Shayban Mubeen 10p
ENGLISH-Mrs Wood
In ‘The Sun,’ the large font persuades people to read the story and the large picture of the lady attracts men to buy it. The Times newspaper would not do this as their readers are usually categorised in the upper class and therefore, they must get straight to the point with the main story as they will not have time to waist with fancy pictures of women or adverts.. That is the reason to why the editor of the newspaper (The Times) places the adverts at the bottom of the page so it does not distract the reader or the focus, which is the main story. Whereas, in The Sun they put the adverts at the top so they can delay the story and continue on another page.
They did not put the small picture at the bottom, as you could not see Tara as well as you could see her in the big picture. This leads me to talk about how colourful the front page is.
The reporters have chosen their colours effectively as they use different shades of pink to suit Tara’s clothes. In ‘The Times’ newspaper, the only colour they use is blue, as this separates the story from the banner. Blue is more of a subdued colour but eye-catching. Another point is that the banner in blue tells us what is in the newspaper today; I notice that it is a quite approach; it is not right in your face in big font. Another point which attract people to buy is when it says in the blue banner, “Win £ 120 000 of prizes.” This provokes people to buy so that they can play. In the front page there are lists of items that will be included in the next issue, therefore, people will be aware of this and will most probably buy it.
In ‘The Sun’ newspaper there is a large headline, “Your time is up.” This provokes the reader’s interest and sums up the story. ‘The Sun’ also features showbiz news, which ‘The Times’ does not. Instead, the broadsheet newspaper features international and national political news which most adults are interested in, in addition, there are articles on home affairs. None of these articles will interest a reader of a young age.
Now I shall concentrate on the language. The language in the tabloid newspaper is very simple, whereas in the broadsheet newspaper the language is more complex. In ‘The Sun’, there is the use of colloquism. For example the headline, “YOUR TIME IS UP,” it is written in big bold letters and it is threatening and aggressive. In the main story, there is a lot of informal language; ‘back down,’ if a broadsheet newspaper used that phrase, they would have said ‘revise your position.’ Another example is, ‘ I will topple you,’ which means ‘I will defeat you.’ The word ‘topple’ is imagery, it is like a building collapsing. Strong and fierce adjectives are also used, such as ‘the Iraqi tyrant’ and ‘evil Saddam.’ In addition there is a phrase at the end of the sentence, ‘doomsday arsenal,’ it is loaded with emotional content. These words and phrases show that the story is more one sided, because those words, specifically the word tyrant, make me think of Saddam Hussain as a huge person with so much power and does so much bad things. The word ‘tyrant’ could be called a metonym as it is a name of a specific thing or object, but describes another person. In my opinion, I think this is very affective because the reporter uses strong adjectives instead repeating his name all the time; if he did do that then the report would very boring, also notice that he only uses ‘tyrant’ once and uses other adjectives such as ‘evil’. This is completely different in ‘The Times’ newspaper as they treat it as a debatable topic. In the showbiz news it says, ‘King of celeb jungle,’ again this is colloquism. The reporter has also used the word ‘celeb,’ which is a short version/slang of celebrity. There is also a short phrase, ‘it girl,’ this means a person who is moving into the high society/ centre of attraction.
In ‘The Times,’ the language is completely different, it is more complex compared to ‘The Sun.’ As the newspaper is mainly read by adults and features international and national news, there are abbreviation like ‘TUC’ and ‘UN,’ which are not fully abbreviated. This is because the readers are expected to know. The story is very detailed compared to ‘The Sun,’ this is shown by the content and how much is written, especially if the text is in a very small font and the whole article is on the first page. However, I think it is a better strategy to have only part of the article such as ‘The Sun’, this is because if people want to read the rest of the story they will have to purchase the newspaper in order to do this. Whereas in ‘The Times’ you could, swiftly read the main points of the entire article, which is on the front page.
