Sunday, 30 April 2017

LO4: Be able to write and edit a news article for an identified purpose. [Distinction grade]



One hundred years on: The effects of World War One on Sheffield and contrasts between the origins of the conflict and events in the modern world.

In the years of 1914 to 1918 more than 50,000 Sheffield born men left home to fight in the conflict that would become the First World War. Thousands of these men would never return home, killed in the line of duty while protecting the country they called home. All the while the war at home raged on and with events such as the L22 Zeppelin raid which claimed the lives of 29 innocent men, women and children while shaking the steel city to its’ core.
However, the events of the First World War’s conclusion (or armistice) are approaching their one handed year anniversary and many people believe that there should be a special memorial to commemorate some of the most terrifying times in Great British history.
Sheffield city council, as of this article being written, have not planned to have any special memorials for the 100th anniversary of such a chaotic and nation defining conflict which led this publication to inquire whether the average person living in the United Kingdom would like to see such an event take place in their home city. A survey to gauge the opinions of the mass populous found that over 65% of the people would like to have a special memorial in their home city. Surely it should be clear to the council that if this may people want to have the service then it is in their best interest to provide it?  It has been only five months since the people of Sheffield had to urge members of their city council not to fell trees that were planted in order to commemorate the dead of the war.
It is easy to point out similarities between the events that led to the outbreak of the first world war and those taking place in the world with the rise of nationalism once again consuming the world stage shown in events such as the United Kingdom voting to leave the European Union as well as The United States Electing Donald J Trump as the 45th president of their country. These events directly correspond with the rabid expansion of empires in the early stages of the 20th century.
In the early stages of the 1900’s the age of imperialism was in full effect and may of the main reasons for the war breaking out was in direct consequence of imperial expansion. The two main empires on the world stage at the time were the French and British, known for their colonialization of parts of both Africa and Asia however their domination over the globe was being threatened by the new imperialist Germany led by the young and charismatic Kaiser Wilhelm II who promised the German people that soon they would be the most powerful Empire in the world. This led to several conflicts between the German Empire and others such as the French, British Serbian and Russian which led to huge rifts between the cultures and a lot of hostility between the different powers of the continent eventually resulting in the brutality of war erupting between them. Perhaps these events can be easily mirrored to the attitudes of modern day world leaders. One participant in a recent survey regarding this subject stated that “it is frightening how short peoples’ memories seem to be.
It seems clear that the people of Sheffield want to see a special memorial however the occurrence of one seems to be in conflict at best.





What could be change about tis article attempt?
  • I should atempt to use mre restrictive coding/ more sophisocated language.
  • The focuses of the article could be blended together better prehaps using more.  
  • Some of my sentences could be restructured in order to make the text flow better.










One hundred years on: The effects of World War One on Sheffield and contrasts between the origins of the conflict and events in the modern world. (Post corection)

In the years between 1914 to 1918 more than 50,000 Sheffield born men left home to fight in the conflict that would become the First World War. Thousands of these men would never return home, killed in the line of duty while protecting the country they called home. The war was bloody and events such as the L22 Zeppelin raid which claimed the lives of 29 innocent men, women and children and shook the Steel City to its core.

The conclusion (or armistice) is approaching its centennial anniversary and many people believe that there should be a special memorial to commemorate some of the most terrifying times in Great British history.

Sheffield city council, as of this article being written, have not planned to have any special memorials for the 100th anniversary of such a chaotic and nation defining conflict which led this publication to inquire whether the average person living in the United Kingdom would like to see such an event take place in their home city. A survey to gauge the opinions of the mass populous and it was found that over 65% of the people interested in the situation would like to have a special memorial in their home city. Surely it should be clear to the council that if this may people want to have the service then it is in their best interest to provide it?  It has been only five months since the people of Sheffield had to urge members of their city council not to fell trees that were planted in order to commemorate the dead of the war.

It is easy to point out similarities between the events that led to the outbreak of the first world war and those taking place in the world with the rise of nationalism once again consuming the world stage shown in events such as the United Kingdom voting to leave the European Union as well as The United States Electing Donald J Trump as the 45th president of their country. These events directly correspond with the rabid expansionism of empires in the early stages of the 20th century.

In the early stages of the 1900’s the age of imperialism was in full effect and may of the main reasons for the war breaking out was in direct consequence of imperial expansion. The two main empires on the world stage at the time were the French and British, known for their colonialization of parts of both Africa and Asia however their domination over the globe was being threatened by the new imperialist Germany led by the young and charismatic Kaiser Wilhelm II who promised the German people that soon they would be the most powerful Empire in the world. This led to several conflicts between the German Empire and others such as the French, British Serbian and Russian which led to huge rifts between the cultures and a lot of hostility between the different powers of the continent eventually resulting in the brutality of war erupting between them. Perhaps these events can be easily mirrored to the attitudes of modern day world leaders. One participant in a recent survey regarding this subject stated, “It is frightening how short peoples’ memories seem to be.”

It seems clear that the people of Sheffield want to see a special memorial however; the occurrence of one seems to be in conflict at best.












LO4 an Analysis - One hundred years on: The effects of World War One on Sheffield and contrasts between the origins of the conflict and events in the modern world.


