Language investigation part two...

Okay, so I had my first lesson of English Language after the summer break today. Spoke to my teacher about my question and hypothesis and received some feedback on my ideas.

Basically... I have to be extremely careful that I don't tread into Literature territory, and because I'm using fiction as the basis for my investigation that's going to be a major pitfall I have to guard against.

Other than that... I guess that I am on the right track at least. I wanted to focus on the characters, and the way they are described by the authors, the language used to show their actions, the way they are active or passive in sentence construction, if they perform stereotypical roles or not...

And, by Jove, I never thought I'd ever want to do a study on gender issues. Damn.

Oh well. Roll with it.

Language investigation...

Hey guys, or gals, how are things?

I'm currently writing for my English Language investigation coursework. I've found a "hypothesis" to go with, it's really a question, and I'm enjoying it... but I have no idea if my teacher's going to like it at all. Ah well.

So, the reason I'm blogging is to tell you all that I will think about posting up the finished thing once I've gotten it finalised - in small amounts, it's a monster!

I'll tell you the gist of it now.

WARNING: Subject to frequent, swift and unannounced changes!

“How do the ways female authors of fantasy use language in their first chapter differ from the ways male authors of fantasy use language in their first chapter?”

Oh, and yeah... I realise that it's a general statement of vagueness... but that's kind of what you're supposed to have.

I'll be analysing lexis, semantics, pragmatics and possibly grammar. I've started on the semantics/grammar/structure side of things.

No idea when it's going to be finished, but hey, it's for college, and they love deadlines!

Results day...

Oh, I didn't post about my AS results. We got them last week, was it last week? Yes, it was... Time melds into a single unit when you do not have school or college to go to. Stupid mind.

Anyways, so... I had four exams, or five if you count Philosophy and Ethics as two, which they really are.

English Literature, English Language, Media Studies, Philosophy and Ethics.

I got two As, a B and an E.

The E was an overall grade for Phil & Ethics, which was a D and E respectively, brought to an overall E.

An A in both Language and Media Studies, and a B for Literature.

Hey, if you've read the other posts from back when... you'll have seen the one where I went into the Literature exam a little bit. I also said that I wasn't sure how well I'd done, but that I did okay. Which I did. Grade Bs are respectable, and nice. Hopefully it can be upped to a low A, which is still an A, next year. Or, stay at B, I don't mind. It is a high B, and if I am lucky next year, I'll get some decent grades and bump it up.

Language and Media were nice exams, in the end. My media coursework was strong, and it has been entered into a regional... competition, if you would call the Catholic colleges in the region coming together to give awards to the best products in their categories a competition. It probably waived the right to be called that when they didn't mention at the very beginning that this would happen at the end of the year though. Sneaked that one onto us, didn't they?
Still... Should be fun.

I am almost there, but I don't think I want to be...

So, I'm currently on page 407 of Ghost Story... there's barely 50 pages or so to go until the end, and I have a feeling that I won't enjoy being there. You know, at the end of another book... waiting for the next one. Waiting a year. A whole year.

I can't do it.

So instead, I'll have to busy myself with things that will take up a lot of time. English Literature and Language investigations anyone?

Huh, the US and UK covers are almost identical
this time around... Strange.

I am adamant that I will choose fiction as the basis of my language investigation, and I hope to God that I can manage a topic around science-fiction, or possibly fantasy. Mainly because my Literature teacher will be taking half of my Language lessons next year, as she teaches the higher level course, and she hates science-fiction. In fact, she even admitted as such to us, but there have been a few incidents where she's seen that possibly science-fiction isn't as bad as she's mistaken it for.

That opportunity comes in the form of dystopian fiction and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale. And boy, is she going to get a shock when I hand in my Literature coursework and I've used a novel by very famous science-fiction writer Philip K. Dick! Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said, is set in a dystopian setting... which will allow me to compare it to The Handmaid's Tale.


Ah, I seem to have gone on a tangent... oh, well, never mind.

I do not want to finish Ghost Story, yet.
But I must know what happens!

I'm going to scurry away and read now.

Hopefully I'll get a decent review posted on here soon.

No. I will post an awesome review.