Language and Mediality – ASSESSMENT 2: TRANSMEDIATION TASK

by | Apr 23, 2018 | Essays

Question and DESCRIPTION
This 3,000 word essay investigates the effects of mediality on two related texts. The first text is a pre-existing piece of your choice. You will give an account of how this text is characteristic (or not) of its mode(s) and medium (media). Discuss the affordances of the mode(s) and media, and how they relate to the type of text, the aim or purpose of the text and its intended audience. You will then recast the text into a different mode and/or medium (the second text), and give an account of the implications of using a different mode/medium on the content and form of the communication. Reflect on any difficulties you had in the transmediation process, and any gains or losses in meaning potential you noted which were related to the change of medium. How is text 2 typical (or not) of its new medium? The account of your two texts, as well as your experience of the transmediation process, should be supported by the theories we have explored during the module, and this, and your own reading, should be referenced.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
• Apply the analytical tools learned on the course in an independent research project
• Deepen the knowledge learned on the course through independent research
• Expressing ideas and information through different modes and media is a critical skill in many professions, including teaching, business, IT and management of all kinds. This task draws attention to the ways in which communication is altered, enhanced and inhibited according to the chosen medium.

PRACTICAL GUIDELINES
• The LEL Handbook gives helpful guidelines for writing essays, avoiding plagiarism, referencing and submission. It also sets out the criteria against which your assignment will be marked.
• The Handbook guidelines for presentation of your work are:
o All work must be double-line spaced [I am also happy with 1.5 spacing].
o Leave a blank line before each new paragraph.
o Longer quotes and citations (more than two lines) need to be single line spaced and indented. Indented quotes do not have ‘quotation marks’.
o Pages should be numbered in the top right-hand corner.
o You should use Times New Roman font, size 12, for the main part of your essay and bibliography.
o Leave a large margin (about one inch, or 2.5 cm) around all work.
• Word count: The word count given above represents a range, within which your number of words should fall. The word count does not include your reference list, appendices or texts, but does include all quotations in the body of your essay.
• Your texts: I welcome all kinds of texts for analysis, and have offered some suggestions in lectures. Bear in mind:
o Do limit your analysed texts, which need to be long enough to offer you a range of examples of the features you are analysing, but short enough for you to achieve the analysis within the word count!
o Texts which are not in the public domain (e.g. recorded conversations, SMS message exchanges, recorded lectures) may need permission to be used, and consent form to be completed. Please discuss this with me if you think this is the case. A blank copy of your consent form needs to be included in your appendices, and you should keep a copy of the original signed forms.
o You need to append both texts. Spoken texts should be made available in transcription, and video texts can be represented as shown in lecture 7. You will need to deal reflexively with how transcription decisions affect your data (week 5 lecture).
 BUT don’t let these considerations put you off using spoken data!
o Please do not replicate any of the data you used in Assignment 1. Your text 1 for Assignment 2 should be a different text.
o Please remember that hyperlinks DO NOT work in Turnitin.

ESSAY COVERAGE
• This essay has both theoretical and applied elements.
o Academic theoretical support runs throughout the essay: you can include a brief overview of work on both of your chosen text genres and the media in which they are presented as suggested in the guidelines (lecture 7); as you write your account, you should support your claims with academic references where appropriate.
o Applied analysis: while most of your account will be about your own experience of the process of transmediation of the text, you should support any comments about typical affordances and characteristics of media from academic sources.

Sample Solution

Sample solution

Dante Alighieri played a critical role in the literature world through his poem Divine Comedy that was written in the 14th century. The poem contains Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. The Inferno is a description of the nine circles of torment that are found on the earth. It depicts the realms of the people that have gone against the spiritual values and who, instead, have chosen bestial appetite, violence, or fraud and malice. The nine circles of hell are limbo, lust, gluttony, greed and wrath. Others are heresy, violence, fraud, and treachery. The purpose of this paper is to examine the Dante’s Inferno in the perspective of its portrayal of God’s image and the justification of hell. 

In this epic poem, God is portrayed as a super being guilty of multiple weaknesses including being egotistic, unjust, and hypocritical. Dante, in this poem, depicts God as being more human than divine by challenging God’s omnipotence. Additionally, the manner in which Dante describes Hell is in full contradiction to the morals of God as written in the Bible. When god arranges Hell to flatter Himself, He commits egotism, a sin that is common among human beings (Cheney, 2016). The weakness is depicted in Limbo and on the Gate of Hell where, for instance, God sends those who do not worship Him to Hell. This implies that failure to worship Him is a sin.


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God is also depicted as lacking justice in His actions thus removing the godly image. The injustice is portrayed by the manner in which the sodomites and opportunists are treated. The opportunists are subjected to banner chasing in their lives after death followed by being stung by insects and maggots. They are known to having done neither good nor bad during their lifetimes and, therefore, justice could have demanded that they be granted a neutral punishment having lived a neutral life. The sodomites are also punished unfairly by God when Brunetto Lattini is condemned to hell despite being a good leader (Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). While he commited sodomy, God chooses to ignore all the other good deeds that Brunetto did.

Finally, God is also portrayed as being hypocritical in His actions, a sin that further diminishes His godliness and makes Him more human. A case in point is when God condemns the sin of egotism and goes ahead to commit it repeatedly. Proverbs 29:23 states that “arrogance will bring your downfall, but if you are humble, you will be respected.” When Slattery condemns Dante’s human state as being weak, doubtful, and limited, he is proving God’s hypocrisy because He is also human (Verdicchio, 2015). The actions of God in Hell as portrayed by Dante are inconsistent with the Biblical literature. Both Dante and God are prone to making mistakes, something common among human beings thus making God more human.

To wrap it up, Dante portrays God is more human since He commits the same sins that humans commit: egotism, hypocrisy, and injustice. Hell is justified as being a destination for victims of the mistakes committed by God. The Hell is presented as being a totally different place as compared to what is written about it in the Bible. As a result, reading through the text gives an image of God who is prone to the very mistakes common to humans thus ripping Him off His lofty status of divine and, instead, making Him a mere human. Whether or not Dante did it intentionally is subject to debate but one thing is clear in the poem: the misconstrued notion of God is revealed to future generations.

 

References

Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). Dante’s inferno: Seven deadly sins in scientific publishing and how to avoid them. Addiction Science: A Guide for the Perplexed, 267.

Cheney, L. D. G. (2016). Illustrations for Dante’s Inferno: A Comparative Study of Sandro Botticelli, Giovanni Stradano, and Federico Zuccaro. Cultural and Religious Studies, 4(8), 487.

Verdicchio, M. (2015). Irony and Desire in Dante’s” Inferno” 27. Italica, 285-297.

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