When planning this article I decided that I wanted the average reader would likely be over the age of thirty, interested in politics and international as well as domestic affairs. As to reach the audience I decided that my article should be written in a Teacher to student mode of address as are most articles focused on politics and other serious cultural matters by large publications such as the Guardian, The telegraph and The Mirror. Writing in this form meant several things for the piece, I was writing. Firstly, it meant that my article should be mainly focused on the facts of the story as well as the opinions I ha
ve regarding the questions I have presented during the article. This is so that the article can therefore start a conversation and reasoned debate regarding the subject matter. As well as this I needed to make sure that the article I was writing was not simply based on emotion based content (that being what I, as the writer think of the issue at hand.) As a Teacher to pupil piece of writing, the piece also needed to include factual content with a mixture of primary and secondary research to ensure accuracy. I believe that my piece displays the teacher to pupil mode of address here:

“ Sheffield city council, as of this article being written, have not planned to have any special memorials for the 100th anniversary of such a chaotic and nation defining conflict which led this publication to inquire whether the average person living in the United Kingdom would like to see such an event take place in their home city. A survey was created to gauge the opinions of the mass populous and it was found that over 65% of the people interested in the situation would like to have a special memorial in their home city. Surely, it should be clear to the council that if this may people want to have the service then it is in their best interest to provide it?  It has been only five months since the people of Sheffield had to urge members of their city council not to fell trees that were planted in order to commemorate the dead of the war. “

I was attempting to show only the statistics and ask the relevant questions that arose from them. Stating only that if a majority of people wanted such a celebration would it not be in the council’s best interest to have it?
As well as the content of my writing, when using a teacher to pupal mode of address it was important that the writing was written using a relatively restrictive code (Bernstien) This is why I have used simple sentences:
“A survey  to gauge the opinions of the mass populous and it was found that over 65% of the people interested in the situation would like to have a special memorial in their home city.”
 Compound sentences:
 “The war was bloody and events such as the L22 Zeppelin raid which claimed the lives of 29 innocent men, women and children and shook the Steel City to its core.”
-   And complex compound sentences:  
“It seems clear that the people of Sheffield want to see a special memorial however; the occurrence of one seems to be in conflict at best”

As well as this I have used some advanced vocabulary in order to make the article appeal to the conventions of the category that it would fit into (that being political/ domestic affairs/ historical journalism) this can be seen with terms such as “imperialism” and “rabid expansionism.” The use of this language was intended to target it towards an older audience, which is at a high level of education and will therefore understand the jargon associated with the subject.
 Overall, I feel that I have written an article ta effectively targets the audience it was intended for wile also being effectively creating a dialogue that people can join in with.

LO4 an Analysis - One hundred years on: The effects of World War One on Sheffield and contrasts between the origins of the conflict and events in the modern world.
How did I write this article to avoid regulation?

In order to ensure that my article was I tune with the IPSO’s independent editors codes I decided that I must evaluate my article and decide what codes this would relate to ensuring that I have not violated any.
The IPSO have codes relating to the following.
§  Accuracy
§  Privacy
§  Harassment
§  Intrusion into grief or shock
§  Reporting Suicide
§  Children
§  Children in sex cases
§  Hospitals
§  Reporting of Crime
§  Clandestine devices and subterfuge
§  Victims of sexual assault
§  Discrimination
§  Financial journalism
§  Confidential sources
§  Witness payments in criminal trials
§  Payments to criminals
§  The Public Interest

Reviewing the subject of my magazine as well as the codes above and what they relate to I decided that the ones I had to worry about the most were:
§  Accuracy
§  Discrimination
§  The pubic interest

Firstly, the application of the IPSO’s accuracy code did not affect my article as that the only things I have written about is Sheffield not having announced a special service (I even emailed them asking if anything was being planned and did not receive response) and historical fact.
This means that I would not need to worry about changing the content of the article that I have written in order to adhere with the accuracy code, as I would have to if my statements were untrue. This includes scenarios such as me writing the same article when Sheffield city council have planned a special memorial event or if the historical part of my article was somehow biased against either of the two sides which were at war with each other at the time.

The discrimination part of the code also applies strongly o my article as that I am writing about a war, which is still a very sensitive subject in the modern world. It was important for me to remember that despite the fact that the United Kingdom and Germany were at war in 1914 they are not in 2017. This means that I cannot state or even imply that somehow Germany is a modern day enemy of the United Kingdom as that that discriminates against German people who may be victimised due to people’s perceptions of the modern day set of affairs being misled due to a discriminatory article. Because of this restriction, I have made sure to state that the events that I am describing took place in the early 20th century (1900s) as not to unintentionally mislead a potential reader of the article.

As for the third and final restriction, I had to adhere to “The Public Interest”. This means that the work I have written has to be about something that the public do not know about and will therefore aid them in gaining a more complete understanding of events of taking place. A memorial to World War 1, in this sense, I would say is very much in the public interest as that it is something that people are very much interested in because they may have been related to people who fought in the war. This may mean that they want to be able to have a special memorial to commemorate the 100 anniversary of the war beginning. If Sheffield city council are no planning to host, such an event the public should therefore know it so that if they want to show their support or displeasure over this decision they will be free to.


In conclusion i feel that i have written an article which stricly conforms to the PSA's standards of journalism as well as using techniques to appeal to the targe audiance whom t was writen for.