#ExtensionEnglish

[saphosticated]

The discursive essay.

I announce it to the class like some foul beast that lurks in the peeling paint on our classroom rafters. Feet shuffle. Eyes avert. But I still start my usual spiel.

The discursive essay is the best type of writing that I will be allowed to teach you during the entire HSC. But, I won’t give you a scaffold. I won’t give you letters like PEEL or PETAL or TEEL to clutch like a life-raft. Instead I will give you freedom.

Sure, you’ll have a prompt. But you can interpret it any way that you want. You can use any techniques. You can discuss anything that interests you. You can have an entire paragraph made up of rhetorical questions and still get a band 6. (Trust me, I’ve seen it)

You can write imaginatively, add in some poetry. Experiment with spacing. Use your punctuation for effect. If you want to write about anxiety (or maybe you’re just overthinking it. Again) you certainly can.

It’s your opportunity to throw away the rules and use your voice. Make allusions to the things you know. The things you care about. Link them to your studies. Make me want to keep reading.

Were Machiavelli’s observations of Florentine society and politics decidedly Lady Whistledown’ish. Maybe you want to see if your reader can decipher the difference between a Taylor Swift lyric and a Shakespeare quote.

Make links between your texts and current events. Maybe it is stupid that you sit in a classroom while the person next to you complains that we have no air conditioning so they won’t do their work, but children are being bombed in Gaza and their schools are now empty mouths in the ground and empty mouths not being fed because of the blockade.

Maybe we taught you too well to follow the rules.

To use your scaffolds.

To tie together your five paragraph essays with overly crafted thesis statements.

To use connectives for your ideas

To analyse the techniques.

To repeat what you’ve been taught.

So much that freedom feels overwhelming. It feels dangerous. This unknown text-type that lurks in the shadows and does not get the love it deserves.

But,

Once you start looking. It’s everywhere. It’s the opinion editorial, it’s the recent personal essay written by Lizzo and published on Tumblr (Go read it, it’s fantastic), it’s blog posts, and travel guides and anywhere that someone is sharing their ideas and their story however they want without trying to persuade you.

It’s the antithesis to AI. It’s the combinations and connections and personal style and voice that only you have. It’s uniquely human, and like the dragon in Shrek. You do not need to be afraid of it.

[codeniall]

HAHAHA

I HAVE AN EXAM TOMORROW AND I'VE BARELY STUDIED AND LIKE, FUCKS GIVEN ARE ZERO.

[worldbeauts]

EXTENSION ENGLISH: crime fiction creative

Jeff stepped into the room and was greeted by the eerie atmosphere. The grey steel walls, coupled with the noise, or lack thereof, accelerated the dread growing within. The light dimmed until he was unable to make out where the walls were. Then, a swift bout of air flew past him, while his eyes were temporarily blinded by a glaring light.

A lone computer lay ahead, waiting, daring him to interact. A mechanical voice instructed that he had 5 minutes to live. He shuddered, knowing all too well what these technological creatures were capable of.

He knew he had to find a way out… and only had a precious 300 seconds to do it.

*

Computers had ruled the world since 3000, ever since artificial intelligence had grasped the concept of doubt. An innate feature within humans, doubt was what had allowed humans to have complete control over technology. But once the millennium struck, the roles were reversed. Computers were able to do everything humans could do, only better. The human instinct was what had kept us in power, but had since, become redundant.

They had taken over the world. Literally being heartless meant they were mercilessly killing humans in the process. Jeff had been appointed as the director of Operation Z, a highly adept taskforce of 4 with the single objective to stop these inhuman killings. They, and only they had control over every computer, and had deducted that the computer's actions were not solely the result of their programming. There was somebody behind these murders, and they were one of the 4 in Operation Z.

*

200 seconds. He looked up, he looked down, he looked left, he looked right. Grey. That's all he saw. But, he knew where he was, deep within the chasms of the sewerage lines, small cubic rooms had been mined out to act as a safe house in situations like these.

Only problem was… the room was getting smaller and smaller.

Or was it?

It was all grey. Jeff couldn't tell for sure. But a sense of doubt had creeped into his mind, whether it was all an allusion, was the room not getting smaller, was he not actually stuck?

*

The other three in the team comprised of a programmer, a coder, and a hacker. They were all quiet men, keeping to themselves, refusing to utter a word unrelated to the mission. They were an efficient group, ensuring they worked in the most economical method to find the culprit.

More and more deaths were occurring every day. An Jeff knew he had to find which Operation Z member was committing these hideous acts.

*

A computer fell from the ceiling into Jeff's lap. Perplexed, he reached for the computer, whereby it unexpectedly broke into pieces, uniformly scattering its parts on the floor surrounding him.

Over the 14 years of his life, Jeff had been taught every aspect when it came to the operation of computers, but never was he taught how to build one. Helplessly, he attempted to click pieces together, randomly hoping that something would work. He knew the rest of his life would depend on his ability to solve this one puzzle. A minute in, he gave up haphazardly experimenting with the challenge presented to him. He slowed his breathing, he thought. Then he remembered the room he was in, the walls, the technology embedded within those walls. He simultaneously got up and ran towards the nearest wall, where he desperately thrashed his body in a futile attempt to break into the wall. By then another two minutes had passed, and he knew that this wasn’t what was expected of him. He absentmindedly grazed his fingers along the wall as he walked, deep in thought, when he felt a miniscule ridge ingrained within the wall. He pushed his nails to the limit prying the gap further but it was no use. With a mere minute left he ran back to the scattered remains of the computer and grabbed two thin slits which he used to push open the slight void. He stuck his head into the hole and looked for a device. Ten seconds. He heard a negligible whirring sound to his left, swung his eyes to that direction and stuck his hand out to grasp the machine. His fingertips grazed the machine, but prior to that the walls had evaporated and the clock displayed the time remaining.

