This section will analyze and compare the
two texts by looking at paragraphs, sentence structure, noun phrases, verb
tenses, and information structure.
I. Paragraph Structure
In terms of
number of sentences, the two texts are roughly equal, differing only by one.
Paragraph
structure is slightly different.
Compared to article one, article two has a slight preference for longer
paragraphs.
Article one has
sixteen sentences, arranged into ten paragraphs: four paragraphs consisting of
a single sentence, and six paragraphs made up of two sentences. Article two has
seventeen sentences, arranged into nine paragraphs: three paragraphs consisting
of a single sentence, four paragraphs consisting of two sentences, and two
paragraphs consisting of three sentences.
II. Sentence Structure
A. Article one
This article has three simple sentences (located in paragraph
4 sentence 2 (hereafter referred to as p4s2) p6s1, p8s3) seven complex
sentences (p1s1) p2s1, p4s1, p7s1, p8s1, p9s1, p9s2), six compound complex
sentences (p3s1, p5s1, p6s2, p7s2, p10s1,
p10s2) and six compound complex sentences (p3s1, p5s1, p6s2, p7s2, p10s1,
p10s2). Clearly the sentence structure
is varied, but the preference is for more complex sentences. Although this article was written for English
learners, it is not for absolute beginners. (It is in fact ranked as lower
intermediate).
B. Article two
This
article has one simple sentence (p3s1), twelve complex sentences (p1s1, p1s2,
p1s3, p2s1, p2s2, p4s1, p4s2, p5s1, p7s1, p8s1, p9s1, p9s2) and four compound
complex sentences (p3s2, p5s2, p5s3, p6s4).
Although
both articles favor complex sentences, article two clearly relies more heavily
on them. In fact article two only has
one sentence without an embedded subordinate clause, compared with nine
sentences in article one. This indicates
the reading level of article two is more advanced.
II. Noun Phrases
A. Article One
Most
of the noun phrases found in this text favor post-modification. Pre-modification, although it exists, is
usually just restricted to a single determiner, so we have several examples
such as “a list,” “the study,” “a parent,” and “the result,” et cetera, making
up the bulk of pre-modification examples.
There
are some exceptions to this of course.
Sometimes a noun or noun phrase is acting as a pre-modifier, as in “space
tourism,” “the UK
government,” and “research company.”
Other times pre-modification is done by adjectives or adjective phrases,
like, “five different jobs,” the most popular jobs,” and “spare legs.”
Other
examples of pre-modification include numbers “20 jobs,” present participle
verbs “exciting changes,” possessive pronouns “their lifetime.”
[Incidentally,
from a prescriptive grammar standpoint “lifetime” should probably be in the
plural form to agree with its modifier “their,” and the subject of the sentence
“students.”]
However
the bulk of the information in the noun phrases is usually in
post-modification. Most commonly this
seems to take the role of a prepositional phrase, usually containing another
noun phrase, as in “some of the most popular jobs,” “the creation of new limbs”
and “$100m on a footballer.” Or sometimes even multiple post-modifying
prepositional phrases as in paragraph 4: “a list of 20 jobs for the study.”
The
post-modification sometimes also takes the form of a peripheral dependent, such
as in “The report, the Shape of Jobs to Come,” or “Rohit Talwar, chief
executive of the research company.”
Moving
onto the more complex, an example of a noun phrase taking a subordinate clause
as a post-modifiers can be found in paragraph 9: “Students coming out of
university now.”
Other
times the entire noun phrase is a subordinate clause. This is true in paragraphs 6 and 7 in both
cases with the object noun phrase following the verb “predicts.”
B. Article two
Like article one,
many of the noun phrases in article two use post-modification. The noun phrases in article two, however, use
much more complex post-modification, often involving a relative clause as a
post modifier. The first sentence in
paragraph 4, for example, takes a relative clause as a peripheral dependent of
the subject noun clause. The first
sentence in paragraphs 5 and 7 both contain relative clauses in the subject
noun phrase introduced by the phrase, “The fact that.” The example in paragraph 5 even contains an
adverbial clause inside of the relative clause.
III. Verb Tenses and Aspects
A. Article One
Because
the first article is talking about predictions for the future (something that
might happen) it makes heavy use of epistemic modality. This is evident in verb phrases like, “could
include,” “could change,” “will come,” “will become,” (used twice) “will be,”
(used twice) “could lead,” and “could have,” which are all used to describe
some of the predictions reported.
When
describing what people should do to prepare for these changes, the deontic
modality “should concentrate” is used.
And finally, in the last paragraph when imagining himself as a parent
Talwar uses the volitional subjunctive.
(Although as an indication of how the language is changing he says, “If
I was,” instead of “If I were.”)
However
when the report itself (sometimes referred to as “the study”), is the focus of
the sentence the author writes about it in the present tense. “The report…predicts,” “The study predicts,”
or “the study says.”
Since
the report has been completed at some point in the past, it may seem strange to
use present tense verbs to describe it.
