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Cs 2006 Mod 2 2023 Model Essay v. Ramoutar-Singh

The essay analyzes Alecia McKenzie’s story 'Natasha' from Longman’s Satellite City, focusing on the dialogue between Natasha and Andrea about their career aspirations and language use. It highlights Natasha's motivation to master Standard English for social mobility, Andrea's surprise at Natasha's fluency despite her Creole background, and Mrs. Jackson's negative attitude towards Creole. The essay suggests that a video presentation could enhance understanding of the characters' communicative behaviors and attitudes towards language.

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18 views2 pages

Cs 2006 Mod 2 2023 Model Essay v. Ramoutar-Singh

The essay analyzes Alecia McKenzie’s story 'Natasha' from Longman’s Satellite City, focusing on the dialogue between Natasha and Andrea about their career aspirations and language use. It highlights Natasha's motivation to master Standard English for social mobility, Andrea's surprise at Natasha's fluency despite her Creole background, and Mrs. Jackson's negative attitude towards Creole. The essay suggests that a video presentation could enhance understanding of the characters' communicative behaviors and attitudes towards language.

Uploaded by

Isabella
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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CS MODEL ESSAY 2006 P2 MODULE 2 V.

RAMOUTAR-SINGH

In Longman’s Satellite City and Other Stories, “Natasha” is cleverly written by Alecia

McKenzie, and features the use of different dialectal varieties and their respective attitudes,

within a discussion between two main characters. The characters, Natasha and Andrea clash

over a conversation about their future career paths. The main features for analysis of the extract

includes Natasha’s motivation for acquiring Standard English, justification for Andrea’s

surprise that Natasha spoke English fluently, Mrs. Jackson’s attitude towards English Creole

and the ways in which communication could be enhanced via a video presentation of the scene.

Upon closer examination of the extract, it became evident that Natasha is highly motivated to

achieving a good command of English. She explicitly states her desire to become an astronaut

in the future. Therefore, it is understood that Standard English has many social benefits given

that it is the language of education. One of these benefits is to attain a high occupation, such as

what she aspires to be in the near future.

Furthermore, Andrea is surprised that Natasha speaks English fluently and competently. Three

main reasons exist for her state of shock. Firstly, Natasha’s native language is English Creole

given that her mother is also a native and fluent speaker of this language variety. Also, Natasha

has not been further than Kingston as stated in line 6 of the extract. This suggests that the

dominant/main language in the Jamaican society is Jamaican Creole, and leaves one to wonder

where and how her exposure to English would have been so advanced, that she competently

speaks it. Finally, Natasha is only a primary school student. It leaves one in amazement that at

such a tender age she is very advanced linguistically, so much so that the average child would

still be acquiring this language variety.

Moreover, Mrs Jackson’s attitude towards Creole is noted in her behaviour. To elucidate, the

fact that she “felt insulted” (lines 19-20) would indicate that her facial expressions of dipped

V. Ramoutar-Singh
@vramoutarsingh_comm_studies 1
eyebrows, lack of eye contact and even a red face would show how embarrassed she was at her

inability to speak Standard English. This is further compounded when “she left quickly” (line

20) showing her embarrassment at the use of Creole. Again, she chose to distance herself from

the situation because of her inferior attitude towards her native language.

Undeniably, a video presentation of the scene would enhance the reader’s understanding of the

piece. To begin, paralanguage can be evident in Natasha’s use of a disappointed tone when she

said, “Oh” (line 16) upon learning of Andrea’s future career path. This helps to show that she

felt that being a teacher would not be an outstanding achievement. Also, when Andrea “burst

out laughing” it shows her kinesics where she is communicating that she felt Andrea’s

justification for her desire to be an astronaut as silly. Furthermore, chronemics and kinesics can

be displayed when Mrs. Jackson “left quickly” after it became evident that she could not

produce English and only Creole. Her quick use of time and her body language respectively

highlights her substandard view of English Creole. Lastly, kinesics could also be displayed in

Mrs. Jackson’s facial expression when Andrea tried to speak Creole to “put her at ease”. The

fact that she felt insulted could be seen in her low eyes, dipped eyebrows and even a red face.

To conclude, the narrative extract dealt with the interaction between two main characters.

During this interaction, language motivation, justification for Andrea’s seamless use of

English, a negative attitude to language and communicative behaviours in a video presentation

were highlighted. All of these features worked together to create a comprehensive

understanding of the piece.

V. Ramoutar-Singh
@vramoutarsingh_comm_studies 2

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