Language and Power (Varietäten, Rhetorik, Mediendiskurs)

Language and Power (varieties, rhetoric, media discourse)

Englisch Klasse 12 11 Aufgaben

LesenTextproduktionLiteratur

Sprache als Machtinstrument: Varietäten und Register (Standard, Dialekt, Slang) und was ihre Wahl signalisiert; Rhetorik von Reden und Werbung; Framing und Manipulation im Mediendiskurs. Der Kern ist, WIE Sprache Wirklichkeit zurechtrückt — die Werkzeuge der Literaturanalyse, angewandt auf Reden, Schlagzeilen und Social-Media- Diskurse.

Voraussetzungen (1)

Literaturanalyse

Klasse 11

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Ermöglicht (1)

Literature and Context (Abitur-Pflichtlektüren)

Klasse 13

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Leicht

Multiple Choice #1 18s ▶ Testen

Which sentence belongs in a formal letter of application?

● "I would welcome the opportunity to discuss my application with you."
○ "It'd be great to have a chat about the job sometime."
○ "Gimme a shout if you wanna talk about it."

Formal register avoids contractions, phrasal and slang forms and uses Latinate vocabulary (opportunity, discuss). All three are "correct" English — they differ in register, not in grammar.

Wahr / Falsch #2 15s ▶ Testen

In "Do we really want our children to grow up in a country like this?", the speaker expects the audience to answer aloud.

✓ Falsch

It is a rhetorical question: the answer ("No!") is implied, which draws the audience into the speaker's position without an argument.

Mittel

Multiple Choice #1 20s ▶ Testen

Which line is an anaphora?

● "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields."
○ "Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers."
○ "Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country."

Anaphora repeats the same words at the start of successive clauses (Churchill, 4 June 1940). The tongue-twister is alliteration; Kennedy's line is a chiasmus (A–B / B–A).

Multiple Choice #2 18s ▶ Testen

Which line is a tricolon?

● "government of the people, by the people, for the people"
○ "Do we really want this?"
○ "I have a dream."

A tricolon is a sequence of three parallel elements (Lincoln, Gettysburg Address, 1863). The question is rhetorical; "I have a dream" becomes anaphora only through its repetition.

Multiple Choice #3 20s ▶ Testen

Which headline frames a tax change most negatively?

● "Government grabs more of your hard-earned cash"
○ "Income tax to rise by two percentage points"
○ "Government to fund new hospitals through tax increase"

Framing selects and colours aspects of an issue: "grabs" and "hard-earned" cast the state as a thief. Headline 2 is neutral; headline 3 frames the same change positively through its purpose.

Multiple Choice #4 20s ▶ Testen

Which word choice presents the same people most sympathetically?

● "refugees fleeing war"
○ "a flood of migrants"
○ "illegals crossing the border"

"flood" is a dehumanising water metaphor; "illegals" reduces people to a legal status. "refugees fleeing war" names a reason and keeps them human agents. Lexical choice carries the stance.

Multiple Choice #5 20s ▶ Testen

A British speaker says "I'm going to the chemist's to get some plasters." What would an American speaker most likely say?

● "I'm going to the drugstore to get some Band-Aids."
○ "I'm going to the chemist's to get some Band-Aids."
○ "I'm going to the pharmacy to get some plaster."

British chemist's / plasters ↔ American drugstore (or pharmacy) / Band-Aids. American "plaster" is the material on walls. Varieties differ in vocabulary, not in correctness.

Multiple Choice #6 15s ▶ Testen

Which sentence uses the passive to hide who is responsible?

● "Mistakes were made."
○ "The minister made mistakes."
○ "We made several mistakes."

The agentless passive removes the doer from the sentence — a classic political move (Fairclough calls such choices "hidden power"). The other two name the agent.

Multiple Choice #7 15s ▶ Testen

Which phrase is a euphemism?

● "collateral damage"
○ "civilian deaths"
○ "people were killed"

A euphemism replaces a harsh term with a softer, vaguer one. "collateral damage" turns killed civilians into an abstract by-product.

Lückentext #8 15s ▶ Testen

Name the device: "I have a dream that one day … I have a dream that one day …" → ___

✓ Antwort: anaphora

Anaphora (Greek ἀναφορά, "carrying back"). Martin Luther King repeats "I have a dream" eight times in his 1963 speech.

Schwer

Wahr / Falsch #1 20s ▶ Testen

"He don't know nothing" is simply bad English with no rules behind it.

✓ Falsch

Many varieties of English use multiple negation and "don't" for all persons systematically — as Chaucer and Shakespeare did. It is non-standard, not rule-less. Calling a variety "wrong" is a judgement about its speakers' social status.