Genre Conventions as They Change over Time - Assignment Example

History of a Genre: Analyzing Genre Conventions as they Change over Time History of a Genre: Analyzing Genre Conventions as they Change over Time Genre can be defined as a group of artistic composition, for example, literature or music that has similar features. The similar features can be in the form of style, subject matter or form. Genres can be defined by tone, length, content or the literary technique that is used. This paper will focus on the news article genres to analyze the water crisis in California (2014) and Sydney (1998). News articles are a piece of writing published in internet or print and include newspapers, news magazines and newsletters. Other examples include the websites (news- oriented) and article directories that discuss recent or current issues of interest. There is difference between the compositions of the news article genres of water crisis in California (2014) and Sydney (1998). This is a proof of transformation of the news article genres over time1. Water Crisis in California in 2014 The water crisis in California in 2014 is longer compared to that of Sydney. This can be seen even without counting the number of words that are used. The font size is also bigger and the spacing done is more than single spacing among the sentences. This has made the article to be more eligible and easy to read. The writings are also appealing with the major points highlighted and connected to links that give more explanations. The phrases that are highlighted include “states epic drought”, “historic and unsustainable” and “life itself is subsiding” among others2. There are several quotations that are used in the California articles to support the information. Examples of these quotations are the words of John Viegas and research done by the University of California. Other quotations are those of Howitt, Thomas Harter, Sutton, Joe Carracncho, and Bryce Lundberge among others. The news article on water crisis in California in 2014 has images that are used to explain the issue3. The images that are used are colored and are used in different areas of the article to explain different concepts. Example is the pictures that are used to describe the fall in the levels of the aquifers. An image has also been used to elaborate on the impacts of drought on the aquifers. The article has also used the images to explain how the drought has impacted on farming practices. The article’s introduction is designed in a way that gives the picture of the situation to the reader. It addresses the audience as if they can see the situation by being present in the area that is affected. The article’s introduction focuses on the negative impacts that are caused by the crisis rather than the crisis itself on the introduction part. It also gives the reaction of those affected by giving the mitigation measures that they have put in place. “WILLOWS, Calif. — When the winter rains failed to arrive in this Sacramento Valley town for the third straight year, farmers tightened their belts and looked to the reservoirs in the nearby hills to keep them in water through the growing season”4 The article gives narration in the form of a period that the crisis started in the period that it ends at the beginning part. This is used to show the suffering that crisis had caused to the California residents. The article brings in an element of sympathy as it narrates how the situation worsened over time. “When those faltered, some switched on their well pumps, drawing up thousands of gallons from underground aquifers to prevent their walnut trees and alfalfa crops from drying up. Until the wells, too, began to fail”5. The California water crisis article used linguistic styles like simile in the explanation of concepts. Example is the explanation of design to which the land is subsiding: “…. like cereal in a bowl after the milk has drained out”6. The article also uses dialogue as a style to pass information to the audience. This is seen as the work gives a part of dialogue, communication between John Vegas, a county supervisor, and his constituents. The article also uses statistics to explain the concepts that link to the California water crisis: “…nearly 60% of the state…38 million residents and 27 million cultivated acres….5.1 million acre- feet….fined up to $500 a day… ”7 This makes the article to be more factual and reliable as it uses other studies to analyze the situations. The article also analyses the issues that are linked to the California crisis and how they affect the crisis: “The shrinking of the aquifers has added a new dimension to the concerns over the historic drought... The parched zone now spans a dozen states … and includes fields and grazing land that produce a third of the country’s beef cattle and half of its fruit, vegetables and winter wheat. Prices for most of these products have soared this year”8 The article also elaborates on the level of impact that has been caused by the menace. The article elaborates on the part of the areas that have been affected. It is also characterized by the views of scientists like the meteorologists. “Hardest hit is California. As of last month, nearly 60 percent of the state is officially in an “exceptional” drought — the highest level, above “severe” — and meteorologists see no immediate change in a relentlessly dry forecast. Indeed, scientists are warning that the state’s cyclical droughts could become longer and more frequent as the climate warms”9. The article also has made use of different language: it used both English and Latin (like “Fiat Lux”). The article gives all the spheres of the problem, including the political part of it: “…rural and urban, environmentalists and property owner, Republican and Democrat…”10. It also includes the views of the scientists and environmentalists: “…environmentalists and many scientists