory: like symbolism, in children's stories characters and objects often stand for things greater than themselves. The Wizard of Oz is a good example of allegory.

Diction: it would be unusual for children's texts to contain too much difficult vocabulary, although stories and rhymes often use synonyms.

Visuals: look out for colorful visuals, vividly drawn people and places.

Fable: a particular type of children's writing that anthropomorphizes animals, who stand in for human characters.

Didactic: some texts for children are designed to teach a lesson or moral. You can look out for didactic messages in children's texts.

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Whether you are a standard or higher level student, Paper 1 tests your ability to analyze unseen texts. If you are a standard level student, you will have to analyze one text out of a choice of two....

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Jacob Collier Improvises the National Symphony Orchestra (Live from the Kennedy Center)

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Jacob Collier Improvises the National Symphony Orchestra (Live from the Kennedy Center)

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Jacob Collier Improvises the National Symphony Orchestra (Live from the Kennedy Center)

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Take that, Picasso: the frenzied work by Faith Ringgold that took MoMA by storm

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Take that, Picasso: the frenzied work by Faith Ringgold that took MoMA by storm

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Take that, Picasso: the frenzied work by Faith Ringgold that took MoMA by storm

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The artist, who has died aged 93, spent her life battling white male dominance, in the gallery and beyond. Her work foregrounded Black American experience with a raw and unforgettable power

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Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl show was one big tease

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Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl show was one big tease

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Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl half-time show was one big tease

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The star hinted that he might not play his smash hit Not Like Us, but gave viewers plenty to absorb.

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A poet, novelist, fiction writer, and playwright, Langston Hughes is known for his insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the twenties through the sixties and was important in shaping the artistic contributions of the Harlem Renaissance.

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Harlem - What happens to a dread deferred? // Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun?

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Kendrick Lamar - Alright (Official Music Video)

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Kendrick Lamar - Alright (Official Music Video)

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Kendrick Lamar - Alright (Official Music Video)

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Bad Bunny's Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show

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Bad Bunny's Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show

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Bad Bunny's Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show

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Logic ft. Big Sean - Alright (Official Audio)

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Kendrick Lamar's Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show

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Billboard (2025) – "Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl Halftime Show Exposed the Limitations..." ​

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Billboard (2025) – "Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl Halftime Show Exposed the Limitations..." ​

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Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show Exposed the Limitations of Subversive Messaging During the ‘Great American Game’

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The Compton MC took several big swings with his record-breaking halftime show performance, but did any of them pay off?

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Business Insider (2022) – "Kendrick Lamar's lyric about police brutality was absent..." ​

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Business Insider (2022) – "Kendrick Lamar's lyric about police brutality was absent..." ​

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Kendrick Lamar’s lyric about police brutality was absent from the Super Bowl halftime show telecast

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It’s unclear if Lamar’s performance of “Alright” was censored or if he refrained from saying the specific phrase.

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Kendrick Lamar's Censorship Of "Po-Po" Line At Super Bowl Is A Painful Reminder

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Kendrick Lamar's Censorship Of "Po-Po" Line At Super Bowl Is A Painful Reminder

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Although the tight competition between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals was the main attraction on Sunday night, one of the highlights of Super Bowl LVI was undoubtedly the 2022 Halftime Show. Three years after the culturally out-of-tune Atlanta Halftime Show that featured Maroon 5 as headliners, the Roc Nation-produced event brought viewers to a full-fledged Hip-Hop concert, led by Dr. Dre and a handful of his most notable protégés and collaborators. And it was one hell of a show.

The halftime festivities kicked off with Dr. Dre emerging from the top of a massive all-white house as the instrumental to "The Next Episode" started to fill SoFi Stadium, and just moments after the crowd showered the legendary producer with applause, Snoop Dogg had everyone's heads bobbing as he performed his classic verse from the record. Snoop and Dre soon met in the middle of the massive set to perform "California Love," and immediately after, viewers were treated with a surprise guest performance from 50 Cent. While his recreation of the "In Da Club" music video likely flew over many young fans' heads, the excitement that 50's cameo created was palpable. Once Mary J. Blige took over from there to perform the Dr. Dre-produced "Family Affair" and her 2001 hit single "No More Drama," it was clear that this Super Bowl Halftime Show was unlike any other that Hip-Hop fans had witnessed before. From Snoop Dogg being in extreme Crip mode to the fact that four Hip-Hop and R&B legends had already taken the stage just halfway through the show, it was already shaping up to be one for the books.

