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Wednesday, September 21, 2011

The author as newspaper columnist

How We Love to Hate

(Theme: communication)

What is it about the web that makes us turn to such poisonous and vitriolic critic of musicians? Whether it is the critique of a band such as Coldplay”(“anaemic arseholes”) or even of the fans themselves (“twats as wet as their idols”) or the looks of in particular female artists (“whore”)? The dialogue is of a smart-ass caustic nature with no explanations, followed by an exclamation mark like a ‘finger up yours’! Though I have no cause for concern regarding Christ Martin - snug in his million-dollar home with Gwen– it is the nature of the attacks and the lack of justification that worry me. Are we just feeling so secure in our anonymity than any kind of drawl can be put out there without consequence or concern? The problem is when there is a spillover and a similar flippant and detached voice gets used between immediate friends. E-mails and texts between young kids contain more and more statements in a similar vein about their friends. Do you think these young kids don’t give a toss? Just ask any teenager or teacher about such episodes of ‘mal-communication’ spinning out of control amongst friends. So please – think twice before you write!

Word-count: 200 exactly!

4 comments:

  1. I enjoyed your Freudian slip of "Christ Martin"!
    I wonder how much this column says about communication. It seems to be very specific, concrete and example-driven. It does live up to the genre, though: opinions are expressed, prescriptive language is used...

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  2. I was pondering as I wrote it how a newspaper columnist would approach a more abstract subject and decided that keeping 'communication' as an abstract was impossible for the context. Hence, exemplification using new media such as the mobile phone and the internet fulfilled both the criteria of 'concreting' the abstract and being newsworthy.

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  3. Speculations on "what differences the text would have if you had chosen another 'function':"
    Let's say the author function was that of a newspaper reporter, the title may have been: British Youth can't spell... and the focus would have shifted to how text messaging spills over into other areas of life and has lead to a generation that can't spell. Or the focus could be on cyber or text message bullying. The tone would have been less personal and with some possible references to important political agencies, Gallup or similar to give the article some clout. The other angle could be how communication has changed with time - a more historical time line of pamphlets, newspapers, letters, fax, telephone, internet etc. Or it could be a linguistic study of interpersonal communication amongst friends and how polite phrases have/small talk has changed over time - but that we still talk about the weather!

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  4. Interesting reflections on how the author function ('udsigelsesposition' we could call it in Danish) would change the possibility of writing at all abstractly. The professional obligations of a reporter or an academic would of course also function as restrictions on the subject matter and the appropriate tone of the piece.

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