Propaganda

For a complete overview of propaganda techniques, see the Wikipedia page.  Below are two youtube films on the most common propaganda techniques.

Here is an example of American cold-war propaganda.  What techniques can you identify?

"Band of Brothers"

 

 
KING. What's he that wishes so?
My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin;
If we are mark'd to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires.
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England.
God's peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more methinks would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
We would not die in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call'd the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.'
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.'
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words-
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester-
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

 

Hiroshima

Watch the following from 0:45 to 2:40:

Introduction to Shakespeare

Analysing poetry

IB Language and Literature

History of English

Film Analysis: The Dark Knight

IB Parodies

Othello Introduction

Media and Gender

Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing by Margaret Atwood

"Stripping for Immortality: A Jungian Analysis of Atwood's "Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing"

Cliff Fosmore and Brett Ruby, 2008

Clearly, it makes sense that most women feel disgust and hate towards those who sell their bodies and degrade the integrity of females everywhere.  However, what if there is another side to the average, earthly woman’s hate of the “world’s oldest profession”?  “Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing” is a poem about ethereal power and unmatched beauty.

            It cannot be overlooked that the name in the title is a very well known myth.  Helen of Troy, most beautiful woman in the world.  Such an allusion provides a clue as to the mindset of the speaker of the poem.  The stripper scoffs at those other homely females who tell her to “be ashamed of [herself]” and passes at the opportunity to attain “varicose veins” by working a regular day job.  These veins are clearly impossible for one so lovely and are a symptom of those simple mortals.  This archetype of beauty is reborn in the speaker as a woman upon a stage, looking down on her audience of “rows of heads and upturned eyes.”  The scene invokes a feeling of worship and awe and the speaker doesn’t hide the fact she entertains such an audience, calling the men her “beery worshippers”.  Surely, Helen of Troy should be worshipped, but the men do not see it as such.  They see her persona, the everyday beauty who sell’s her body for profit because she doesn’t know any other way.  What they miss is that in truth, they are paying homage to a true deity.

            What they miss is this woman’s reason to strip, her inner energy, her anima.  She holds herself in very high esteem whispering she “comes from the province of the gods” and that her “mother was raped by a holy swan”.  The allusion to Helen’s mother, Leda give’s a certain allure to the speaker and makes her higher than everyone else.  She admits that her worshippers would like to “see through [her]” but then returns that “nothing is more opaque than absolute transparency” meaning that while they look upon her naked form and think they know what’s going on, they have no idea.  They do not see her “rising…in the air” in a “blazing swan-egg of light” again alluding to her divine lineage, revealing her to be a goddess, looking down upon them all, taking in the idolization.  Through stripping and being transparent to them, she believes she will be forever cherished by her subjects and knows she’s above them all in a blazing light.  She challenges anyone who denies her birthright as a daughter of Zeus in this lamentation she calls a “torch song” suggesting a double entendre where her audience is oblivious to the existence of this great goddess they unknowingly worship and that it is also an energy that will “burn” anyone that lays a hand on her holy body. The “burn” is another allusion to Helen having caused the Trojan war showing her danger and power, her divinity.  She strips for the immortality, for the essence of her hidden anima, a reincarnate Helen of Troy.

(URL: AP English Literature )

Text:

Helen of Troy Does Countertop Dancing

The world is full of women
who'd tell me I should be ashamed of myself
if they had the chance. Quit dancing.
Get some self-respect
and a day job.
Right. And minimum wage,
and varicose veins, just standing
in one place for eight hours
behind a glass counter
bundled up to the neck, instead of
naked as a meat sandwich.
Selling gloves, or something.
Instead of what I do sell.
You have to have talent
to peddle a thing so nebulous
and without material form.
Exploited, they'd say. Yes, any way
you cut it, but I've a choice
of how, and I'll take the money.

I do give value.
Like preachers, I sell vision,
like perfume ads, desire
or its facsimile. Like jokes
or war, it's all in the timing.
I sell men back their worse suspicions:
that everything's for sale,
and piecemeal. They gaze at me and see
a chain-saw murder just before it happens,
when thigh, ass, inkblot, crevice, tit, and nipple
are still connected.
Such hatred leaps in them,
my beery worshippers! That, or a bleary
hopeless love. Seeing the rows of heads
and upturned eyes, imploring
but ready to snap at my ankles,
I understand floods and earthquakes, and the urge
to step on ants. I keep the beat,
and dance for them because
they can't. The music smells like foxes,
crisp as heated metal
searing the nostrils
or humid as August, hazy and languorous
as a looted city the day after,
when all the rape's been done
already, and the killing,
and the survivors wander around
looking for garbage
to eat, and there's only a bleak exhaustion.
Speaking of which, it's the smiling
tires me out the most.
This, and the pretence
that I can't hear them.
And I can't, because I'm after all
a foreigner to them.
The speech here is all warty gutturals,
obvious as a slab of ham,
but I come from the province of the gods
where meanings are lilting and oblique.
I don't let on to everyone,
but lean close, and I'll whisper:
My mother was raped by a holy swan.
You believe that? You can take me out to dinner.
That's what we tell all the husbands.
There sure are a lot of dangerous birds around.

Not that anyone here
but you would understand.
The rest of them would like to watch me
and feel nothing. Reduce me to components
as in a clock factory or abattoir.
Crush out the mystery.
Wall me up alive
in my own body.
They'd like to see through me,
but nothing is more opaque
than absolute transparency.
Look--my feet don't hit the marble!
Like breath or a balloon, I'm rising,
I hover six inches in the air
in my blazing swan-egg of light.
You think I'm not a goddess?
Try me.
This is a torch song.
Touch me and you'll burn.

 

Margaret Atwood

 

(URL: Poemhunter )

 

Media and Gender

I Have A Dream

And here is the full text

Language and Gender

See also: http://youtu.be/Hb_BcM3nJns

Dystopia

'

Further Oral Activities

Language and Gender

Tips for structuring your Individual Oral

Structure your oral

1.       Introduction:

Briefly state what happens in this scene.

Place your extract in its context. Where is it in relation to the plot of the play or novel.

Who are involved in the scene? Which themes are prevalent in the scene? Identify only major ones that you will come back to in the Body.

State the significance of the scene and why it is significant (purpose). When identifying the purpose mention audience.

2.       Body:

Identify different aspects of the text, especially cultural references and stylistic/literary devices with which the author or playwright tried to achieve his/her purpose and reach his/her audience. Comment on the effect of the different literary devices.

How is the abstract structured, is it chronological, does it have change in tone?

3.       Conclusion:

Make sure your short presentation has a conclusion. In this conclusion you can state that the language used was very effective as shown before and that this scene ties into a later scene where the audience or characters acquires more knowledge or insight.

Remember:

It lasts a maximum of 10 minutes.

The presentation doesn’t need to be exhaustive.

Stick to the extract for examples, don’t be led into temptation to give long summaries of other parts of the novel or play.

Legalese

Ned Kelly Introduction

Presentation on True History for a Creative History course:

Introductory Presentation:

 

Ned Kelly in his own words: The Jerilderie Letter