Ronald Martinez/Getty Images

An uncontrollable excitement had been established during this year's halftime spectacle, but once the show shifted to Kendrick Lamar's "m.A.A.d. city"/"Alright" medley, fans were reminded that the Super Bowl Halftime Show is still an NFL-sanctioned event. In fact, viewers were made aware of that on two separate occasions during Kendrick Lamar's solo performance. The first reminder came at the start of "m.A.A.d. City," when the classic chant "If Pirus and Crips all got along" was heavily censored to block out any mention of either gang. While the decision to censor that line took a little steam out of K. Dot's intro, it wasn't necessarily a bad call given the fact that no corporation would likely feel comfortable name-dropping two of the most notorious gangs on one of the most-watched broadcasts of the year. However, as previously stated, Snoop Dogg didn't seem to care about that rule in the slightest, as he proudly chucked up his C's throughout the show and yelled "Crip" during his performance of "The Next Episode." Despite that strange - and admittedly funny - disconnect between Snoop Dogg and Kendrick Lamar, the second reminder of the NFL's longstanding attitude about racism and injustice came during Kendrick Lamar's performance of "Alright," and that one was significantly harder to stomach.

After powering through "m.A.A.d city" and the first verse of "Alright," the intro track "Blood." But beyond Kendrick Lamar's legacy or personal motives behind not rapping the word "po-po" on Sunday night, that unnecessary censorship hurts even more in February. During Black History Month, To Pimp A Butterfly artist butchered one of his most infamous and most relatable lines: "Nigga, and we hate po-po/Wanna kill us dead in the street fo sho'." Instead, Kendrick rapped, "We hate...Wanna kill us dead in the street fo sho." For viewers unfamiliar with the Compton-bred artist's catalog, the censoring of "po-po" likely didn't even stand out to them. However, for Hip-Hop fans who have thoroughly studied Kendrick Lamar's work, hearing K. Dot refrain from rapping "po-po" hurt. Sure, the drummer - whether it was Anderson .Paak or one of the other percussionists on-stage - did deliver two loud hits in its place, but in the midst of such as important historical moment for Hip-Hop, Kendrick's brief silence was deafening. On one hand, Kendrick has ridiculed Fox Reporters Eric Bolling & Kimberly Guilfoyle in the past for slamming that line - and in turn, reducing a traumatizing Black experience - on live television, as evidenced by his Damn Black Future Month, or whatever you wish to call it. And just weeks after the highly publicized and scrutinized police shooting of 22-year-old Amir Locke in Minneapolis.

Steph Chambers/Getty Images

While Kendrick Lamar's decision to refrain from saying "and we hate po-po" during an event hosted by the same sports organization that blackballed Black person slain by police over the internet, they got two drum hits. The situation is reminiscent of a line from Colin Kaepernick for similarly speaking up about police brutality will undoubtedly be a topic of debate for weeks, months, and years to come, this essay isn't meant to criticize the "family ties" artist or any of his fellow performers from Sunday night. It just has to be said that instances like these hurt. Black culture was being touted as top-tier entertainment throughout the Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show, yet when Black Hip-Hop fans, and Black viewers in general, could have benefitted from hearing the unfiltered version of Kendrick Lamar's now-timeless protest anthem to help cope with the ongoing trauma of seeing another Macklemore - of all people - on 2016's "White Privilege II," in which the controversial Seattle-bred rapper said, "We take all we want from black culture, but will we show up for black lives?"

So regardless of whether the censorship of "po-po" is a reflection of the NFL's strict censorship over artists, a decision independently made by Kendrick Lamar, or the byproduct of an extremely criticized partnership between the NFL and Jay-Z 's Roc Nation, it doesn't matter - moments like that are painful. Now, whenever Black fans remember what was otherwise a phenomenal Super Bowl Halftime Show, we'll remember the stacked line-up of Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, and Eminem as well as the untimely butchering of one of Kendrick Lamar's most uplifting songs.

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Kendrick Lamar's Censorship Of "Po-Po" Line At Super Bowl Is A Painful Reminder

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During the star-studded Super Bowl LVI Halftime Show, Kendrick Lamar didn't rap the infamous "Alright" line, "we hate po-po," and the brief silence from that moment was deafening.

