Active or passive politics?

[metal56]

On the election trail, a politician would more likely say...

There will be a privatisation of the railways.

We will privatise the railways.

Either- in equal use.

[lolwhites]

This reminded me of a quote I saw during my TEFL training when passives were discussed. It went something like this:

Journalist: Can you give an undertaking to keep inflation down?
Politician: It is hoped that it will not exceed 3% this year.

By using the passive, the politician was implying that he wasn't personally responsible if inflation did exceed 3%. A similar thing happened during the Kosovo war when a spokeperson said The Chinese embassy was bombed rather than the (more precise) We bombed the Chinese embassy.

We will privatise the railways suggests a more pro-active role on the part of the politicians (i.e. he or she wants to claim the credit for it). If at some future point, rail privatisation turns out to be a complete disaster, the same politician is more likely to revert to There was a privatisation of the railways....

[LarryLatham]

Yes, exactly! And following along with lolwhite's analysis (which is right on target), I think, from a politician, we would be more likely to hear something like:

My administration would privatise the railways.

or

Railways would be privatised.

for just the reasons that would is more remote than will...hitchhiking on lolwhites ideas here.

Larry Latham

[lolwhites]

Interestingly, now that it's generally accepted in the UK that rail privatisation (by the now in opposition Conservatives) was a disaster, Labour insist on reminding us about When the Tories (Conservatives) privatised the railways, while the Consevatives prefer to talk about when the railways were privatised, though they never add by us. I wonder why?

[metal56]

Yes, exactly! And following along with lolwhite's analysis (which is right on target), I think, from a politician, we would be more likely to hear something like:

My administration would privatise the railways.

or

Railways would be privatised.

for just the reasons that would is more remote than will...hitchhiking on lolwhites ideas here.

Larry Latham

So you wouldn't go for this fellas findings:

Gunther Kress (see also his chapter in Wetherell et al, 2001). For example, he pointed out that a very powerful discursive practice in political argument was to change verbs into nouns ("nominalisation"), and to use passive rather than active forms of verbs.

http://www-staff.lboro.ac.uk/~ssca1/ttlecture10DA1.htm

[LarryLatham]

Although I haven't read Kress' chapter in Wetherall, I did have a look at the website you offered here, and from what I can tell there, I do agree with him. The point obviously is that public officials in general do everything they can to distance themselves from events that have or might still go bad. That includes making use of language forms that seem either to be "agentless" (as passive forms are), or "remote" as certain choices in verb forms are, or both. Sometimes, the further away, the better. The following sentence is likely to be uttered by a politician:

I would think the railroads would be privatised.

Larry Latham

[Stephen Jones]

Politicians will use the active for something that is popular and which tney hope will go well, and the passive for the opposite.

Civil Servants wil always use the passive because they know if it goes well the politician will take the credit.

[LarryLatham]

Well, it's clear that we all love our politicians and our bureaucrats.

Larry Latham

[Sally Olsen]

Is it also part of becoming part of a discourse community. You always notice new politicians speaking in the present and gradually they start to use the forms of language around them in the political community. It is like that in any situation. If you hang around teenagers long enough you will begin to understand and even think in, if not use, their language. It is the exceptions that stand out, like Eminem, until everyone starts talking like he does. We are all socialized into some group. Some people can operate in many groups and the ones that do it well becomes the leaders and the ones that insist on staying outside with their language become the rebels. Some people seem unable to learn the "rules" and become outcasts or fail in the language community. Those are the ones that interest me.

[LarryLatham]

Sally Olsen is who interests me! How can one person be capable, as you are, Sally, of writing post after post on this forum with each of them containing much to think about. You are indeed a shrewd observer of the human condition; of the teenage condition. It's gotten so that I hungrily scan the forum for any posts by Sally Olsen, salivating at the thought that I might be allowed to read yet another great observation or terrific teaching tip or sound analysis of the grammar of this language we all are interested in. Most of the rest of us do well to crank out one gem in a score of posts, if that. How do you do it?

And why, if you wouldn't mind elaborating, is it the language (or social) outcasts (or at least the outsiders--whatever their reasons may be for remaining on the fringe) who interest you?

