English Grouping Task

Texts B, D and F all involve to the use of imperatives to achieve the different intended effects of the text. Text B is an advert, published in The Independent newspaper, for a law firm appealing to Independent reader to contact them if they think that they have been mis-sold an investment and lost money because of this. It uses the imperative ‘DON’T DELAY. TIME LIMITS FOR CLAIMING APPLY’ to encourage the reader to take up the offer and not hold off. Having ‘DON’T DELAY’ at the beginning of the advertisement strikes a sense of urgency in the reader, suggesting that if the don’t do it now that they might run out of time and be excluded from this offer. The ad then follows this by saying ‘TIME LIMITS FOR CLAIMING APPLY’ which possibly reaffirms the sense of urgency in the reader but also suggests a sense of uncertainty to reinforce the ‘DON’T DELAY’, as the reader may think that the time limit for them might be soon and that they better be quick about enquiring for a claim. This imperative is neither cloaked nor mitigated as if it was cloaked then the urgency of the advert would be lost on the reader and possibly stop the text from achieving its purpose, which is to persuade the reader to call the business. Mitigating the imperative in this example would also harm the appeal of the ad as the connotations of a law firm is that they are strong and powerful in their field of work and by mitigating the imperative in the advert it could give the reader the idea that this firm is weak as it would almost sound like the firm is begging for the business.

Text D utilises imperatives similarly to Text B in that it uses the imperative to set the theme of the text to the audience. The difference between the two texts is that Text D is a social media message for the purpose of entertainment and discussion rather than contacting the business. Text D opens the text with the imperative ‘We want your nominations for our #TeamOfTheWeek feature’, which immediately puts across the message of the text with no confusion. This imperative also utilises inclusive language to give a more personal address to the reader, which makes them more likely to respond to the text if they feel that the text is personally addressing them. The imperative also includes ‘we want’ which suggests to the reader that the author of this text is coming to them for their opinion, and as the source of this text is the official Twitter account for the Football League 1, it could make the reader feel more important as the League itself wants their opinion for their feature, which applies to all the fans across all the football clubs in the league. This imperative also uses a positive face to elevate the status of the reader so the reader possibly feels greater inclined to help the author of the tweet by responding to their request. This text also differs from Text B in that the purpose of the imperative and the purpose of the text would not be damaged by mitigating the imperative, in fact mitigating the imperative in this case would actually further the appeal of this text as without mitigating the imperative the text comes across quite blunt and could possibly turn the reader away from responding to the text.

Text F uses imperatives as the use of imperatives is essential to the text. Text F is different to texts B and D in that it isn’t trying to open a dialogue with the readers, as Text F is an excerpt of Govt. legislation, detailing laws and the consequence for breaking them. The text comprises almost entirely of imperatives, an example of one being ‘punishable by; 6 months/maximum fine on summary conviction [or] 5 years/maximum fine on indictment’. This imperative is neither mitigated nor cloaked, as with text B, it would be inappropriate in the context of the text. It is inappropriate for legislation to be mitigated as it could give the impression that the audience can ignore this with little consequence and cloaking the imperative would confuse the message of the text. The imperative uses a bald on record face with the audience as the author of the text is not concerned with losing face and only with getting the message of the text across.

Texts B, C and D all share the common purpose which is to persuade their respective audiences. Text B, the newspaper advert for the law firm, heavily utilises inclusive 2^nd person pronouns: ‘Have you suffered losses because you were missold an investment’. By doing this the text promotes a deeper, more personal connection with the text through sounding like it’s addressing the audience as an individual rather than more impersonally, as a group. The audience for the Independent newspaper is the upper middle class and beyond/the more affluent or well-to-do in society and so more likely to be the people who have the disposable income to be making large investments, as compared to the typical audience of the a newspaper like the Daily Mirror for example, and these are the people that the advert is targeting. Text B also uses an example client to provide proof to the reader who may be skeptical of the firm and their bold claims by saying ‘Listen to our client on BBC Radio, we recovered £86,000’. This extract is effective at persuading the reader in a couple of ways, it references the BBC, which an extremely famous national institution which is well-known for good journalism, showing to the reader that this huge group recognizes their work and adds a level of prestige to the firm giving the impression that’s its exclusive, like many prestigious groups are. It also gives an example of the range of reward that the reader could receive (£86,000) for using the firms services, which when coupled with mention of the BBC, the reader knows that the figure is not exaggerated to mislead the audience.

Text C is the weak inclusion for this group as persuasion is the texts secondary purpose rather than its primary purpose like texts B and D. Text C is the blurb for a box-set of the third season of TV show Game of Thrones. The persuasive aspect of this text mostly comes from the content of the entire text rather than techniques when compared to the other texts in this grouping. This text does however end the text by using a power of three: ‘bonds are strained, loyalties are tested and cruel fates are met’. By using this at the end of the text, it leaves the actual content of the series deliberately vague whilst simultaneously giving the reader a sample of the content in it, hopefully leaving the reader intrigued and wanting to watch to find out.  
Text D is similar to text B in that persuasion is its primary purpose unlike Text C. Text D is also similar to Text B in its use of 2^nd person pronouns to create a personal connection with the readers. This text does this in ‘We want your nominations’ and ‘who impressed you’, which hopes to elicit the same response in the reader as if it had been another fan who had asked them, and by the text putting itself down to the same level of the reader, the reader is more receptive of the invitation for dialogue. This text puts heavy emphasis on the 2^nd person pronouns, most notably the pronoun ‘you’ and ‘your’, which makes the reader feel like them and their opinions are the theme of the text rather than the text itself. Outside the text itself, the reader can see other readers responding to the text with their own views like the text has encouraged them to, which could possibly cause the reader to weigh in with their on views and opinions as the text promotes a group discussion rather than a one sided, short discourse with the author of the text.

Texts A and E both use, to an extent, informal register to contribute towards achieving the primary purposes of the texts. Text A is a weak inclusion and is a short article from the Daily Mail newspaper, published online. The typical audience for the Daily Mail is the working/lower middle class and so to relate to the audience more easily the text is more informal than other newspapers like the Independent, which is aimed towards a more affluent group of society. An example of the relative informality in this text is ‘A McLaren supercar worth £250,000 was left almost entirely destroyed’, which although not appearing very informal is less formalised than other similar publishers in the industry. The idea of this slight informality is that the reader is less likely to be turned away from the paper due to the over-formalised language that a lower class person may associate with being ‘posh’ or ‘snobby’.

Text E is a strong inclusion in this group. Text E is a phone conversation between two people about the purchasing of train tickets. The informal register in this text is more overt than in Text A. The text uses colloquial words like ‘quid’ to show that there is a level of closeness between the two participants as they talk very casually to each other. The casualness of the relationship between the two participants means that the dialogue flows more smoothly than if the two participants were trying to keep it unnecessarily formal. The informal register in this text also makes the dominant speaker more apparent in the conversation. Throughout the duration of Text E, the two participants vie for the dominant role in the conversation. Both participants use strategic interruptions to assert their power in certain points during the dialogue whilst simultaneously expressing their anger/annoyance through the paralinguistic features such as the tone and pitch. The purpose of the text is to inform and the informal register means that the friendly relationship between the two participants aids the text in achieving that purpose as the participants are extremely blunt about the  topic of discussion.