One of the main reason why the tabloid is less detail then the broadsheet is because ‘The Sun’ talks about what has happened and so does ‘The Times.’ However, the Times expands a lot more by firstly talking about what has happened and what is going to happen. This is shown by the use of ‘will,’ this word is very important. This is because the word itself is strong and powerful and it tells us that whatever the Prime minister is going to do, he will definitely do it. This will encourage the reader to read on, as it will interest the reader, therefore he will know what is going to happen. Obviously, the reader will question how the reporter knows what he will do. However, this is supported by evidence, the reporter refers to the conversation between President Bush and Prime Minister Blair in which they talked about what they will announce in the forthcoming speech.
As I have mentioned before, ‘The Sun’ was more one sided and instead of calling Saddam Hussain by his title, they replaced it by aggressive adjectives, as I have written in bold in the previous page. ‘The Times’ on the other hand said, ‘President Saddam Hussain.’ ‘ The Sun’ newspaper treat this subject as if there is good side, a bad side, and therefore, the bad side should be ‘crushed’. Whereas ‘The Times’ newspaper are neutral (not on anyone’s side), and discuss the situation.
There are many words that you would not find in ‘The Sun,’ such as ‘credibility,’ this makes ‘The Sun’ look stupid. The sentence structure is more complex and longer and has more sophisticated words; this makes the article more serious. In ‘The Sun,’ there are simple sentences, which can be clearly understood by anyone. In addition, the way in which the story is written as if facts are just thrown at you, whereas in ‘The Times’ the pace of the story is more slower. Here is an example: The Sun
“They agreed the Iraqi tyrant must let in UN weapons inspectors NOW or be crushed.”
The Times
“Tony Blair will tomorrow challenge the United Nations to prove its worth and force Iraq to dismantle its deadly weapons stockpile”
These are both opening sentences on the main story. The first quote has described what Tony Blair and President Bush want and has given a solution, ‘or be crushed.’ The second quote is more expanded; this is shown by firstly stating that they are doing this to prove its worth. Secondly, they go into more detail; they don’t just say, ‘let in UN weapons inspectors,’ but they say, ‘force Iraq o dismantle…’ They use the verb ‘force’ as it is very descriptive and you can imagine them trying hard. Also, notice that the sentence in the second quote is more complex as I have just shown. In addition, they use complex words such as ‘dismantle.’ The reason why ‘The Sun’ gives a solution is because they are biased and they do not want to debate it because if you do then the reader will know both sides to the story.
In ‘The Times’ newspaper there is little bit of colloquism (words or phrases not considered part of standard English) in the headline, ‘on the spot.’ In addition, there is alliteration, which is used in one of the small articles, “beans banned,” this creates a humorous effect. Accompanied to this, there is a small cartoon picture, which is for humour. In ‘The Sun,’ they used the word ‘crushed’, which is also colloquism, but it is pictorial and threatening, they also use the word ‘jetted.’ Furthermore, there is also a cliché, ‘crowned king of the jungle.’ All of these slang words are used in the main story, but would never be used in the main story of a broadsheet newspaper.
In the Sun, they talk about President Saddam and actions, which must be carried out immediately, the reporter makes sure that the readers identifies this by sing the word ‘now’, which is used when people are angry and want things done straight away. He emphasises on this word so much by firstly typing it in capital letters and then in a different font to the rest of the paragraph, and lastly in bold. Another aspect, which I would like to talk about which regards ‘The Sun’, is the suspense that is created. In the showbiz news, it states the reaction of a man named Tony. This is expressed as a cropped picture of himself and a caption underneath that says, “Shocked…Tony hears news last night.” The reporter creates suspense here by using ‘…’, this holds the readers attention.
In my opinion, I prefer ‘The Times,’ to the ‘The Sun,’ this is mainly because it gets straight to the point and it does not meddle with with large ‘flashy’ pictures. Instead, it gets to the point with detail. The reporter also expands a little on the story by stating what will happen.
Shayban Mubeen 10p
ENGLISH- Mrs Wood
