AS Comms - final advice for tomorrow

The AS Comms exam is at 9.30am tomorrow in the Sports Hall.
Please make sure that you are there by 9.10 at the latest.

Remember:

There will be 4 questions - all equally weighted (20 marks):
Qu 1 will be on Culture
Qu 2 will be on Identity & self presentation
Qu 3 is the semiotics question
Qu 4 is the 'wild card' question, which asks you to draw from across the course

Spend 25 minutes on each question: 5 mins reading the question & planning; 20 minutes writing.

For Qu 3, spend a minute per mark (e.g. if a question is worth 4 marks, spend 4 minutes on it). It is fine to give bullet point answers for questions worth 2-6 marks.

How to write a strong answer:

- put the question at the centre of your answer
- use Comms & Culture terminology
- use specific examples through which to explore the question
- apply theory to your specific examples
- never put the examiner in a position where they are asking 'so?'; 'and?' or 'why?' about your answer


Example of an student answer which does the above:

·        We use verbal communication and NVC as a means of gaining power and status over others

Power and status are two things key to people’s sense of self; gaining these attributes requires a specific use of verbal communication and NVC. One of the most physical and clear examples of this is divergence; this is when a power figure, or someone trying to achieve a role of power widens the gap between how they speak compared to the person they are speaking to. For example, a manager who may not speak with very prevalent R.P. might make that accent more prevalent in the context of disciplining an employee. Goffman would argue that the manager is using their voice as a ‘prop’ while ‘front stage’ to achieve more power over their co-actor. This is a means of gaining power and status. Goffman would in turn argue that the manager is likely to change their voice while ‘back stage’, while away from work, when asserting power is less relevant.

Moreover, proxemics – how far away people are from each other – can be used to gain power and status over someone else. An argument between two teenagers would be a prime example of this. Standing over someone connotes a sense of higher status and makes the other person feel small physically and metaphorically. Berne would argue that using proxemics in an aggressive and attacking way would be an example of the ‘child ego state’, as proxemics embodies the physical nature of a tantrum. {Although Berne’s ego states fails to take into account any overlaps of the three states.} An argument may be in a controlling ‘parent’ context – although this would still demonstrate a desire for power and status.

In addition, both verbal communication and NVC can be used in harmony to create a sincere performance; thus gaining power and status. Status is sometimes inferred, like a pupil knows the teacher has the power but may try to challenge this by not conforming to the paradigm of expected class behaviour. The teacher might then try to re install their sense of status by changing their paralanguage and shouting. Shouting may not re-gain status but it is a trait identified with a position of power.

Overall, verbal communication and NVC are used in order to gain a means of power from both quietly elevating a person, as well as loudly asserting dominance.

 

GOOD LUCK!

AS Comms - Question 3

AS Comms - Practice question 3 (semiotics)

1. Identify and briefly explain the use of icons, indexes and symbols in this text. (6)
Scan the codes below for suggested answers:

Indexes

Icons

Symbols

2. Comment on the use of anchorage within this text. (6)

3. How are Arsenal being represented within the text? (8)

AS Lit: 'Behind me - dips Eternity'

Time is presented in 'Behind me - dips Eternity' in various ways. The structure of the poem itself creates an idea of time being an endless entity, while Dickinson also uses the idea of time to question the idea of life.

One of the most noticeable elements of time in this poem can be seen through the way the poem is structured. The poem does not contain a full sentence, but rather just contains a series of phrases separated by hyphens. One interpretation of Dickinson's decision to exclude any complete sentences in her poem is that she's trying to replicate how time itslf has no 'full sentence' Time as we know it does not have a start, nor does it have an ending, and so it can be argued that Dickinson is trying her best to replicate that endless and immeasurable sense of time within her poem. Furthermore, even though there is no full stop in the poem, it is still read at a relatively slow pace. This is because the numerous caesurae used in the poem is very disruptive: 'In perfect - pauseless Monarchy.' In this sense we could argue that Dickinson is trying to manipulate our sense of time, by making the poem appear to be fast paced, yet it actually moves along very slowly. Perhaps this is what we perceive time to be in our ordinary lives, since time often appears to go quickly, yet in reality time is not actually altering its pace, rather it's just our perception of time that alters.

Nervertheless, in the first stanza of the poem Dickinson tries to position herself on a sort of timescale: 'Behind Me - dips Eternity - / Before me - Immortality - /Myself - the term between.' This unconventional way of trying to enhance our understanding of abstract concepts by mixing it with something concrete and visable is a common technique throughout her poems. In this instance, however, she is using the idea of 'positioning' and geography to help us gain a more vivid image of how vast time is and how little we are in relation to time. This metaphor creates an image of Dickinson pinpointing her position on a map, and when viewed in this context, Dickinson is making us realise how vast time is.

AS Lit: A narrow Fellow in the Grass

AS Lit: Going to Him! Happy letter!

AS Lit - It was not Death, for I stood up

AS Lit - I heard a Fly buzz- when I died-

AS Lit: Behind Me - dips Eternity -

AS Lit - This World is not Conclusion

AS Lit: What mystery pervades a well!

AS Comms - Qu3 revision - My Butt is big

Let's think about:

- the use of icon, symbol and index in in this text. Can you find an example of each and briefly explain it?

- the use of anchorage. Read the copy again and analyse how it is being used to fix the meaning of the text (think also about tone, layout...)