Larry Latham

[Sally Olsen]

I don't know how to use those cute Smilies or I would put the blushing one in, but seriously, I don't come near to what you all are writing here. I am learning all the time from all of you and yet I have been teaching for sooooo long.
I think I write here because I am frustrated at not being able to talk with my colleagues in Greenland, either in Danish or Greenlandic about teaching. I love to teach and teach about teaching and yet can't do that here because of the teacher culture. The Danish teachers have a certain style they believe in and don't believe that they need to do it differently and the Greenlandic teachers want to have as much of their culture in their teaching style as possible. Luckily that is closer to the Canadian.
As for the social outcasts or the language outcasts, I have been diagnosed with ADD and part of that neurological dysfunction is not knowing how to "fit" in patterns of a social group. There is something missing in the brain that doesn't make the connections. You might want to try it the opposite way to see how my brain works. Try a game (if I dare suggest it Larry) of "My football has feathers." The next person must say a sentence that has nothing whatsoever to do with any of those words such as, "Napolean told Josephine not to wash for three weeks before he came back to see her." Now the next person must make sentence about a completely different subject from the first two. If you do it quickly in a group of four or more it gets quite hilarious. But most people naturally try to make connections in conversations and find this game really hard to do. I can play it for hours without repeating a topic. I would like to be able to find a test through language like this that would allow teachers to diagnose ADD more quickly and cheaply than is able to be done at present and then of course, figure out a way to help. I hope whatever is found might help second language learners as well.
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[LarryLatham]

Sally, if I understand you correctly here, your interest in the "outcasts" possibly stems from a certain kinship you might feel with them because of your diagnosis of living with Adult Attention Deficit Disorder. Okay, I can understand that, if that is correct.

But I am quite serious about my view of you as a standout teacher, with not only clear evidence of a great deal of true experience [my adjective here is intended to express a differentiation between the bland kind of experience so many teachers have, unfortunately, which consists merely of so many years of standing in front of groups of students going through whatever motions they go through, perhaps many times over, and the "true" experience that some, such as you, gain which means you consistently reflect on your skills, knowledge, and participation in a learning process, and gain much from that reflection over the years], but also a heckofalota brains too that you bring to bear on your classroom procedures. I'm having a hard time, however, imagining that your excellence is a direct derivative of your ADD. If so, where can I go to get such a diagnosis? More to the point, perhaps, do you believe that diagnosis is correct in your case?

Larry Latham

[Sally Olsen]

Yep, I have it in writing from no less than three psychologists and a psyhcological tester and am sure you could get personal testimonies from my mother, husband, two sons and students. Of course, having it myself, I don't take it too seriously. I have a theory (which I am hestitant to espouse after what some of you have done with theories here) but I think there are basicially two kinds of people. Hunters and Farmers. Farmers have settled down and improve the land, make things orderly, make things sensible, easy and stable. They build up traditions and rituals. Lots of good things. Hunters come along and stir them up, steal their beautiful daughters, move often, bring an unstable strand of thinking into the community, and shake things up. Of course, farmers can be upset by this and so label these people and one of the labels is Attention Deficit Disorder. They then try to make you a farmer by giving you pills that alter your brain's chemistry so that you do think like a farmer. Does it then take away that variety of thinking - I don't know. But I do know that every class has its hunters or as we are calling them now - its Morpheus, Trinity and Neos, from the Matrix. Hunters seem to think that they have the answers as you can tell from my posts but we cause a lot of difficulties for our bosses and teachers (yes, I got the strap and was out in the hall for talking and wrote essays that my profs didn't know what to do with - one kindly said my essay was "role busting"). If you have hunters in your classrooms, it might be interesting to look at them in this light and see how you can encourage them. One of their positive qualities is that they will work for another person harder than they would ever work for themselves if they are believed in and encouraged.
BTW I suspect that anyone who is brave enough to go and teach in another country has probably got a lot of this in their system so perhaps you have the best of both worlds Larry.

[LarryLatham]

At last! Finally I can understand why my life has been thus!

Larry Latham