Comparing_the_Language_of_Today_to_That_of_1944

Comparing the language of today to that of 1944. For this assignment we are comparing the text from stories on two front pages of the Daily Mail newspaper, both carrying stories related around the important war of the day. The present-day text coming from the Daily Mail dated Thursday November 26th 2009 and the historical text from the much earlier Thursday 20th January 1944. On first glance at the papers themselves we can see that the modern day Daily Mail has evolved into a tabloid format of the paper, whereas the 1944 edition is still in the original Broadsheet format. We can see from reading the two papers that the Broadsheet format, being the traditional home of the serious newspapers including The Times, The Telegraph and The Financial Times, deliver their stories in a more formal format compared to the sensationalising and more gossipy delivery of the popular tabloids these include The Sun, The Star and The Mirror. So why change format and put itself out as a tabloid' This is possibly due to the way people perceived the newspaper at the time, in 1944 the newspaper was a serious means of communicating information, many people were inclined to believe what was in the papers simply because “it was in the papers” whereas today a lot of stories and headlines are just dismissed as rumour, lies or just “paper talk”. A reflection of todays society where headlines do not have to be true just attention grabbing. Reading the stories we can feel a definite difference in the persuasiveness of the language used. The 1944 paper is very positive and upbeat whereas the 2009 paper uses its text to show a negative side. This is again possibly a reflection of todays society in the “blame culture” of today, where everyone is looking for someone to blame, compared to the 1944 papers “we are all in this together” and “stiff upper lip” team spirit nature. The text in both papers is formal in style more so in the 1944 edition,fitting in with its Broadsheet format, compared to the lighter 2009 edition. This easier to read, lighter style has possibly been adopted to appeal to more readers, just think of how many people have seen Tolkien’s Lord of The Rings films compared against how many have actually read the original books, today’s now, not yesterday lifestyle demands a quicker, easier read with much of the hard work done for us. So sensational headlines, a short summary of the forthcoming article at the beginning and an easy to follow style makes today’s newspaper stories what the public demand. The 1944 edition is defiantly more detailed in each article with a lot of technical terms included, aside from the laziness of today’s reader, this is also likely to be influenced by the increased amount of legislation regarding what they can, cannot and should not publish, that the media of today operates under compared to 1944. We can see that both papers carry advertisements for products, the 1944 carrying adverts for Bear Brand Stockings, Sifta Salt and Marmite compared to the 2009 which seems to be advertising its own Femail magazine and other stoires contained inside the paper itself. It is interesting to see that the adverts in 1944 are contained to the corners of the page whereas the 2009 edition is right in the middle towards the top of the paper. This is partly due to society’s acceptance of advertising and sponsorship where everything and anything is supplied or backed by someone whereas is in 1944 and the rationing you would be grateful to just have any, not be worried by the peer pressure of having the right brand, the right colour and the right one. The modern day paper retains the original logo albeit with a white background rather than the old black, this is done to try and reassure the reader that the same traditional values are maintained as when originally published. Looking at the amount of stories mentioned on the front page of each paper, we can see the 1944 edition carrying many short stories complementing its main headline compared to the relatively sparse layout of one main story, albeit advertising two others, of its 2009 counterpart. This may well be a reflection of the times, with rationing in place, everyday supplies at a low, and of course Britain at war! Did the 1944 paper need to make every column inch count whereas today in our throwaway society is the 2009 paper a reflection of our wastage and not caring. When looking at the two examples together we can see the formalised English ebign used by the 1944 paper, helping to add to its honest and correctness whereas the 2009 edition has a more relaxed friendly anyone would use those terms about it. The language in the 2009 edition is definably more reader friendly and again reflects our society today where the dumbing down of things to make them easy or simple to follow is almost as important as the basic need to communicate. Both of the papers use a variety of font size and type faces in the 1944 this is done to separate the huge amount of articles emphasis some more than others and is defiantly needed. But in the 2009 edition is it really necessary to have almost a third of the page taken by the headline' This is a great example of how peoples need to sensationalise headlines to help sell papers. Without that huge font and bold type face would it stand out amongst the many other papers' Leading us to the thought do more people switch newspapers daily because of today’s mad headlines or are they more the old traditional buyer who buys the same paper every day because he always has done. Overall both papers are effective at what they were designed to do, communicate information, it just looks prettier, more expensive, simpler and more fun in the 2009 edition. Word count 995.