A World We Live In - Unit4
.pdf11. What is the principle of paragraphing in this article? Is it logical?
II. Answer the questions about this article:
Trevino “Well” After
Having Appendectomy
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES, N.M., Aug. 10 (AP). - Golfer
Lee Trevino was reported in good condition today after undergoing an emergency appendectomy performed at St.Anne’s Hospital here.
Trevino, the PGA’s leading money-winner this year , was stricken yesterday evening after returning from Soccoro where he held a clinic at the New Mexico Junior PGA tournament.
“He’s doing very well. He tolerated surgery very well”, Dr. Leonard R. Stoops, who operated, commented early today. He said Trevino would be hospitalized about one week.
The El Paso, Texas, native was visiting the area to do some fishing but took the time to give some instructions to the young golfers.
1.Give examples of stylistic and grammatical awkwardness in this article.
2.Does the impression of hurried writing in the article depend on the use of short sentences or accumulation of clauses in longer ones?
3.What is the function of the quotations in the headlines and in the article itself?
4.What are the facts mentioned in the article?
5.How does stressing the facts and events effect the choice of words and sentence
structure?
6.What is omitted from the article that would probably have been included in a literary
story?
7.What means are used to make the report interesting?
8.Is it possible to describe the author’s attitude?
III. The following humorous selection is taken from the “Private Eye”:
Turd Let Out
Mr Spiggy Topes, leader of the Turds, a popular singing group, was today fined 5 s in the Inner Circle Magistrate’s Sessions and ordered to pay $ 100 costs for the hire of the premises and other effects (scenery, costumes, etc.)
Young girls wept as Topes knuckled his forelock and with a muffled grunt of “Thank you, Your Worship, you’re a white groover” stepped out of the dock and into a waiting chauffeur-driven hovercraft.
Sensation
Topes, 21, was fined for being in possession of a quantity of certain substances, not un-kin to the drug cannabis. He said “It is not true. I am going straight”.
Insp. “Knacker of the Yard” Knacker told the court how “his lads” had visited Mr
Topes Kings Road-style lodging house and attempted to gain access by smashing down the door.
They found Mr Topes lying with his head in the gas oven.
He was alleged to have said “Cool it, fuzz baby. This just isn’t your scene, man. Can’t you see I’m blowing my mind?”
Counsel for Topes, Mr Emmanuel Luftwaffe, Q.C., explained: “My client may be paraphrased thus: Good evening, officer. How nice of you to drop by. I’m just putting the fishing touches to a delicious home-made madeira cake. Won’t you make yourself comfortable in the sitting room and I’ll be with you in a jiff!”
1. May this article be considered as a parody of a newspaper report?
2.Who or what is ridiculed?
3.How is the humorous effect achieved?
4.What image of Topes is created?
5. What is the function of the phrases:
a)was ordered to pay other effects
being in possession attempted to gain access
b)you’re a white groover cool it, fuzz baby
I’m blowing my mind
6. Why is the story not presented in the chronological order?
7. Comment on the use of the “human interest” technique.
8. Give examples of sentences which are overloaded with information. 9. Give examples of grammatical structures typical of journalistic style. 10. Comment on the use of quotations.
11. What does the number following the name of Topes stand for in this article?
12. Rewrite the article in a more serious tone, making it a brief, matter of fact report.
IV. Choose a newspaper article which has characteristic features of journalistic writing and discuss them.
V. Write a short article based on the following facts:
1.The police receive a mysterious phone call informing them of Miss Gee’s death.
2.Sergeant Brown finds her body in her bedroom.
3.Her house is in the outskirts of town; nobody else lives in it.
4.Miss Gee’s only relative is a niece who is said to live in the United States but nobody knows her address.
VI. Write a brief article on a political event (international conflict, meeting of diplomats, etc.).
VII. Write two reports (with headlines) based on the facts given below. The first report is to be in favour of the custodian, the second in favour of the two hooligans.
1.A museum is on fire.
2.Two hooligans smelling of petrol are caught near the museum.
3.They say they acted out of revenge because the custodian of the museum refused to let them in on grounds that their boots were muddy.
VIII. Write a short literary story based on the facts given in the previous exercise. In what respects will your approach to the facts become different?
IX. Write a journalistic account of a football match and make up an appropriate headline for it.
X. Write a report describing a car accident. Add an appropriate headline.
XI. Change the following headlines to clear, complete sentences:
1.Miker Upset by Australian and Hecklers.
2.Winless Martin Loses 11th to Brown.
3.Blue’s Bid for 20 Fails but A’s Win.
4.Equine Epidemic Vaccine: Too Little Too Late.
5.Summit Meeting Soon.