argue that…”11 The article is divided into subheadings like “Worst drought on record” and “Conflicts in the state capital.”12 The California article gives how water as a commodity is used in the community. “Irrigation accounts for 41 percent of the state’s water use, compared with 9 percent of urban water systems.”13 The article ends the information given through issuance of the solution for the problem: “…any long-term solution would have to balance competing interests… require not only more storage for water, but also a general willingness by all sides to make do with less”14 Water Crisis in Sydney in 1998 The Sydney water crisis article’s wording is more compressed compared to the California writing. The article is also shorter in terms of the number of wordings compared to the California’s case. The font size and spacing is smaller compared to the California water crisis article of 2014. The article is written in plain texts, that is, there is no inclusion of any image or diagram in the article. The article begins with a box in which the texts are written in italics before going to the open prose format15. The article starts with the summarization of the whole information in an abstract format. The article talks in terms of emotional comparison of the effect of the Sydney’s water crisis. It contradicts what the crisis was considered be and what it was in the reality form. It gives a feeling that the information out to the public was exaggerated and had no facts: “The widely publicized contamination of Sydneys water supply in July 1998 felt like a crisis to affected Sydney residents, but the rhetoric did not match the reality.16” The article lays more emphasis on the perception of the crisis by the public as opposed to the impacts of the crisis. It analyses more on what people said and published in relation to the crisis and the reality that it bears. “We are interested in the way our reality is constructed, the way we manufacture consent or dissent, the way in which some knowledge is privileged and the way that power is attached to this knowledge”17 The article also raises issues that were omitted in the decision making processes that linked to the crisis. This is seen as the author refers to the process as “…example of public exclusion from the decision-making process.”18 The article takes into consideration the timing of the crisis and issues, even the date of its occurrence. “… will call Day Seven of the crisis. We count as Day One the Wednesday (29 July)…”19 The voice used in the article is of the second person: “We begin to write this on what we…we…we”20 The article is in a narration format, it gives the story of how the crisis came to exist, its causes and the impacts. The article is written in a blaming tone: “We knew that they were always present in the water... We also knew that there is an absence of published safe levels of either of these two parasites…so we continued to drink the water”21 The Sydney article gives the extent to which the crisis was growing or developing by time. This is shown in the sentence: “By Day Three the affected areas had grown in number.” The article uses dialogue to communicate the impacts of the crisis, even though not directly. This can be seen in the communication between the “colleague” who had a stomach pain and the doctor.22 The article also relies on other sources as references to back its information. Example of this case is the use of “Sydney Morning Herald (31 July 1998)”23 in the explanation of the extent of impacts. The article takes consideration of the different spheres of the society: political, environmental, sociology among others. This is seen as it gives the views of politicians, environmentalists and sociologists in the article24. The paper entails the analysis of the news article genres to compare the transformation that has taken place over time. It analyses the water crisis in California (2014) and that of Sydney (1998). There are few similarity aspects of the two articles with the differences being so many. This means that there has been a transformation of the news article genre over time. These differences are caused by things like technological improvement among other factors. Notes 1. Kerry Dirk, “Navigating Genres,” Writing Spaces: Reading and Writing 1(2010): 249, accessed April 25, 2015, http://www.parlorpress.com/pdf/dirk--navigating-genres.pdf 2. Joby Waarick, “West’s Historic Drought Stokes Fears of Water Crisis,” Washington Post (Health and Science, IN), August 17, 2014, http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/wests-historic-drought-stokes-fears-of-water-crisis/2014/08/17/d5c84934-240c-11e4-958c-268a320a60ce_story.html . 3. Ibid. 4. Ibid. 5. Ibid. 6. Ibid. 7. Ibid. 8. Ibid. 9. Ibid. 10. Ibid. 11. Ibid. 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid. 15. Carson L. & White S., “The Sydney Water Contamination Crisis: Manufacturing Dissent,” Science and Public Policy 25, no. 4 (1998): 265, accessed April 25, 2015, http://www.activedemocracy.net/articles/02_sydneywater.htm 16. Ibid. 17. Ibid. 18. Ibid. 19. Ibid. 20. Ibid. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid. 23. Ibid. 24. Ibid. 25. Ibid. Bibliography Dirk, Kerry. “Navigating Genres.” Writing Spaces: Reading and Writing 1(2010): 248- 262. Accessed April 25, 2015. http://www.parlorpress.com/pdf/dirk--navigating-genres.pdf L., Carson & S, White. “The Sydney Water Contamination Crisis: Manufacturing Dissent.” Science and Public Policy 25, no. 4 (1998): 265- 271. Accessed April 25, 2015. http://www.activedemocracy.net/articles/02_sydneywater.htm Warrick, Joby. “West’s Historic Drought Stokes Fears of Water Crisis.” Washington Post (Health and Science, IN), August 17, 2014. http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/wests-historic-drought-stokes- fears-of-water-crisis/2014/08/17/d5c84934-240c-11e4-958c-268a320a60ce_story.html . Read More