Author: Christopher

In this essay, I will be discussing my response to Isabelle Kerr’s article about the use of slang in modern English. This is a letter to the editor of the newspaper in which this article was printed on.

I agree with what Belinda Webb’s article says about the beauty of new words but while Isabelle Kerr, on the other hand, has made me change my mind to disagreeing with what her article says and what I once thought. I’m all for finding new ways of communicating between each other because it helps us to understand one another better and possibly break a barrier that has caused so much conflict and disagreements over long periods of time. I believe that if we come up with new words and find shorter ways of saying words that already exist, it could help to enrich the English language and make it better. It hasn’t stayed the same over the years and never will stay the same, for example, who says thou, art or thee any more? We’ve adapted to make communication easier and I think that it is very important and is something that we should constantly be doing, improving the way we use our language to interact with one another I do however question some new words that are being come up with like bruv, innit, fam, outhchea…. Words like these, I admit, can create a bad impression of how our youth is “enriching” the English language to some people because they sometimes sound like accidental noises. I have no idea what that last word means but I hear it all the time. Now that says something. Some of the new words right now are exclusive to certain groups of people just like, I imagine, it was for Shakespeare or anything new in life. Nothing is just born into a universal state. “Great things come from small beginnings”. Some of these words may be unknown to many of us right now but in the future will be used by everyone. These words are completely new and I support their intentions of making an exclusive way of communicating. “We are afraid of what we don’t know” I believe this applies strongly to slang in all parts of the world, people who don’t know what certain words mean are scared to let them into the language but there is no such thing as a wrong word, all words have the intention of helping people express themselves better and have access to more things if they are used correctly.

I’ve had many conversations with elderly people about what they think of the way young people speak now and some have said that it worries them that the English language will just turn into a jumble of accidental sounds and will lose it’s spark. However, there was this one old man that I remember said he didn’t worry about what the English language will become because that was exactly what was happening during his time, the youth were changing words and coming up with new ways of expressing themselves and it will carry on happening, it is something that no one can control or dictate, language will always adapt to its time and will be changed by the people who use it.

Shakespeare was a very famous inventor of slang in his time and his words have become some of our richest words today (e.g. assassination, equivocal, majestic). So what stops our new words from becoming our next generation’s richest words? Nothing. I believe that we as the youth of today have the responsibility and the task of paving what tomorrow’s English language will be. We need to be careful with the words we invent and the short cuts we take to make it easier to communicate because it will be what our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren will be speaking and even they will be inventing new words for the English language each generation on just as our parents, grandparents, great grandparents and ancestors before us have done themselves.

The English language is not something to just play around with, it’s a form of art and passion for some. It is the thing that connects us and allows us to evolve. Imagine being in a country that you don’t know the language of. You’re pretty much alone unless you’re lucky enough to find a translator. That is what would happen if people are not willing to adapt the English language. We need to find ways of communicating better and building stronger bonds.

I believe Isabelle Kerr has made many contradicting and unclear points to back her argument and she hasn’t got a true understanding of why the English language is what it is today. It is the result of many genius minds that have worked together to make communication better for our generation. Kerr hasn’t managed to grasp how beautiful the act of inventing new words is. It’s not just an act, I believe it’s a form of art that will carry on for many more years and will have a huge impact on our future generations. Those are the reasons why I disagree with the very naive and blind article that Isabelle Kerr has written which has been published on this newspaper.

Here at the London Nautical School, we are known for our kind students, loving atmosphere and modern facilities. We are quite proud of how young students are able to go to the older students and be turned away with such love and grace, with a hint of swear words. We are also very proud of how wisely our income is spent; 10% goes towards cleaning and sanitation then the other 90% goes towards green pens, yellow and red cards and really bad chairs. We are proud of our recycling, every few weeks during lunch, a dinner lady sneaks out to turn the fire alarm on and, with all the other dinner ladies, collect the food that is left to provide for the next few weeks. No food is wasted.

