Collocations and Dara Lind

The session focused on useful collocations that make your essay, term paper, etc. sound top-notch. A collocation is a combination of words formed out of two or more words that are often used together and sound like "correct English". First, we learned about collocations that organize one's text (argumentation):
- draw a distinction between
- take into consideration
- make reference to
- raise questions
- touch on issues
- make a case for
- fall into ... categories

referring to arguments:
- draw an analogy
- present the case
- draw parallels
- state
- put forward the Argument
- take up / adopt the Position
- argue convincingly
- research suggest
- draw attention to
- disagree profoundly
- briefly summarize
- draw the conclusion

Afterwards we were shown some collocations used to reinforce arguements:
- assess the significance
- lay emphasis on
- lend support to
- hold firmly to

In order to practise the use of those collocations, we listened to Dara Lind stating her opinion on Trump's recently enacted entry ban and commented on her argumentation:

Dara Lind makes reference to Trump's immigration policy and adopts the position that the reduced number of refugees allowed to enter the U.S. will result in a crisis of the countries' self-identity. She draws parallels to the Holocaust and Second World War, which she regards as a shameful chapter in U.S. history since America could have done a lot more then (could have taken in a lot more refugees than they actually did). She firmly holds to the belief that it is America's responsibility to admit as many refugees as possible. Although I profoundly share her belief, she lays too much emphasis on America's "image".

Collocations

A collocation is a sequence of words or terms that co-occur. Collocations can help to write and speak natural-sounding English. In academic writing collocations can be used to make the text more enjoyable to read.

List of collocations:

• fall into categories
• drawing a distinction between
• taking into consideration
• making reference to
• raising the question
• assessing the significance 
• laying emphasis on
• lending support to
• holding firmly
• drawing an analogy
• drawing parallels
• presenting the case for
• puting forward the argument
• taking up / adopt sth.
• arguing convincingly
• drawing attention to
• which / that suggesting
• briefly summarize
• disagreeing profoundly
• driving the conclusion

 

Relative Clauses

The main focus of the 5^th session of „Text Production“ on November 23^rd was on relative clauses. Next to definitions and different exercises, we also practiced the usage of comma in this session. Relative clauses are non-essential parts of sentences. They can add meaning, but if they are removed, the sentence still function grammatically. Mainly they are used to identify or define the noun which precedes. There are two different types of relative clauses in English.

1)Defining relative clauses:

We use defining clauses to give essential information about someone or something. If we remove a defining relative clause out of a sentence, the meaning of the sentence will change.  The information which we give with a defining relative clause is important to understand what or who is being referred to out of a larger group of people or things. This type of relative clauses usually comes after the noun it describes and is not separated from the rest of the sentence by commas.

This is the girl who wants to buy my bike.

à If I wouldn´t use the clause “who wants to buy my bike”, then my interlocutor can´t  know which girl I actually mean.

2) Non-defining relative clauses:

This type of relative clauses is used to give extra information about the person or thing. But the information, which is given, does not help us to define what we are talking about. In contrast to defining relative clauses, non-defining relative clauses are separated by commas from the rest of the sentence. If this clause is removed out of the sentence, the sentence would still be grammatically correct and the meaning wouldn´t be changed. We only would give the interlocutor less detail.

That Mall, which is the largest in Europe, opens 7 days a week.

à The meaning wouldn´t be changed, if we remove the clause „which is the largest in Europe“. This clause only gives additional but irrelevant information about the noun, which is already identified by the determiner that.

Dara Lind on Trump’s New Immigration Ban

Dara Lind lends support to the Obama administration’s policy of the last two years of making an effort to admit more Syrian refugees and draws attention to the fact that immigration lies at the heart of US identity. She also draws parallels between the situation today and the refugee crises during the holocaust, making a case for a more welcoming society. Lind profoundly disagrees with the ban and adopts an opposing position. She lays emphasis on the inevitable consequence that this will change how the US sees itself and how others see the US. Comparing US and Canadian migration policies, she convincingly argues that US identity is at stakes. 

Blogs 1-3 (David Lohrberg)

Blog 1: Modifiers

There are different types of modifiers. The word ‘different’ in the previous sentence, for example, is an adjective modifying the object of the sentence. Remarkably, I could leave out ‘different’ in the first sentence of this blog, since modifiers are optional grammatical elements. Likewise, I could omit ‘remarkably’ from the sentence I used to characterize grammatical modifiers. Explaining which sentence I was referring to in the previous sentence, I used a relative clause as modifier.

Blog 2: Parellelism

Parallel structures create flow and rhythm. Consequently, repeating grammatical structures, sounds, meanings or meter can be very persuasive. Therefore, politicians like to use parallelisms:

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I may remember. Involve me and I will learn.”              

(Benjamin Franklin)  

"We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interest, and teach us what it means to be citizens."
(George W. Bush)

Blog 3: MLA Citation

Judith Butler’s distinction between sex and gender is helpful to understand how the latter is socially and mentally constructed:

To be female is (…) a facticity which has no meaning, but to be a woman is to have to become a woman, to compel the body to become a cultural sign, to materialize oneself in obedience to an historically delimited possibility, and to do this as a sustained and repeated corporeal project. (Butler 522)

According to Butler, gender is “an identity tenuously constituted in time – an identity instituted through a stylized repetition of acts.” (Butler 519) In this view, gender is not a natural category, but a socially and culturally constructed mental concept reinforced by performative acts of the body that are continuously repeated and reenacted. Since “gender is an act which has been rehearsed” (Butler 526), the performance of these acts follows a script. This script can be interpreted differently, but it simultaneously confines and enables the performance (Ibid.)

Works Cited

Butler, Judith. "Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and      Feminist Theory." Theatre Journal 40.4 (1988): 519-31.