The idea of this piece of work is to hype up our own style. I picked this article because I actually liked the style, it wasn’t as dry as the usual articles in the Economist, plus I am intrigued by Obama and haven’t quite made my mind up about him yet. Politics is one of my weak areas, mainly as I believe that fundamentally they’re all the same and therefore have to make an effort to be interested. There’s another one of my sweeping, inaccurate, offending statements!
After reading through this and considering how I tend to work in general I recognised some key points. My work , left unchecked, is often:
v Grammatically incorrect.
v Badly researched. There are few solid statistics although the original article is full of statistics and quotes.
v I often include something of my own experience and use this to back up my point. I know little about the health system in the US or the proposed reforms, but aged 18 I was working in America teaching outdoor pursuits. I broke my toe in what I would like to say was a heroic adventure, but I was only playing volleyball. I was taken to hospital and luckily had health insurance. I wasn’t in very much pain at all, but a black pregnant woman near me was in agony. They were trying to find ‘someone’ to pay for her care as she had no insurance. They treated me first. I left after having X-Ray’s and perfect treatment about two hours later. As I passed through the waiting area I noticed the black woman was still there, still in agony. I don’t even know the whole story, she could have been an addict who regularly came in cold turkey, but I have still used this experience in my article. It is wrong to do so, for several reasons, but mainly personal opinion in an article disrupts the balance of the article and one incident proves little. If the article is not perceived to be balanced then the writers credibility could be doubted and therefore the ‘facts’ not taken as true.
v Full of strange humour, which is too subtle, and not many people ‘get’. For example I mention the ‘right-wing bangs’, this is to replace ‘right-wing fringe’ in the original article. ‘Bangs’ being a word used for a straight fringe. The article makes no other mention of hair, so it would be difficult to pick up. I sound sarcastic. This will put the reader off, especially if my articles aren’t known for style.
v Has two or more crossed themes, here I’ve crossed references to Jesus Christ with Obama. This is something I love to do, take two different concepts and mix them up and make new metaphors. I could have mixed Obama with references from the movie Grease, but I’ve chosen Jesus to mix with Obama for several reasons.
o I often offend people with non-pc writing
o The new messiah is often said to be black. There are also references to the original Jesus being black and not of Jewish origin.
o Obama came from ‘small’ beginnings, like Jesus. He speaks passionately and is able to motivate and attract huge crowds of people. His story isn’t yet told and I think that he has stirred up such a hornet’s nest within the US and will they ‘kill him if they think he’s lied’. (Jesus Christ Superstar the musical).
o Gallup and the ‘respected analyst’ are like the Apostles and Gospels of today and it made me smile. I used the word prophet for Charlie Cook as Obama claims to have lived as a Muslim. So again badly researched references to major religions, neither of which I am involved in or know very much about.
Again this isn’t a good idea if I don’t want to alienate or confuse the reader.
v I often sound ambiguous about what my opinions are. Here I start as if I disapprove of Obama, then appear to defend him half way through. Finally to discard him altogether. In my attempts to be balanced I often swing from one extreme to another rather than walk a middle line throughout the text.
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