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Lamar Super Bowl

2025

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Kendrick Lamar's Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show

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Paper 1 Comics and Graphic Novels Analysis

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Graphic Novels & Manga Explained: Your Ultimate Guide Hey everyone, and welcome back to the blog! Today, we’re diving deep into a world of incredible…

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Cartoons and comics combine image and text using humour or satire to convey the main message. They often use symbolism, exaggeration, or visual metaphors. In IB English A Language and Literature, students analyze how visual and linguistic elements combine to express social or political ideas. Typical features include panels, speech bubbles, exaggerated expressions, and minimal text. Satirical cartoons also often use irony or parodies to deliver their intended message.

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First Dog on the Moon is Australia’s only Walkley award-winning marsupial-based cartoonist and has done all sorts of things including books, radio, stage shows and a lot of lying down

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Graphic Novels & Manga Explained: Your Ultimate Guide Hey everyone, and welcome back to the blog! Today, we’re diving deep into a world of incredible…

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1. Restate the thesis statement that answers the question

2. Synthesize the argument of each paragraph without repeating, do some paraphrasing succinctly, and arrive at an implication of the story that answers the question.

3. Write a short extension from the two works' exploration of the question to talk about the question in the larger social or literature context.

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Before writing: Create a rudimentary outline covering different comparative ideas (e.g. circumstances, ending)

Six elements of body paragraph

Language of the question

Rich idea

Textual references

Authorial choice

Author-audience relationship

Comparative phrasing

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Robin: IB English guys comparing texts 1 and 2 

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Robin: IB English guys comparing texts 1 and 2 

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The video is of the two creating a table and listing off all the points that may be important to exploring, both similarities and differences. The table is very simplified, and does not actually contain authorial choices.

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needs:

a hook that explores the topic of the question (can be skipped but enhances the writing if used correctly)

brief summary of the texts in relation to the question (shouldn't be longer than thesis)

a comparative thesis with rich ideas and keywords from the question

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Lesson 7_ Writing Body Paragraphs - Google Docs

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Lesson 6_ Writing the Introduction - Google Docs

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Emotions are not peripheral but central catalysts:

Medea - fuel personal revenge that destroys a family and a kingdom

We - ignite individual rebellion that threatens an entire dystopian empire

Medea - Medea's intensive emotions drive herself from passive victim to active agent of destruction which overrides reasons and emotions

Destructive power in patriarchal society

We - The corruption of rationality and emotions shatters D-503’s originaly logical mind and drives him from obedient Number to revolution

United State’s inability to suppress the human soul.

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emotions

medea - sorrow driven rage caused by the prejustice against women, where they are disrespected and medea herself was exiled multiple times

we - manipulated thoughts and lack of emotions caused by control and punishment from the one state

significance

medea - to seek revenge and feel emotionally free (freedom)

we - to discover oneself (freedom + world view change)

drive

medea - realized the status women has in society, fueled with rage and wanted to seek revenge

we - D-503 initially opposed to the idea of irrational emotions, but I-330 changed his world view

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Prompt: Examine the role of emotions in two works you have studied.

Comparative Theme 1: How a central emotion in each work drive the development of plots:

Text A: Medea's love for Jason drives her course of revenge.

Text B: Irrational affection for I330 drives D503's derailment from rationality and comfort with One State.

Theme 2: How their respective emotions prevail over conventional ethics

A: Medea prevails over patriarchy and the ethics of maternity

B: D503 breaches the rationality rule of One State

Theme 3: Do the authors depict the respective central emotions as favorable

A: affirms revenge, denounces the slaying of her own children through the Chorus

B: equivocal, open to the interpretation of readers

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Robin: compare how they assert that life's darkness and suffering are more than simply negative 

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Robin: compare how they assert that life's darkness and suffering are more than simply negative 

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point 1: We explores how darkness is not inherently just pain, but also imagination and chaos

point 1: Medea explores how darkness leads to insight and chaos, pain allows people to shed the illusions of society which bind them

point 2: suffering is entirely internal and psychological, D-503's struggles with his minds. Pain is debilitating

point 2: Medea's struggles are almost all external, pain fuels her thunderous spirit

point 3: D-503 shatters, psychologically and mentally, but it is seen as positive

point 3: Medea's change is a brutal warp as a result of pain, leading to strength and insight which allows her to gain revenge

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Collective whole’s well-being outweighs the interests of individuals; thus, the One State robs its citizens of all identifying characteristics. The One State regards its citizens (referred to as “ciphers”) not as individual beings with unique perspectives and needs

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The One State worships pure reason, mathematics, and technology as the path to perfect order. Happiness is mathematically guaranteed, yet this eliminates art, spontaneity, and freedom.

