Bavaria - The Hills are Alive with the Sound of Mozart

"Just so you're all aware," Robert, the tour guide, shouted as our group shuffled around Salzberg (which was unsurprisingly lacking in nuns and singing children) "I am well versed in all 'Sound of Music' hits and if requested, can lead the group in a singsong"
Groans rippled through the crowd as Robert snapped his Leiderhosen and told anyone who'd listen that he'd directed a version of the play in Amateur Dramatics.

Unfortunately, Robert's personal achievements were the only things impressive about the city. Shops were packed with tourists buying anything with Julie Andrew's face on for the bargain price of 40 euros. Sticking a celebrity's face on something is like encrusting it with diamonds - it becomes ten times more expensive. Streets were filled with small children, that could speak more German than our tour guide, who were feeded Salzbiscuits to seagulls.

If it wasn't the sound of 'Doe, Rae, Me' being hummed by everyone, some more enthusiastic than others, we might have been able to enjoy the chiming of the Glockenspiel, that seemed to ring every other second.

Sitting on church steps, waiting for the coach to come and rescue us all wasn't exactly a highlight of the holiday. I can't say that playing Miniature Golf, the same course you can find in Bristol, was traditionally Bavarian, but that's what I distinctly remember about the trip.

Bavaria held other exciting new experiences, like watching a man dive off the edge of a mountain that was 6,473ft from the ground. Skydive, that is, for those wondering if he ended up flatter than an Austrian pancake. It was quite a performance watching the man set up his parachute and tieing himself into a backpack the size of a German grizzly bear.
The Rauschberg mountain is situated in the small town of Ruhpolding. It's a popular spot for skydiving and, for those less adventurous out there, hiking routes. With neon yellow signs directing you to the bottom there's a guarantee you won't get lost…probably.

Once you've made the exhausting trip up the mountain, or the more popular option of the ski-lift, there's a delightful wooden cabin at the top, serving apple streusel and blackberry cheesecake made with goat's milk. Sure it's four euros a slice - sans Julie Andrews' face - but well worth a taste all the same.

If you want to get even more involved in the Bavarian culture, attend what's known as a 'Hut Evening' at a local pub or restaurant. My family made the decision, although it was probably a mistake in retrospect, of attending a Hut Evening that commenced at 6pm and ending at 10:30pm. According to experts four and a half hours is the longest amount of time anyone can listen to old men with walrus moustaches yodelling at the top of their lungs. That is one evening I'm not likely to forget any time soon - probably because it's permanently scarred my ear drums…

Overall, Bavaria is beautiful, brimming with tradition and opportunities to act like locals, waving white and blue checkered flags and donning lion hats with pride. The perfect holiday for those not afraid of looking a little stupid.

Style Models

Fiction Style Models:
(all are fiction books that I own physical copies of)
- Paper Towns by John Green (full length)
-A Cheertastic Christmas Miracle by John Green (short story)
- Severed Heads, Broken Hearts by Robyn Schneider (full length)

Persuasive Style Models:
-  The Life Stages of Women
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/10146752/Have-the-traditional-life-stages-for-women-disappeared-forever.html
-Airbrushing Kate Winslet
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/emma-brockes-blog/2013/oct/17/kate-winslet-vogue-cover-grotesque

To Inform and Advise:
-Neo magazine: How to dress Lolita
- Travel Writing on Bavaria:
http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2013/oct/18/bavaria-munich-off-piste-skiing-resorts
- Travel Writing
http://www.theguardian.com/travel/2012/jul/15/country-music-nashville-tennessee-us-america

Beauty is a Beast Draft One

Beauty is a Beast

Why self-esteem is at an all-time low

 

There’s been a multitude of things in the media over the last few months about the beauty and fashion industry as well as the self-esteem levels of young girls. France made the not-so-drastic choice to ban beauty pageants, Dove launched its campaign of ‘Real Beauty’ and Barbie is no longer the most popular girl in Malibu. Times are changing. So, it’s about time that the problem of low self-esteem was addressed.  

