This week (week 7), we’re looking again at our final folio task: “comparison of discourses”. Then next week (week 8) we’ll look at an extra idea that can really help you develop your folio pieces, and then (in week 9) we’ll have a consultation week so that I can help you check that you’ve got all of your work ready for submission in your folio. To get us back into thinking about this final folio task, here’s a really nice example of how “explaining a text” can work 🙂 In the following clip, Sheila Marie Orfano responds to the (implied) question, “Why should you read “The Joy Luck Club” by Amy Tan?”. This is a similar idea to your folio task: it explains to someone in an engaging and direct way why a text/author is interesting and relevant: Play Video You can find this and plenty of other examples of this kind of literary explanation here: https://ed.ted.com/series/reading-between-the-lines Like the “textual intervention” task, you’ll do two versions of your “comparison of discourses” task for your folio. So this week, I’ll be asking you to continue thinking about your first version and to also work on your second version. For this second version, you’ll still use the same text you chose last time, but you’ll pick a different audience. That means you’ll have to find a different way to communicate with your new audience, and perhaps even a slightly new “meaning” for the text to make it specifically relevant to them! What do I mean by the “meaning” of the text changing depending on your audience? Well, for example, I might tell a group of school kids that “The Three Little Pigs” is a story about the importance of good planning and perseverance: the pigs run into some problems but they keep trying and eventually succeed. That’s a pretty nice way for a group of kids to understand the story. But what if my audience was a group of corporate executives? They might not find that interpretation of the story particularly interesting or engaging… So I might explain to corporate executives that “The Three Little Pigs” is a story about how important it is to diversify your investments rather than only investing in straw housing. That way, even if the straw market “collapses”, you’ll still have your investments in sticks and bricks! Or maybe I could explain that it’s a story about planned obsolescence. Why sell your clients (the “pigs”) a house made of bricks right away, when you could first sell them a house made of straw and then (when that house falls apart) sell them a house made of sticks, and then (when that falls apart as well) sell them a house made of bricks? ie. the story is all about sales strategies and maximising profit! In other words, the relevance of the text (what it could “mean” for that audience) can change depending on who it’s being presented to. Starting up again As you saw last time, this task is very much about how we use language. So for a quick reminder about the decisions we’re always making (or should be making) about language, jump over to page 50 of the Red Book for some of George Orwell’s suggestions for communication. And if you like, turn to page 112 in the Red Book and think about giving one of those exercises a shot. Even though the exercise is asking you to describe an object, it’s the language that you use that will help you to really capture the essence of what the object is and the value it has. And don’t forget this week’s reading: The Little Green Grammar Book pages 129-150. In this week’s readings section on the course page, there’s also an interesting excerpt from the play Cyrano de Bergerac which involves finding all kinds of different ways of saying the same thing: that the hero has a big nose. The play has been adapted a few time; here’s a version of the scene in an adaptation called Roxanne (1987): Play Video Play Video Comparison of Discourses task, second version Here’s a reminder of the quick version of the “comparison of discourses” task: – What is your text and what does it mean? – Who is your audience and why should they care? – How can you make your audience understand and care about this text and what it means? How can you make it relevant to them? For this second version, you’ll keep the same text, but you’ll choose a different audience. To get the most out of this task, try to make your audience choice completely different so that you have to use a really different method of communication. (Don’t be afraid to pick an audience that’s a bit unusual. It can make it a lot more fun!) For a reminder of the full task info, don’t forget that you can check out the “folio resources” tab on the course page and also the info on our week 6 posts. Communication: What do we need to know? What are some of the things that can help us when we’re trying to communicate with different audiences? There’s all kinds of information that can be useful, but here are some things that you can keep in mind to help make decisions about your communication methods: Context: What kind of environment (social, political?) is this information intended for? Audience: Who, more specifically, are you trying talk to? What do you know about them? Purpose: What are you trying to achieve? What are the key points? Possible complexities: What are the “problems” that need to be addressed? What additional problems might arise in your communication? Who might not “get it”? Communication Examples Take a look at the following examples and think about how they’ve used certain communication techniques and decisions based on an understanding of their intended audience. If you’ve ever seen Horrible Histories, just about every segment is doing what we’re doing in this task – it’s taking some potentially dry information about history and then communicating it to its audience in a way that’s engaging and enjoyable, and also gets a lot of key information across! Here’s one example, but you can find plenty online: Play Video Play Video This kind of approach to communication isn’t just about teaching people things. In fact, finding different ways to target and engage your audience is absolutely vital if you want to influence or persuade people. Whether you want to sell something to someone or you want to change the world (or even just make it a tiny bit better), you won’t get anywhere unless you can get people to listen to what you’re saying and understand your ideas. We’re surrounded by “noise” (there are messages everywhere!), so how can you get your message to cut through and make an impact? This can, of course, also be very political. Understanding the way that methods of communication target us can also help us to look at what we’re being told critically and to question what’s being presented to us. The first step to questioning a message is understanding exactly how that message has been crafted. Some different methods to keep in mind: Metaphor: Describing something as something else to show resemblance. Analogy: An extended comparison between two things, usually comparing the way they operate. Illustration: Using an example to show how it works. Anthropomorphism: Giving human qualities to non-human things. Think about the benefits and drawbacks of each method depending on who your audience is and what you’re trying to communicate. Here’s one example of analogy: Play Video Play Video What do you think? Is the approach effective or not? What works, exactly, and what doesn’t? And here’s another one: Play Video Play Video How about that one? Effective or not? What works and what doesn’t? There’s never a single correct answer to whether or not communication is effective. We all receive information differently! But even though things that work for some people won’t work for others, we can still base our decisions on informed and logical ideas. (eg. Personally, I think the first example – an example of analogy – works pretty well. The use of Tetris may be more relevant or less relevant for different ages and cultures, but I’d expect most people in the intended audience to be aware of the game and how it works. Even though we can question how closely the analogy fits the real science, the basic idea – the way the environment problem builds and increases – comes through pretty clearly in the analogy. The second example is, for me, not that effective at all. It’s an example of anthropomorphism, giving the punctuation marks human attributes. But they’re all dropped into action so quickly that I can’t keep up and give up on the whole thing pretty quickly. That’s just the way that I respond to the communication methods, though! Others will respond differently, so alternate ideas and methods are always welcome :)) And let’s add one more term to the list: register. – We change our register (our method of speaking) depending on our social context. eg. you don’t talk to your boss the same way you’d talk to a group of children. – Think about the tone and manner of speaking you use in different situations. There’s no such thing as neutral communication: when we communicate, we’re always manipulating our register. Attendance task For this week’s attendance, I’d just like you do the following: 1) Post a draft (or an excerpt or just a plan of what you’re going to do) of the second version of this task. Use the same text but pick a different audience. Explain how your second approach is different from your first approach. Are there completely different methods you could try to communicate your message to your audience more effectively? A song? A comic book? A play? A diagram or image(s)? A physical activity? See how creative you can be with this! Try to reference the original text as much as possible as well — feel free to include quotes and explain to your audience what they mean. You can find a lot of nuances and interesting ideas in these texts, so don’t be afraid to write some long(ish) pieces for these tasks (but no more than 500 words for any piece of writing.) And also feel free to change the “meaning” and relevance of the text depending on who your audience is (like in my Three Little Pigs example above.) You can actually have a lot of fun with this! 2) Discuss some of the communication examples I’ve included above and point out the methods of communication that you think are effective, the methods you think are less effective, the benefits and drawbacks of the different approaches, and what methods you might find useful in your own work.