I am confident in saying that our toilets are very hygienic, they shine with graffiti and sparkle with diarrhoea. The actual toilet seats are nicely stocked up with poo which brings a very unique scent that only The London Nautical has. Hang on. We could make a fragrance out of it. We could make loads of money from it and use the money for even more broken chairs. it’s a really good idea, anyway, the taps and sinks are home to amazing creatures like spiders and are filled with tissue and blood. It’s a generous thing from the guys. They love attracting friends and dirt for them to live on, it just adds more value to the school and separates us from many other schools. It puts us in our own category. Even the maintenance staff have come to realize that they should just leave all the dirt there because if they cleaned it, the creatures would leave and that would be catastrophic for the school.

Ofsted loves to visit and they say really nice things about us, we are a satisfactory school which the governors and school staff are very proud of. When an Ofsted inspector comes, they never leave because they love the school so much but it is rumored that each inspector is actually killed and their ghosts are kept in the basement to torment kids during detentions so that they are NEVER late again. It’s effective I guess. I have no problem because I’m never late. The office ladies are really nice and are the most helpful people you will ever meet, They are always there to put an ice pack on anything, a cold, broken leg, heart attack or seizure, they have ice packs for everyone and everything.

Our school focuses on the important and serious issues such as the type of hairstyle you have, whether or not you have a slit in your eyebrows or if you aren’t wearing your jumper (or blazer if you are in KS4). These things help us to become better people and will get us the grades at GCSE’s and A-level’s that we want if we don’t do them.

If you run in the corridors there is always a member of staff to tell you off and give you a yellow card, it shows how alert the staff is but how playful they can be by issuing yellow or red cards- they treat it like a football game haha.

Our food is the best out of all the schools in Stamford street. We cut down to almost 0% salt which is really healthy and they’ve made the prices of drinks that are high in sugar, overwhelmingly expensive which helps to stop kids from buying them and pushing them to the healthier, cheaper options that have no taste.

Our library is always quiet because not many people go there. The librarian doesn’t let anyone noisy in. It creates a working environment and helps to keep the books dusty and tidy, I think that’s why the librarian doesn’t let anyone in her library, to keep the books neat, duh. The library has high level security, an alarm that goes of when it senses anything go by, and rings so that everyone can hear and look at the culprit at the door. It’s a very effective technique, the attention and dirty looks that the thief receives causes them to emotionally break down and return the stolen item. It stops them, and everyone watching, from ever stealing in the future. It’s a really good alarm. Sometimes, however, I do see certain people walk out of the library with a book in their hands holding it above the alarm and the it doesn’t go off so the alarm has it’s weak area.

Detentions are always the best, everyone sleeps which makes it quiet while the teacher on duty just glances up every now and then to check for anything unusual. Some boys sit behind pillars and go on their phones or just chat to their friends for half an hour and once they’re done, they just simply walk out.

Safe. Simple. Helpful. Productive. That’s the London Nautical School.

THEN

You look at the man at the sound desk but can only see an outline of his body. He waves his hands in the air simulating the actions of someone playing the guitar. You laugh at the awkward air guitar but realise that he’s telling you to play something. You take a deep breath and play the easiest riff you know, the thing you know off by heart. The man suddenly cuts your volume down and you look up towards the figure trying to make out what you did wrong, he speaks into your earpiece and tells you to play something else. Your palms begin to feel sticky and wet, you wipe them slowly down on your trousers. You grab the neck of your guitar, dig in your memory for something more complicated, take another deep breath and play. The sound of your guitar and the odd gallop-like delay fills the empty hall and bounces back to you. A feeling of satisfaction fills you. There were no mistakes, let’s just hope it goes that way on the night of the event. The man at the sound desk gives you a thumbs up and moves on the next instrument, the drums, all you can hear now is the awkward sound of a raw drum kit just randomly being hit off beat as if it were in another room. You begin to daydream and think of all the practices you had with the band. Your mind wonders like it was trying to distract you and you fight it off. you won that little battle, let’s hope that DOESN’T happen on the night. Finally it’s the bass guitar’s sound check, he plays a short bass riff and plays around with his pedals a bit then his sound check is over. The fastest, easiest of them all. You then remember when you used to play the bass and music life was so much easier. Again you fight off the distraction. The man then gestures the whole band to play as if he were a conductor. You look at your brother on the drums and your other brother on the bass and nod at them, the drummer then screams “1!, 2!, 3!, 4!” then you play the first song on the list, without any mistakes. You finish and then everyone looks at you, for a moment you think you’ve played something wrong but remember that you play the intro to the next song and all of a sudden, get a small lump in your throat and your eyes tear up. Everything around you seems to be getting hotter and hotter but you know it’s just you being nervous. The singer speaks into the microphone and says “come on man! you should’ve started by now!”. You get even hotter with all the pressure and attention on you. Gravity begins to feel like its stronger on you alone, you look up, breath out and start the next song.