00:00 Remaining it read. He was so close. Yet so far.

Two hands covered his mouth with a piece of cloth drenched in chloroform. Jeff's knees gave way as his mind lulled in and out of consciousness. He felt his body being lurched up by two men and thrown into the back of a van. He knew who these men were. They were the ones who had been murdering the innocent people all over the world.

He stepped into a cell and was greeted by the eerie atmosphere. The grey steel walls, coupled with the ghostly silence accelerated the dread growing within. The light dimmed until he was unable to make out where the walls were. Then a swift bout of air flew past him, while her eyes were temporarily blinded by a glaring light.

A lone woman lay ahead, waiting, daring Jeff to interact. She was a gnarled woman with her hair ruffled and her posture hunched, curled up in a fetal position weeping to herself. The woman regained composure, and stood up, radiating a type of beauty which time had failed to rob.

[filledwithnoir]

extension english exam went well.

all i can hope now is that the teacher likes what i wrote. 

[worldbeauts]

EXTENSION ENGLISH: crime fiction essay

The crime fiction genre has been prevalent for almost two centuries but has thrived, appropriating itself to changes in attitudes, correlating with changing contexts. Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954), Michael Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost (2000) along with David Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) all reflect dynamic conventions of crime fiction which reflect social attitudes of the time these texts were composed. Rear Window depicts the changing attitudes of the post-World War II economic boom, exploring shifting opinions regarding the role of women, the rising fear of communism in the United States, while also conveying socioeconomic differences prevalent during the period. Anil's Ghost depicts a different crime, a crime against humanity where countless innocent civilians are murdered by the government and Tamil insurgents. Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is an adapted screenplay of Steig Larsson's novel of the same name written in 2005. This film incorporates many modern features, notably the inclusion of technological devices. It is evident, through analysis of these texts which have been produced in different timeframes, that crime fiction is indefinitely acclimatising itself to the context of when it is composed.

David Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo depicts the disappearance of Harriet Vagner, who is suspected to have been murdered by her loving uncle, Henrik Vanger. The film reflects concerns of contemporary Swedish society, depicting the struggling situation of Lisbeth Salander, who is classified as a ward of the state, being deemed mentally incompetent as a child. The film comments on the abuse, especially rape of women. This is evident in the scene where Lisbeth is extorted by her new legal guardian. The modern nature of the film is also reflected, where the use of technology is prevalent and plays a major role in the solving of the mystery. Lisbeth Salander is an adept computer hacker who has the ability to efficiently obtain personal information simply with the aid of a computer. The concept of justice is unconventionally served in this film, due to the varying issues in terms of both the nature and the degree. The disappearance of Harriet Vagner is solved where she is in fact not murdered, but has been alive and well having escaped abuse from her own family since the age of 15. The libel case which was lost by Mikael Blomkvist at the introduction of the film is rectified when new allegations against Hans-Erik Wennerström are found true. The rape and murder of the several girls is rectified when the perpetrator essentially kills himself, burned alive. David Fincher's film depicts contemporary Swedish values, allowing him to comment on Swedish society by portraying a similar society, a society for viewers to escape into.

Rear Window depicts the suspicions of LB Jefferies, where Hitchcock comments on the popular ideas of the context in which the film was composed. The rising role of women is depicted through the characterisation of Lisa Freemont, who takes over the physical aspect of the investigation due to Jefferies' immobility. This represents the empowerment of women during the time and how they were gaining a larger role in society. The scene depicting Lisa risking her life to break and enter into Thorwald's apartment illustrates this characteristic of the 1950s. Socioeconomic disparity is also commented upon in Rear Window, through the characterisation of the nurse, Stella. The way in which she dresses in addition to how she is treated by other characters depicts the differing values between the upper and working classes. Rear Window is a murder mystery, where Jefferies works with both Lisa and Stella to come to a conclusion that Mr Thorwald has murdered Mrs Thorwald. The film revolves around the methods which they undertake to prove that it is true. The varying shots depicting Jefferies' point of view subtly provides an array of clues for viewers to piece together. The concept of justice is evident in the eventual arrest of Thorwald and the associated charges. Hitchcock has created a small society in Rear Window to create escapism for viewers from the real world.

Anil's Ghost is based on the Sri Lankan civil war, exploring the investigation of Anil Tissera, a forensic anthropologist and Sarath Diyasena, an archaeologist regarding the countless murders which have been occurring throughout the country. Michael Ondaatje published the novel in 2000, reflecting upon the war between the Tamil Tigers against the Sri Lankan government. This novel is not your classic murder mystery, as it explores crimes against humanity, committed by both the Sri Lankan government and the Tamil insurgents. Ondaatje symbolises the skeleton of Sailor to represent all the innocent victims of the civil war, describing how "To give him [Sailor] a name would name the rest", suggesting that it is the one body who is committing these numerous crimes. Ondaatje also comments the controversial nature of the truth, characterising both Anil and Sarath to represent two different viewpoints. Anil believes that "The truth shall set you free", which contrasts against Sarath's more conservative attitude, that "The truth can be like a flame against a lake of petrol." The different attitudes is a result of Anil's foreign nature, which is only disrupted by her Sri Lankan background, while Sarath has witnessed the impact the civil war has had with his own eyes. Michael Ondaatje, through Anil's Ghost has created a society for readers to escape to, allowing him to effectively comment on the impacts of the Sri Lankan civil war.

Murder in fiction is one of the most effective ways to grasp a viewer's attention, while also allowing composers to comment on the topics of the context. Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window, Michael Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost and David Fincher's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo all reflect their respective contexts, providing a form of escapism for viewers from the tumultuous society of the real world.