XII. Discuss the similarities between headlines and the style used in writing telegrams. Write a telegram asking a friend to come to your birthday party and a headline for an article about a celebrity’s wedding party.
XIII. Discuss the possible interpretations of these headlines: 1. Shooting to Start on Spy Film.
2.Soldiers Stop at Pinesville.
3.Mad Professor Hunt.
XIY. Read the article and sum up the facts from the history of American Press and one of its leaders . Translate the article into English.
Можно ли было удивляться, что современные американцы нетерпеливо, а иногда и отчаянно искали неповторимые, непроизвольные и захватывающие переживания, которые могли бы придать остроту их жизни, все более состоящей из стандартных впечатлений массового производства? Погоня за “сенсациями” в XX веке, хотя и была более яростной, чем в любую прежнюю эпоху американской истории, все же не являлась простым продуктом алчности газетчиков или нездорового массового вкуса. Как и другие насаждаемые пороки, она отвечала определенной человеческой потребности, в данном случае общераспространенной потребности в потрясениях. Эта потребность удовлетворялась разными способами. Развитие популярной прессы вызвало новую волну интереса к уголовной хронике и спорту.
Новый стиль, в котором выделялась неповторимость и сенсационность, был привнесен в американскую журналистику эмигрантом из Венгрии Джозефом Пулитцером, который в 1883 году принял руководство нью-йоркской газетой “Уорлд”. “В нашем великом и постоянно растущем городе, - объявил Пулитцер своим читателям, - найдется место для газеты не только дешевой, но и блестящей, не только блестящей, но и крупной, не только крупной , но и истинно демократической, преданной делу народа, а не властителям кошельков, больше посвященной новостям Нового, чем Старого Света; газеты, которая будет разоблачать мошенничество и обман, бороться со злоупотреблениями и пороками общества, которая будет сражаться за народ с искренним усердием”. “Уорлд” Пулитцера - первая общепризнанная современная массовая ежедневная газета - продавалась по два цента за экземпляр и за пятнадцать лет увеличила свой тираж с 15 000 до 1,5 миллиона экземпляров.
Погоня за сенсациями означала оживление внимания к преступлениям, катастрофам, сексу, скандалам и ужасам. В первом номере пулитцеровской “Уорлд” на первой странице основное место заняла статья “Смертельная молния” - история пожара в Нью-Джерси, унесшего шесть человеческих жизней и уничтожившего сто тысяч баррелей сырой нефти; другая передовая статья описывала последние часы жизни приговоренного к смерти убийцы, изображала в подробностях, как он уверял, что невиновен, барабанил в дверь камеры, отказался от посещения священника и как он в конце концов прореагировал на чтение смертного приговора. На первой странице помещалась еще статья о казни в Питтсбурге, где “был повешен сторож Макконки. При чтении приговора он кричал судье, что его палачи - убийцы.” В течение следующих лет Пулитцер приправлял столбцы своей газеты, а вернее, начинял их историями об абортах, растлениях, нанесениях телесных повреждений и убийствах.
Для того чтобы пробудить интерес читателей и увеличить тираж, Пулитцер готовил состязания и массовые кампании, выискивал (или придумывал) светские сплетни.
Существовало еще несколько областей, где американцы надеялись найти неиспользованный запас неповторимого и непредсказуемого. Одной из таких вызывающих новый широкий интерес областей была погода и ее прогнозирование. В стране, где с каждым годом уменьшался процент фермеров, где добывание средств к существованию все меньше зависело от дождей или морозов, где основное средство ежедневного передвижения, автомобиль, было на редкость водонепроницаемым, где люди все больше привыкали к центральному отоплению, кондиционированию воздуха, увлажнителям и осушителям, этот пробудившийся интерес к предстоящей погоде трудно поддавался объяснению.
ROLE PLAY
This is a meeting held by the newspaper staff members, to decide on what steps can be taken to halt the decline of readership. You have invited interested parties and experts to the meeting to put forward their viewpoints and hope that by the end of the meeting they will be able to advise you on a suitable course of action. You have to analyze the situation and give possible proposals.
Roles:
Editor-in-chief.
Editorial department manager
Correspondence subeditor
Advertising manager
Circulation manager
Production manager
Business manager
Professor of journalism
Sociologist
Russian journalist
Editor-in-chief. You are supposed to act as chairperson. The policy of the newspaper had long been summarized in the phrase which in modest pica type, can be found at the head of page one: “All the news that’s fit to read “. We have to maintain our reputation for integrity, fair-mindedness and sound news presentation.
Lately, the circulation has dropped down considerably and you have to do something to cope with the difficult situation.