            We all know of the perfect ideal that we can wear whatever we want, whenever we want, so why does no one act upon it? You don’t see Miley Cyrus crying in the bathroom that everyone hated her outfit; she’s out there in the spotlight writhing around in a plastic bikini no matter how socially inappropriate it is. I’m not saying that we should all jump on the bandwagon, wearing wetsuits in winter, but maybe it’s not such a bad idea to adopt some of Miss Miley’s ‘don’t care’ attitude?              Women through the ages had different opinions of beauty. Females of the 21^st century are weightlifting the pressure to be thin, to be picture-perfect…but if you look at the pictures of the 15^th century, society preferred their women chubby by today’s standard. 18^th century women liked to squeeze themselves into corsets that were uncomfortable but beautiful, yet nowadays women are shamed for wearing the current trend of corsets and cropped tops. Correct me if I’m wrong but I’m sure Marie Antoinette didn’t get hassle for her high fashion.

Girls are judged everywhere for wanting to look young, sweet and pretty by strangers. They shouldn’t have to put up with that, because youth is hell enough as it is. When we were all young, sweet and pretty without realising it and a girl told us our Lelli Kelli sandals were so 2003 our mother's would tell us she was "just jealous". That's what they've been telling you for years; that you're perfect 'just the way you are'. Hate to break it to you, Bruno Mars, but no one believed you. Why was that exactly?

A study was done by Boston University showing the levels of self-esteem in teenage girls throughout their college life and how it decreased as the years progressed. What that research told us was that generally all girls are insecure. We’re just hardwired that way. The beauty and fashion industry is meant to be a hopeful resource to girls to prove to themselves and others that they can be beautiful no matter what their shape, size or social status. As time’s gone on the beauty and fashion world has become one of criticism and judgement, no longer a celebration that women can look however they want.

So what about an even younger audience; how are we influencing the opinions of young and impressionable girls? I bet you can all name someone that owned at least one Barbie…or thirty and we wonder why girls have such high standards. Barbie has perfectly styled blonde hair, an unrealistically perfect figure and the biggest wardrobe known to mankind. She is the epitome of perfection. Or should that be she was?
In a recent report published by Mattel, the creators of Barbie, the sales of the multi-billion dollar doll dropped by 6%. Girls just aren’t as interested in Malibu’s most famous anymore.  This is probably due to the introduction of competition, ironically also owed by Mattel. ‘Monster High’ are dolls made to be daughters of famous monsters with the catchy slogan of ‘Be Yourself, Be Unique, Be a Monster’. It’s definitely encouraging to see consumers opting for a brand that encourages individuality rather than idealism.

             It’s not just young girls that are gaining better ideas about what beauty is, but also a slightly more mature generation. Dove recently launched a campaign talking about finding ‘Real Beauty. A survey was completed, worldwide, that showed only 4% out of over 1000 women consider themselves beautiful. The research also revealed that 72% of women feel the pressure to be perfect. That’s just upsetting. The beauty world should be doing something to fix that depressing statistic.

Some may argue that beauty is encouraging women to improve their self-esteem and the way they view themselves, but those people haven’t yet fallen down the rabbit hole and been exposed to the hypocrisy of the beauty industry. How can people feel good in their own skin when they constantly compare themselves to the likes of Kate Moss and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, who prance around catwalk like they’re queens of the world?

                In general we need to come up with a way of combatting the self-esteem issues that shroud women like a black storm cloud. This could mean using models with more ‘average’ proportions in magazines and fashion shows, or changing the dolls that are given to girls so a better message about self-image is presented. The point is that every woman has the power to pick up a magazine and say “I’ll look good in that outfit” and not bother to pay attention to the person actually wearing the clothes. Every woman has the power to believe they are beautiful.
Together we can change the way people think about themselves and what it really means to be beautiful.

Persuasive Language - An Analysis

 

English Language Assessment – Analysis of Persuasive Writing

 

The art of persuasive language is used by many people in different situations to get the audience to agree with their own views. It can be both direct and subtle. In this assessment I will be looking at a variety of texts and how the authors of said texts use persuasive techniques effectively.

 

The first article is a response to an open letter, meaning that anyone can read it and not just the person to which it is addressed, written by Sinead O’Connor to Miley Cyrus concerning her ‘Wrecking Ball’ music video. The response is written by Melissa Bradshaw, persuading an audience that it is not Miley Cyrus, and to extent women in general, that is a ‘victim’ but is in control of the things she does, whether that include getting naked in a video that received over 18 million views.