NOW

Here you are again, on that same stage you once dreamed of being on but now were dreading. The same stage you pictured yourself on in front of thousands of people but now were too afraid to be on. The hall is dark and dimly lit. The video is playing on the big screen behind you. The music in the video is building up and you know that you are up soon, the video finishes and the crowd applaud. That’s your queue. The light focuses on the stage, the people continue to clap. The spotlight blinds your eyes. You can’t see anyone so you just look down at your pedal set-up to check if everything is in its correct position. The drummer begins and everyone else joins, clapping along to the bass drum. The first song begins a bit stiff but you get looser and looser by the end. You finish and now it’s your turn to start the next song. You close your eyes and play the guitar lead line just as you had remembered it and open your eyes to see the crowd all looking at you. That same small sudden heat from the sound check creeps back and urges through your brain, trying to take control over your body. You resist it but know it will come back again. Your fingers begin to shake. You cannot gain control of them. A trickle of sweat slides down the side of your face and you feel it go into your mouth. It tastes salty and you try to spit it out but remember that the attention of a thousand people are on you. A sudden pulse of heat races through your body at the thought of making a mistake in front of that number of people. The extreme heat resonates through your bones as if you were an instrument that something was playing. The only thing you can hear now is the music as if it were in another room, muted and muffled. There’s an annoying ring in your ear as if something had exploded right next to you. Everything seems to be fading away from you. You step out of your skin and take everything in as it is. You realise that you haven’t made any mistakes so far and you join your flesh back on stage. You fall back to earth and continue to play. You let your mind think of something else to distract the worry of making a mistake and it works. You’re playing everything smoothly. “You know that feeling that you get when you know you’re doing something right and then it all suddenly goes wrong?”. Well that happened. You make a mistake and the musicians all look at you with a face of discontent. Everything you felt in those last moments hit you like a wall. You just want to get this over with now but the songs just seem to get slower and slower as you move further down the list. The last song seems so far away.

This was once your biggest dream but now your worst nightmare.

Your task is to identify the metaphor present in the following excerpt and then write a paragraph that explains the metaphor and its effect on the meaning of the passage it is embedded in.

ROMEO

I fear, too early: for my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night’s revels and expire the term
Of a despised life closed in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But He, that hath the steerage of my course,
Direct my sail! On, lusty gentlemen.

Hello and welcome to your personal online journal.

This platform has been created to enhance and enrich your learning at the London Nautical School. Its purpose is to provide you with an audience for your work (or work-in-progress) and you have the choice (by altering the ‘visibility’ of your posts) of whether your work on here is visible to the world, or only to your teacher.

Anything you post here in the public domain represents you and thus it’s important that you take care with that decision, but don’t be afraid to publish your work – as the feedback you may get from people at home, your peers and people from around the internet is only likely to enhance it.

Remember you can always access your class blog and all manner of resources through the Edutronic.net main website – and by all means check out the sites of your peers to see what they’re getting up to as well.

If you have any questions for me, an excellent way to get an answer is to create a new private post on this journal. I am notified of any new posts and will reply swiftly to any queries.

Make the most of, and enjoy this new freedom in your English learning.

Righto!

Mr Waugh