To work out a strategy in the development of the newspaper, it is necessary to analyse its fundamental organisation. We have got five major departments: editorial, which gathers and prepares the news, entertainment, and opinion materials, both written and illustrated; advertising, which solicits and prepares the commercial messages addressed to the readers; circulation, which has the task of selling and delivering the newspaper to the readers of a community; production, which turns the editorial materials and advertisements into type and prints the newspapers; and business which oversees the newspaper’s entire operation. Let’s hear out the representatives of the departments.
Editorial department manager. Newspaper stories should be written to include the “5 W’s and H” - who, what, when. where, why, and how. Their purpose is to present a report
of an action or a situation in simple, easily understood language that can be comprehended by a mass audience of different educational levels. Increased emphasis should be placed upon simplicity of writing and upon explaining the “why” of news situations. You think that your department should work more, effectively with the readers’ letters. Ask the correspondence sub-editor to speak about the improvements in your work.
Correspondence. You think that you should work more effectively with correspondence. It seems most people don’t like getting advice from members of their family. When they need advice, they don’t usually ask people they know. Instead many people write letters to newspapers and magazines which give advice on many different subjects, including family problems, sex, the use of language, health cooking, child care, clothes, and how to buy a house or a car. But do they follow it?
Advertising Manager. Newspaper advertising is divided into two types, display and classified. The former ranges from inconspicuous one-inch notices to multiple-page advertisements in which merchants and manufacturers proclaim their goods and services. Classified advertisements are the small-print, generally brief announcements packed together near the back of the paper; they deal with such diverse topics as help wanted, apartments for rent, used furniture and automobiles for sale, and personal notices.
I think in order to work more effectively, classified and display advertising should be handled by different staffs. I can work with classified advertising. We shall have to hire a person to deal with display advertising. Display advertising is broken into two categories, retail and national, sometimes called general. Retail advertising, often called local comes from local merchants and service companies. National advertising comes primarily from manufacturers and other commercial organisations selling brand-name merchandise and services over wide regions or the entire country. We can establish contacts with advertising agencies.
Circulation. Since 1971 there has been a massive desertion of 5 million readers from the middle market popular papers. Although there has been an increase of nearly 2 million for the tabloids and 700.000 for the quality papers, 2.3 million readers have been lost. A fundamental reason for the change lies with television becoming the main medium for news. Consequently all newspapers now give more attention to sports results, city finance and entertainment, but this has failed to half the decline in readership.
Among Britain’s best selling periodicals, the favourites are the Radio Times and the TV Times, which provide detailed information concerning forthcoming programmes on BBC and independent television. Their popularity is evidence of the dominant place of television in national life. Why not publish TV information?
Second to them in popularity are the women’s magazines, Woman’s Weekly, Woman and some other. Why not leave a page for information for women and about women?
Production manager. We have to introduce new printing technology. It can cause bitter conflicts between the newspaper management and the unions of the typesetters and printers. We should realise that without a great number of computer terminals we won’t be able to increase the profitability of the newspaper. Technical rearrangements will help us to remain politically independent and it can attract journalists of the highest callable.
Business manager. Advertising has always been a vital source of income. As long ago as 16660, King Charles II advertised for his lost dog. Today, income from advertising is as crucial as income from sales. We ought to be looking for firms and sell their production. We
have to think about new advertising gimmicks: photos, headlines, graphic devices. With new computer technology we acquire a wide range of advertising means.
Let me remind you that there are over 900 free newspapers, popularly known as
“freebies”, almost all of them are financed entirely by advertising. They achieve a weekly circulation of over 40 million. They function as local noticeboards, where local events are advertised, and anyone can advertise in the ‘for sale’ or ‘wanted’ columns. Why not try this method of attracting the reader?
Professor of journalism. Let’s take the books, magazines and papers we have seen where we have stopped. The dominant publication has been the comic book. There have been local papers and I’ve bought and read them. There have been lots of paperbacks with some great and good titles but they were greatly outnumbered by the volumes of sex, sadism and homicide. What has come of the emotional life of the nation?
Tell the staff members how you understand ‘news’ and what can become news in your newspaper.
Sociologist. To make the analysis of the situation more effective, we’ll have to make predictions about the future and try to answer some questions:
*Do you think that newspaper readership will increase or continue to decline?
*Do you believe that papers may one day be ousted by radio or TV?
*Do you think that newspapers will become more or less subject to government interference? Can there be any limits to press freedom?
Russian journalist. You try to make comparisons between the British media (particularly newspapers) and the media in your country:
*Which newspapers are comparable to the main British tabloids and broadsheets?
*To what extent are newspapers funded by advertising?
*Are there any limits to press freedom?
What can you advise to the newspaper staff to improve the situation?