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Suppression of Individuality and Collectivism,

Control of sexuality and reproductive rights

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How movies teach manhood - Collin Stokes

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How movies teach manhood - Collin Stokes

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When Colin Stokes' 3-year-old son caught a glimpse of "Star Wars," he was instantly obsessed. But what messages did he absorb from the sci-fi classic? Stokes asks for more movies that send positive messages to boys: that cooperation is heroic, and respecting women is as manly as defeating the villain.

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‘Pepsi weren’t counting on a dreamer like me’: the student who sued a soft drink giant for a $23m fighter jet

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‘Pepsi weren’t counting on a dreamer like me’: the student who sued a soft drink giant for a $23m fighter jet

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n 1996, PepsiCo - then known for creating the young, cool, carbonated drink of a generation - made an incredible mistake. The company had just launched its Pepsi Points scheme, in which customers could save Pepsi labels and redeem them against Pepsi-branded merchandise. Sixty tokens would get you a hat. Four hundred and you'd get a denim jacket. But in the commercial accompanying the launch, Pepsi went further, joking that anyone who collected 7m labels would be eligible for a brand new Harrier jump jet. The mistake? Pepsi forgot to add any small print pointing out that it was a joke.

That one oversight now forms the basis for a wildly entertaining Netflix series, entitled Pepsi, Where's My Jet? It tells the story of John Leonard, a Washington State community college student who decided to take Pepsi at its word. After quickly realising that buying 7m cans or bottles of Pepsi would be prohibitively expensive, Leonard saw a disclaimer revealing that, rather than collecting labels, consumers could buy Pepsi Points for 10 cents each. A $23m Harrier jump jet for just $700,000? That was the bargain of the century. Over four episodes, the show recounts one young man's determination to take on a multinational corporation to get what an advert had promised him.

"John had this kind of Spielbergian quality about him when he was younger where it was just, like, anything is possible," recounts Andrew Renzi, the show's director, over a riotous four-way Zoom call with Leonard and Todd Hoffman (more on him later). "I don't know if you have ever seen the film Being There," Renzi adds, referring to the Peter Sellers satire about a gardener who accidentally works his way into the corridors of power, "but I had this thing in my head where John Leonard at 19 years old is Peter Sellers."

"Yeah. So that's pretty close to accurate," Leonard interrupts.

Renzi sighs. "I forgot to mention that John is opinionated," he says.

Renzi was initially offered Pepsi, Where's My Jet? as a work of fiction. But after tracking down Leonard, by then in his mid-40s and working as a park ranger in Alaska, he realised that the truth would be more entertaining.

Michael Davis as John Leonard in Pepsi Where's My Jet?. Photograph: Netflix

"It was a long time ago," Leonard continues. "And I just kind of wanted to keep it back there, as something funny that happened a long time ago." That changed when the Netflix series Tiger King became a lockdown hit, and people started looking for more weird historical stories to turn into documentaries; various producers came sniffing around. "There were some real schmucky people that would lay on this really thick, used-car salesman, Hollywood type of thing. But Renzi sent me an email. And of all the different emails I got, it felt really sincere. It didn't seem like it was the same old thing of, you know, blowing smoke up your ass. But simultaneously, Todd and I had a conversation. He said something along the lines of: 'This is a cool story. It needs to be told, and it needs to be told by the right person.' He said: 'When I die, I'd be happy to have this be on my epitaph.'"

Now let's introduce Hoffman, the secret sauce of the whole crazed scheme. A charismatic millionaire, then in his 40s, Hoffman had befriended Leonard on a mountaineering trip. And when Leonard realised he needed $700,000 to force a fighter jet out of a fizzy drink company, Hoffman was the first person he turned to. To everyone's surprise, Hoffman was keen.

