Political Satire

With the elections right around the corner, political satire has become common in various media outlets including newspapers, magazines, and television shows like "Saturday Night Live". As we read about political and persuasive speech, I think that the recent popularity of such satire is very much political persuasive speech because it defends or makes fun of one side of the election. As we see on SNL skits about Sarah Palin, the intention is to make her look ridiculous to the United States. As a mode of persuasive speech we can infer that they are attempting to slander her character and persuade people that she really is unfit for the job. On the same note, these media outlets are really showing their political choices by not equally spoofing both parties but rather just one. This to me makes an more powerful persuasive statement.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdDqSvJ6aHc

The reading I found regarding politics and comedy looks closer into the life of Al Franken, a comedian turn politician, and the relationship of politics and comedy. This article dissects the effects of comedy on politics and questions the role each plays. Is it okay for politicians to be funny? Is there a line that must be drawn. Is comedy a type of persuasive speech? We can think about these things as we examine what the article has to say.

http://g.ggimg.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/itx/itx_2_1_0_119/images/Gale_logo_top.gif

The Fallout: New Zealand Style

So I decided I would check out an article from a New Zealand newspaper to apply Fairclough's elements of media studies. Relative to the United States, I discovered that New Zealand is also going through an election season and the topic of the recent wallstreet woes is of great importance. I chose this article because it writes about a topic we Americans face in the newspapers daily, not to mention read about everywhere on the internet. I don't think many Americans realize how much it is influencing the rest of the world, and that is exactly why I wanted to read about their perspective.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/vote08/4719479a28479.html

This article definitely is written as a form of information for the public sphere (of New Zealand I guess, to be more specific). When analyzing the representation I noticed that the article included lots of talk about the two parties and their political actions on this situation in relation to the election and subsequently the people of New Zealand. This included lots of talk about tax cuts (the main point of the article), the fall of the dollar, and the many other negative consequences that New Zealand is suffering. What I noticed was excluded was the fallout itself, who is affected and how, and maybe their opinion of what caused it. These things are usually mentioned in the American reports of anything mentioning Wall street and stocks these days.

I'm not sure if I'm using presupposition accurately but I find that this article assumes that the economy is done for and it scared me. I think its the way the author suggests the downfall of their entire economy and offers up solutions or situations that seem so final and pessimistic. The vocabulary used adds to this effect by painting such a dark mood. Using words like "grim", "knife", "carnage", "stunned", "diving", "bare", "crisis", and "one light on the horizon".

The event in this article is the definitely the fallout and the resulting tax cut solutions while the action in this event surrounds the government and the political parties. The author nominalizes both the National and Labour parties and in many instances provides active duties for them such as "National reins in tax cuts" or " National has taken a knife...". There are many other examples within the article.

Through the article the author tends to use more formulation style writing when mentioning specific people's opinions. Rather than quote them, he always does a he says/she says style of reporting opinion that shows he is not directly quoting and probably choosing how and what he wants them to say to accommodate the article's purpose. If you see toward the end he mentions a Mr. Key and a Miss Clark but offers no direct quotes.

I also wanted to note that I found it incredibly interesting that they only mention the United States once and that is when they mentioned the price of oil in terms of the US dollar. I didn't realize how hard other countries were taking hits in regards to this financial crisis.

Media and Politics: Fairclough

I like how this reading begins with the goals of the book. I was immediately drawn in with thier examples of how the proper analysis of media reveals great things about how we are persuaded to think cerains ways. The reference to 'foregrounding' and 'backgrounding' allowed me to see certain media situations from a different perspective. Word choice, imaging, and setting all set the tone for what the media wants you to believe and how they would like you to follow the story they are writing.


I enjoyed these tips that help one analyze media:



1. How is the world represented?

2. What identities are set up for those involved in the programme or story?

3. What relationships are set up between those involved?



The last section on critical media literacy also suggests more criteria to look at when analyzing media text. It is great that Fairclough suggests that students learn these kind of questions to use when making their own opinions about what they will be influenced by in the media. I really wish I was taught this when I was younger because so often I believed what documentaries said or what news reports covered and never questioned the biased nature. I was naive in that I never questioned the information I was given, ever and now I look back and see that I could have been skeptical all this time. Could this be a cultural thing? Maybe. Maybe I just wasn't raised to question things I might have believed I had no right questioning. Is this how people today think? Possibly.

Random But VERY Interesting Poem I Found...

So this is a very random post but I read it and enjoyed it very much. This is for your reading pleasure!

Pronunciation Poem

I take it you already know
of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you,
on hiccough, thorough, laugh and through.
Well done! And now you wish, perhaps,
to learn of less familiar traps?
Beware of heard, a dreadful word,
that looks like beard and sounds like bird.
And dead -- it's said like bed not bead --
and for goodness' sake don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt)
A moth is not the moth in mother,
nor both in bother, broth in brother.
And here is not a match for there,
nor dear and fear for bear and pear.
And then there's dose and rose and lose --
just look them up -- and goose and choose,
and cork and work and card and ward,
and font and front and word and sword,
and do and go and thwart and cart --
come, come I've hardly made a start.
A dreadful language? Man alive.
I'd mastered it when I was five.

The Veep Debates

So I did watch the VP debates and would have written in my blog sooner but I was on some pain meds at the time and passed out soon after. I enjoyed both sides of the debate and noticed that it was very important to find the right words to say. Word choice seemed to be the theme of the night because everyone was all too cautious of the fact that people(media pundits) were ready to pick at every little thing they said. The next morning it was obvious that the media was looking even closer at what Sarah Palin had to say, especially because they expected her to do worse and expected her to "eat her words" more often than she did.

In my own opinion, there was a lot going on beyond the debate itself that distracted from the importance of the issues. There were too many references beyond the two candidates and some situations that seemed a little unrealistic to be debated at that time.

I feel that the media is too biased to be making the claims that they do. I like to keep my political opinions to myself because everyone seems to be an extremist in their views and tend to get too involved in trying to convince you of how wrong you are. So, in that case I'm not going to state who I liked better. I think both of them spoke really well and represented their parties to the best of their abilities. It was an amazing thing to see public speaking at its best especially when two people are capable of keeping thier composure during such a highly publicized event.