Bradshaw uses synthetic personalisation to involve the audience, for example saying ‘perhaps you can already see a problem here’. The use of the pronoun ‘you’ is a direct address. It is calling upon the reader to think of their own opinions on the subject matter. She also does this by saying ‘we live in a world…’ to connect herself with the reader’s situation.
Bradshaw effectively uses rhetorical questions, such as ‘but where does that leave women who don't have boyfriends or husbands, or who want to be promiscuous?’, to provoke thought about what is lacking from O’Connor’s original article. A good persuasive text will leave readers thinking about what is the right way to think about are issue, and by questioning their current views.
The simple sentence ‘the perpetrators are to blame’ draws the reader’s attention to the opinion because it’s direct, strong and leaves no room for argument. It’s using the negative connotation of ‘perpetrators’ to relate to rape culture that is talked about within the article.
Overall, the tone of the article is critical of the opinion of Sinead O’Connor by the constant questioning of her logic.

 

The second article is written by Victoria Coren, writing about her opinions on the choice within Girl Guiding to remove the word ‘God’ from their “Promise” in replacement for ‘be true to myself and build upon my beliefs’.

The headline of the article ‘God swapped for gobbledegook’ instantly gives Coren’s point of view on the matter, which is that taking away the word God from the Promise is taking away one of the fundamental elements of Girl Guiding: a belief in God.

Coren uses an asyndetic list as well as 'tripling' to create a negative effect with the words 'lame, weak, hollow' All of these words have a negative connotation, putting emphasis on the fact that Coren disagrees with the idea. The adjective 'hollow' suggests that the new Promise has little effect or substance.

She writes 'was there no better alternative?'. Much like Bradshaw, Coren uses rhetorical questions to make the reader think about what should have been done. However, the point of a rhetorical question is that there is supposed to be no answer.

By using anaphora with 'when I was a kid' helps to reinforce that things have changed drastically over time. The use of short, simple sentences makes the writing style in this paragraph very conversational, making the reader feel closer to the writer and to the topic, perhaps as well as thinking of how things were like in their own childhood.

Finally, throughout Coren's writing, she uses humour, to both interest the audience and belittle the people that decided to change the Promise, for example when she says 'I promise that I'll chillax over a glass of 'poo, or maybe a swift half, which would be totes amazeballs' The use of slang language makes the text uncomfortable for the reader as the target audience of this article is probably not aware of what some of these words mean. By using slang she is suggesting that the new Promise means little to an older generation of parents that would like to send their children off to Brownies.

            In the final article I looked at, the topic was about the changing milestones in a women's life, and comparing what they are now to those of an older generation. It was written by Rebecca Holman for the Telegraph.

Holman uses a lot of pronouns throughout the article, such as 'we' and 'you', like Bradshaw, to include the reader. This technique makes the reader feel more connected with what is being said and makes it easier to relate to because the subject of the article is supposedly happening to everyone.

She uses adjectives like 'overwhelmingly' to describe something positive as well as using abstract nouns like 'freedom' to persuade the reader that the direct in which society is heading is a good one. It will, in Holman's eyes, lead to more freedom for women away from the expectations that are currently upon them. This is very emotive language that promotes emotional responses.

Holman uses declarative sentences such as 'I want to have children' to make sure that her opinion is clear and easy to understand. This is similar to the way Coren stated her opinions.

Running as a constant theme throughout the article is the use of facts and figures to corroborate with whatever Holman is writing, for example 'first time buyers will hit £100,000 by 2020' This makes her opinions sound more reliable because they are backed up by evidence.

Exaggeration and hyperbole are also used to make the current life of women seem harder than it is for example: 'it will be murder on my back' and 'I only ate eggs for three days'. This use of language means that the reader can easily imagine what it's like to be a female in today's society, even if it is slightly exaggerated.

 

In conclusion, persuasive language is used in a number of ways throughout a variety of texts. It is used for multiple purposes and the use of certain techniques can vary from writer to writer depending on how they'd like to reader to respond.