Writing+Styles

For each of the following pieces of text, answer the questions below in your workbooks:
**1. What language features can you find in this piece of text? List them down with examples.** Tone Persuasive techniques Language/vocabulary Structure/sentence structure Narrative voice/P.O.V **2. Now that you have taken note of the language features of the text, who would the audience be?** Age Gender Educational background Social/cultural background 4. What is the style and purpose of this text? **
 * 3. What form does this piece take?

=The voice of youth cannot be silenced= By David Toovey Posted Mon Jul 21, 2008 8:18am AEST

The 2020 Youth Summit, co-chaired by Hugh Evans gave youth an opportunity to be heard. The old saying that 'young people should be seen and not heard' is one that is fortunately no longer popular in the community. However, making sure the voice of youth is genuinely heard can take hard work, determination and no small measure of creativity. In 2007, hundreds of young volunteers for The Oaktree Foundation ran the Zero Seven Roadtrip campaign to encourage the Australian Government to increase foreign aid from 0.35 per cent of Gross National Income to 0.7 per cent - as promised in 2000. Australia had agreed to do so by signing the UN's Millennium Development Goals, yet little action had been taken in the intervening seven years. The Zero Seven Roadtrip was organised and led by 700 passionate and committed young people, including hundreds under 16 years of age, who travelled across the country spreading the word about foreign aid. During the course of the trip, thousands more of Australia's young people were educated about foreign aid, encouraged to have an opinion on the subject and enabled to share their views with politicians and the community. The campaign culminated in poverty and change messages being projected on to the sails of the Sydney Opera House, and attracted world wide media coverage. At the height of the campaign on July 7 (07/07/07), the then opposition leader Kevin Rudd promised to increase aid if elected, in what would be the biggest increase in foreign aid in Australian political history. Since then, the new federal government is in the process of increasing foreign aid by $4 billion. This group of young people presented their opinions on an issue and their voices were heard. The 2020 Youth Summit in April this year, co-chaired by the Oaktree Foundation's founder Hugh Evans, gave 100 young people the chance to discuss the future of our country in regards to productivity, infrastructure, sustainability, rural industries and communities, health, indigenous Australia, creativity, governance and security. During the summit these young people and their opinions were acknowledged as a valuable source of ideas by politicians, academics and business and community leaders. Having this opportunity to be heard was a wonderful step forward. But we cannot rest. The voice of Australia's youth must remain at the forefront of the minds of our political, business and community leaders. We must never allow issues of importance to young people to be debated behind closed doors, or for the assumption to be made that only older people have the answers. It is crucial that these topics be debated with young people, not around them. Our leaders were all young once, but many of the issues young people are facing in 2008 are very different to what they encountered in the past. The opinions and political views of young people should be seen as a valuable resource for politicians when making decisions regarding youth. Age should be no barrier when it comes to self-expression. Young people growing up in a democratic country should be encouraged to have an opinion on a range of topics, most especially the ones which affect themselves and their peers.

//David Toovey, 18, is the CEO of The Oaktree Foundation, Australia's first entirely youth run aid and development agency.//

=No excuses, make the violent pay= August 25, 2009

REPLACE the useless catch-phrase of alcohol-fuelled violence with the useful one of mandatory sentencing for assault (//The Age//, 24/8). As long as we as a nation continue to use that misleading phrase (alcohol-fuelled violence), we will continue to excuse people who commit assault while intoxicated from their criminal behaviour. Most young adults manage to drink alcohol without bashing someone else. Alcohol does not compel anyone to commit violence - it remains a choice. People who make that choice need to be punished severely and kept away from society so that society can be safe. People should be entitled to visit late-night bars or walk the streets at night without fear of assault. The solution could not be more simple: mandatory lengthy sentencing for assault. Why punish the law-abiding public and late-night businesses for the criminal behaviour of a minority of people who know they can get away with violence? Punish the offenders, and punish them hard. There could be no greater imperative for our police and justice resources than to protect us from violence.

= = =Anzac Day parade crash driver taking photos before accident=
 * Sarah Wotherspoon
 * From: [|Herald Sun]
 * May 06, 2010 10:11AM

A photo sent to ABC 774 Radio by a listener shows the driver using both hands to use a camera to take photos through the truck windscreen. Police are examining a photograph sent to the ABC, which shows the driver holding a camera and with both hands off the steering wheel as the truck crawls just metres behind veterans. The person who took the photo told the ABC said the accident happened seconds after he snapped the driver taking a photo. "My estimate is there was only 25-30 seconds between when I took the photo of the truck, until it stopped after driving through the soldiers," the listener told ABC. "When the truck hit the marchers it continued at about twice the speed of marchers at an even pace for a short distance - then the truck stopped with the engine revving fast." Six members of the Ceylon Ex-Servicemen's Association were run down by the truck in the final hours of the parade. Those injured were Anton "Sydney'' Ludowyke, 87, Lionel Daniels, 85, Maurice Gibson, 79, Reg Oorloff, Kenny Fernando, 89, and Ken Pietersz. The veterans all stressed they did not hold driver Russell Hughes, 64, responsible for the accident.  Mr Hughes collapsed after the accident. Inspector Greg Doueal, who attended the scene, said Mr Hughes was in shock after the accident and was taken to hospital. One witness, Jenny, said it appeared "that the driver was trying to stop it but couldn't'."   Following the accident Mr Hughes, who has been a volunteer driver in the Anzac Day Parade for a decade, said he was devastated.    "All I can do is convey my utter dismay about what's happened. I am utterly distraught and offer my commiserations to everyone,'' he said.
 * THE driver of a World War II-era truck that ploughed into a group marchers at last month's Anzac Day parade was taking photos moments before the accident.**