- how Nike has chosen to represent women in this text (and why): which ideological beliefs is it challenging and supporting? How does it compare with how women are often represented in texts?

AS Comms - group identity

AS Lit: 754 My Life had stood - a Loaded Gun

 My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun

Poem 754, ‘My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun’ is an obvious example of how Emily Dickinson personifies and characterizes inanimate objects. However, this poem is particularly unusual because it not only depicts the relationship between a gun and its owner, but is actually narrated from the perspective of the gun itself. 

Firstly, there is a sense of passivity about the gun having stood ‘In Corners’, before subsequently being ‘carried…away’ by the owner. Despite this, there is a clear sense of danger about the gun itself; it being loaded but unused suggests that it could exert deadly force, but chooses to retain this inaction. 

The use of anaphora in the second stanza concerning the words ‘And now’ arguably serves to lend a sense of pride to the tone of the narrator, through the jump to the present tense and the use of the pronoun ‘We’. Therefore, the gun takes great pleasure in now being involved in a kind of partnership with the owner. The verbs used- such as ‘roam’ and ‘hunt’- are also much more active than the previous stanza, again giving a sense of the gun being brought to life. 

The relationship between the gun and the owner is explored in more depth further on in the poem, when the former ‘guard(s) my Master’s Head-‘. There is an idea conveyed here of protectiveness, which in turn implies the strength of loyalty the gun has to the owner. This is reinforced in the following stanza, which states ‘To foe of His - I’m deadly foe-‘. Although the power balance in this relationship could lie with the gun, being the object with ‘the power to kill’, it is clear that it only acts when on behalf of the owner (‘every time I speak for Him’) and refers to him as ‘Master’. Furthermore, the last stanza claims that although the gun will physically outlive the owner, ‘He longer must – than I- /For I have but the power to kill, /Without – the power to die-‘. 
Although several alternative interpretations exist, it seems plausible that the gun is stating an attachment to the owner and an unwillingness to outlive him, and indeed places the power of death above the ability of living beings to take life. On the other hand, it could be a literal statement that the owner will continue existence past the moment of his death, being in the afterlife. Therefore, the owner will outlast the gun in a spiritual sense because he possesses a soul, which clearly the latter does not. 

Interestingly, the poem is written in hymn format; in quatrain, with a syllable pattern of 8686. The rhyming scheme is ABCB, although some rhymes are pararhymes. In this manner, it is almost as if the gun is worshipping the owner, by narrating their story by using this structure. Dickinson also employs a great deal of caesura in this poem, reflecting the jump not only from scene to scene, but the gun’s own stream of conscious thought. 

Poem 494 (‘Going to Him! Happy Letter!’) is also addressed to a man whom the poet feels great affection for, and holds similarities in that neither this man nor the man in 754 are ever mentioned by name. However, 494 is seemingly unstructured with no clear rhyming scheme, conveying a sense of excitement that lacks the controlled tone of the gun. 

AS Literature: 501 This World is not Conclusion

501 This World is not Conclusion

In this poem, Dickinson explores what lies beyond the human world – and concludes that there are no satisfactory answers to this question. The only complete sentence in the poem is the very first line: ‘This World is not Conclusion.’ There is a certain irony in the fact that this is the only completed thought (signified by the full stop) in the poem. The rest of the poem is structured through a series of thoughts, characterised by Dickinson’s frequent use of the dash, thoughts which are left hanging in the last line of the poem with the final dash used: ‘That nibbles at the soul –‘ Perhaps Dickinson uses this structure to help suggest that there are no answers, that our quest for understanding will always be left incomplete. The mystery of what exists beyond human existence is personified in line 5 with ‘It beckons, and it baffles-‘ suggesting that this is a ‘Riddle’ that humans simply can’t solve, despite the tempting answers that might be on offer.

The most interesting thing for me about the poem is the way it appears to reject any religious argument for what lies beyond the human world. Dickinson's careful use of the word ‘Species’ in line 2 – ‘A Species stands beyond’- can be seen as an allusion to Darwin’s Origin of the Species (1859), in itself a text which was seen to challenge conventional religious belief with its presentation of the theory of evolution. Later in the poem, the personification of Faith as a clumsy and naïve fool – ‘Faith slips – and laughs, and rallies - /Blushes’ – emphasises the weaknesses of religious faith in providing a credible argument, and this is enhanced further when we are told that Faith ‘plucks at a twig of Evidence’. The verb ‘plucks’ suggests desperation, and when matched with the noun ‘twig’ (insubstantial – not even a branch!), there is the sense that Dickinson is ridiculing the way that many people cling to religion as an answer to the big questions of human existence. The Church as an institution is also challenged towards the end of the poem, with preaching described as no more than an empty performance through the phrase ‘Much Gesture’ and the suggestion that ‘Strong Hallelujahs roll’ off the tongue like hot air – sounding good, but amounting to nothing. Dickinson’s conclusion - if she reaches one – is about the failure of religion rather than what the answer to the mysteries of life are. In using the analogy of drugs in the final two lines of the poem ('Narcotics cannot still the Tooth/That nibbles at the soul - '), drugs which might dull the pain of toothache but will never actually cure the source of the pain, she makes the point that whilst religion might appear to provide the answers, actually this is a false solution, one which perhaps keeps people quiet and docile but stops them from questioning and challenging accepted beliefs.

Link this poem with 721 and 465.

AS Comms - The party leaders & self presentation