"John brought this to me, and told me the story," he recalls. "We looked at the videotape of the commercial, and I just kept looking at it over and over and over and going: 'That is absolutely a reckless ad put out there by a major corporation that knows better.'" After that point, the game was afoot. Pepsi's defence throughout was that the ad was clearly a joke. At one point during the series, a Pepsi spokesperson mentions that, while millions of people watched the advert, only one person actually tried to redeem the jet offer. It is possible nobody else went as far as Leonard in their attempts to claim the prize, but he points out that he first heard of Pepsi Points when a father at the Little League baseball team he coached mentioned he was part of a jet-buying consortium. Leonard was unique in being the only viewer who had access to Hoffman, a like-minded renegade with the funds to back it up.

John was the Pepsi generation. They blew a great opportunity to lasso this kid

John Leonard

Leonard describes Hoffman as "the math that Pepsi didn't do. They were counting on there being a ton of dreamers like me, but they just never figured a dreamer like me would ever have access to somebody that was willing to go on this crazy ride and actually would write the cheque."

"Making the series, I always had this guiding post of: 'Everybody needs a John and everybody needs a Todd,'" Renzi explains. And it is this relationship, between two men of different generations who had a wild idea and saw it through, that runs through the series like a golden cord. Even decades later, over Zoom, they are warm and familiar, crashing into each other's stories and finishing each other's sentences.

"I just love being connected with people like John," beams Hoffman. "He looks all serious and he looks conservative, but he's insane. He's certifiably insane. He holds a job. He has a beautiful family. He has a house and pays a mortgage and goes to work every day, but he's got some real mental things going on. Way outside the box."

The climax of the story is easily Googleable, but the journey there is about as crazed as its genesis. At one point, Michael Avenatti - later to find infamy as the lawyer of Stormy Daniels - pops up to help the fight against Pepsi, sharing a hotel room with Leonard in what is described as a "Planes, Trains and Automobiles road trip across the midwest". Avenatti filmed his segments for the show under house arrest for attempting to extort Nike for up to $25m (he has since been imprisoned for defrauding Daniels), but his participation in the case was a rare point of contention between Hoffman and Leonard. While Leonard developed a personal friendship with Avenatti, Hoffman rankled at his methods. "I didn't think of him as a major part of our story," he says when Avenatti's name is mentioned.

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You sense that Pepsi is still embarrassed by the skirmish. The fight for the jet did the company no favours whatsoever. At the time it was still locked in the "Cola Wars" with Coca-Cola - a ruthless scrap for dominance that saw Pepsi introduce blind taste tests to prove its superiority to the world - and any slip-up could have been fatal. Here was a brand selling itself on how cool and youthful it was, but it responded to Leonard's claim by - spoiler alert! - slamming him with teams of corporate lawyers. When TV companies saw what an open, guileless boy Leonard was, asking politely for his jump jet, he was suddenly everywhere. It was a terrible PR move from Pepsi, and Hoffman is still convinced that its self-inflicted damage lingers.

John Leonard (left) and Todd Hoffman in Pepsi, Where's My Jet?. Photograph: Netflix

"John was the all-American kid," he says. "He was the Pepsi generation. And that's kind of what's ironic, too. Pepsi blew a great opportunity to lasso this kid and say: 'Look, we'll take you around the country in the Harrier jet for the next year, we'll pay you a million bucks.' Instead of hiring lawyers and suing us, they could have actually done the right thing and said: 'This kid put the deal together. He rang the bell and he gets the prize,' you know?"

Still, this all happened a quarter of a century ago. The world has moved on. Leonard and Hoffman have changed. As we wrap up, I ask if it's strange for them to revisit the distant past like this, knowing all the attention the show will bring.

"Over the years I've been sensitive to it, because even close people have said: 'Well, you're an opportunist,'" Leonard explains. "Lawsuits like this end up being compared to the McDonald's hot coffee case, the kind of ambulance-chaser thing. And that hit me wrong. Looking back on it, it was opportunistic. Absolutely. But that's not always a negative thing. And back then I wholeheartedly thought that we were going to get the jet.

"What I struggle with today," he adds, "is how can I have really thought that I was going to get the jet? I'm 48 years old now, and I'm now looking back on it like: what kind of dipshit were you, man?"
Pepsi, Where's My Jet? is on Netflix from Thursday

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