Biff culture needs a king-hit if we're going to stop bullying

ADELE HORIN
February 20, 2010

Australian schools have no need for metal detectors at the school gate and armed guards in the playground. The gun and knife culture, endemic to the US, is still peripheral to the Australia way. But there is no room for complacency. For unacceptable numbers of students, school is a miserable place that imperils their physical and mental health. The fatal attack is rare. Last year a student of Mullumbimby High, Jai Morcom, 15, died of head injuries sustained in a fight; last week in Brisbane a 13 year-old was charged with the murder of a 12-year-old fellow student. In NSW between three and six children under 18 are charged with murder a year. No one can be sure how close we are to a tipping point where it becomes cool for youngsters to carry a knife, or to feel unsafe without one. Beneath the tragic extremes lies a minefield of other acts of violence and bullying perpetrated by youngsters on youngsters. It is a vicious circle. Schoolyard behaviour is influenced by a society in which king-hitting is a national sport and domestic violence a national shame. In turn childhood bullies can grow up into adult bullies of the kind that tormented 19-year-old waitress Brodie Panlock to suicide, and inflicted misery on the 2.5 million workers who have been victims of workplace bullying, as reported by the Productivity Commission earlier this year.

Schools have a vital role in breaking this cycle. But it is not easy to counter a culture that admires the biff, tolerates high levels of drunken violence and produces significant numbers of parents who condone violent retaliation. The crusade against playground violence and bullying must be fought within the school and within the wider society. It is hard to know whether the problem is worse than in the past. What is clear is that assaults and knife attacks by young people rose rapidly over the 1990s and have plateaued at an unacceptably high level. The number of suspensions for violence in NSW public schools increased from 5388 to 6500 over four years - reflecting in part stronger rule enforcement - and the number of suspensions for carrying knives has reached almost 400. Recent research by Sheryl Hemphill and John Toumbourou comparing students in Victorian and Washington State high schools found, surprisingly, a higher proportion of the Australian kids - 17.5 per cent - admitted to having seriously hurt someone in the previous year compared to 12.6 per cent of the Americans. It is perhaps no coincidence that a key difference was the much higher rate of binge drinking among the Australian 13- and 14-year-olds. As education ministers never tire of repeating, schools are safe havens for most of the children who attend. But this should not blind us to multiple studies that show bullying is extremely common and can leave lifelong scars. A recent authoritative study by experts at Edith Cowan University shows one in four students in years 4 to 9 were regularly bullied, when covert attacks, such as cyber bullying, are included. Bullying behaviour is not part of the rough and tumble of childhood and adolescence. It is repeated, prolonged, and destructive, and after a build-up of weeks or months, can explode into violence. There was plenty of time for someone to have intervened to defuse the tensions, a study by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research showed. But many teachers don't notice and many youngsters never tell. They think it will do no good. And often, it doesn't. Despite years of research, it is still not clear what works best. If prevention is to be effective, anti-bullying policies have to target the whole school, not just a particular bully, and rules have to be clearly and consistently enforced, and racism tackled. But the latest research shows bullies who are punished persist in their behaviour, few regret hitting, and many see the violence as unproblematic. A child involved in a violent incident at age 13 is five times more likely to be involved in another one by 14, Toumbourou told me. Especially if their parents support them, they see violent retaliation as justified. Suspension has long been the schools' first response but now experts claim it is counterproductive, indeed can increase the risk of further incidents. Punishment alone cannot effect a genuine change of heart. You have to have sympathy for the schools. The proffered alternatives from Ken Rigby, the nation's foremost authority on bullying, is an approach known as Shared Concern where the bullies are counselled one-on-one in a non-punitive way and invited to suggest how they can improve the situation. Every school has an anti-bullying policy but whether it is an effective one needs to be reviewed in light of changing evidence. What is clear is that we cannot remain passive. The goal must be a zero-tolerance of violence and bullying in the school ground, and outside it. Governments need to help parents do a better job of child-rearing, and enforce laws on knife-carrying so the practice never becomes fashionable. In particular, governments need the guts to tackle the business interests that perpetuate our binge-drinking, king-hitting culture. If this country is ever to made safer for children and young people, it can't be left to schools alone.