And another writer might have conceivably preferred the past tense for
these same sentences.
However,
when describing the written word, it is customary with some writers to refer to
it in the present tense. The logic is
that the written word is more permanent than a vocal utterance. A vocal utterance is usually only spoken
once, and only heard once. Printed words
are only written once, but they can be read numerous times, and so each time
the report is read by another reader, it will continue predicting and saying.
The
contrast in verb tenses used to attribute written words and spoken words are
interesting. Almost all the verbs used
to attribute spoken words are in the past tense, whether attributed directly or
indirectly.
Examples
are paragraph 4 “The company asked,” (in paragraph 4, for indirect
attribution,) “He said,” (in paragraph 7, for direct attribution), “said
Talwar,” (in paragraph 9, direct attribution) and “Talwar said” (in paragraph
10, indirect attribution).
The
exception to this is paragraph 7, where the present tense “Rohit Talwar…predicts,”
is used for indirect attribution. It’s interesting
because in the next sentence the writer switches back again to the past tense
with “he said.” One way to explain this
is that “predicts” is used to attribute Talwar’s general opinion, whereas “he
said” refers to a direct quotation only uttered once.
And
finally a brief mention about other verb types.
The passive voice is used once in the present tense as an agentless
passives used to describe the predictions of the report: “roles…are expected”. It is also used once in the past to describe
what had been considered, this time with the agent “by the researchers” attached. And a verb in the imperative is used to begin
the article.
Article Two
Because
the second article covers many different periods of time, it makes use of four
different types of verbs: the present simple, the past simple, the past with
the perfect aspect (past perfect), and the present with the perfect aspect
(present perfect).
The
present tense is used sparingly, but is used to describe the way things are in the
world today, for example: Che’s picture “adorns student bedrooms across the
world” or “[Diaz] lives in Cuba.”
Also,
as with the use of “predicts” in article one, the present tense here is also
used to attribute ongoing opinions, such as “she accuses” or “Michael Casey…notes”. Somewhat unusually perhaps the present tense
is also used in attributing written words in “Casey writes.” It might have been more correct (from a
prescriptive view) to say, “Casey wrote.”
But although the act of writing only occurred once, perhaps the author
wanted to convey that these are still Casey’s opinions at present. Also Diaz’s indirect dialogue attribution is
used with the present tense “says.”
This
contrasts with Korda’s opinions, which are reported in the past tense, as in “said
Korda.” However Korda died nine years
before this article was published, and so his opinions can not be said to be
ongoing.
The
article also uses the past tense to describe many events that took place in the
past. It is notable that the past tense
in this regard is not used to describe degrees of past. Events that took place fifty years ago (“Guitierrez
snapped”) or ten years ago (“he sued”) and even events that spanned several
decades (“did not recognise” or “could be utilised,") all make use of the
simple past tense.
The
past perfect, then, is used in contrast to the past, to locate events that are
further back than the time the sentence references. For example “had shown,” and “had been taken,”
(the latter one a passive example) are both further back in time than “he told
one interviewer.”
It
is interesting, therefore, that “only managed” is not also in the past perfect,
however perhaps the unwritten words “he had” are assumed.
Next
let’s turn our attention to the present perfect.
The present
perfect is used in this article to describe situations which have resulted from
past events, for example “the image has become the subject of bitter legal
battles,” “Cuba
has demonstrated,” “she has had to sell,” and “has led to.”
The
present perfect is also used to describe situations which are extending beyond
the time of the writing, such as “[Diaz] has pursued.”
The
addition of the perfect aspect in the second article is one of the things that
differentiates it from the first article (which contains no verbal elements in
the perfect aspect) and is probably one of the reasons why article two is
marked as more advanced.
IV. Information Structure
A. Article One
As
noted above, article one uses the passive voice twice. Both of these times are to highlight the
actual predictions or considerations. In
paragraph 5, the agentlesss passive is used because who is doing the predicting
is uninteresting compared to what is being predicted. (Although in this case the reader knows from
context that it is the study’s prediction.)
B. Article Two
Article
two mostly avoids the use of the passive.
There are a couple examples however, such as “he had been …taken aback,”
and “the image could be utilised.”
The
first phrase is an agentless passive.
This is probably because it is perfectly obvious from the context that
Guevara was the agent. It is an example of a set phrase that is almost always
used in the passive. In fact the active
form, “Guevara took him aback,” almost sounds unnatural. The focus in this phrase is almost always on
who was taken aback, not who caused them to be taken aback.
The
second passive example is used to keep the focus of the clause on the image,
and not on the people who used it, who are probably unknown (at least in their
entirety) and even if they were known, their actual identities are unimportant.
Besides the passive
voice, another information structure that article two makes use of is
end-weight, with all the new information being put at the back of the
sentence. Sometimes the It-cleft
formation is used to achieve this, as in the very first sentence, or in the
second sentence of paragraph 3. In both
of these sentences “It” is the subject, and all of the information is in a
subordinate clause following the be-verb.
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