Text 1.1 - Article - Charlie Brooker

"Too much talk for one planet" - Charlie Brooker

voices Anthology text 1.1- Articles

Charlie Brooker Context:

• Charlton Brooker was born March 3rd 1971 and is an English television presenter, writer, producer and satirist

• Brooker began writing a TV review column titled "Screen Burn" for the Guardian newspaper's Saturday entertainment supplement The Guide in 2000, a role he continued to October 2010

• Brooker won the 2009 columnist of the year award at the British press awards for his Guardian TV review column

what is a satirist?

• Satire is a genre of the visual, literacy and performing arts in which vices are made to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or exposing individuals, corporations, the government/politics or society itself into improvement

• although satire is usually used to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, used to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society

what is a satirist?

• A feature of satire is strong irony or sarcasm, either to create a sense of humour or to provoke attention to certain issue

• is found in many forms of expression, including: memes, literature, plays, commentary, music, film and TV shows.

Text Summary:

• an article in Brooker's Guardian newspaper column to inform his audience that he is taking a break from writing his weekly column

• too much hate in comment sections, too much talking all the time, ironically as a columnist he was contributing to

• Satire, shaming and exposing society for comments and constant trolling of others, he uses wit, humour and sarcasm in his tone, again ironic that he is complaining about there being too many words, when as a columnist he contributes to this weekly

Text Summary:

• the lexical field of pollution/toxic/science and mechanical processes are used constantly throughout his text to represent how people and their constant need to access to talking/ the internet is toxic to society/ polluting society

• contextually he is a satirist

Things to know!

• Voice/tone: humorous/ satirist/ sarcastic/ frustrated/ conversational/ reflective/ ironic/ deflated/defeated

• Audience: readers/fans of his column and readers of the guardian newspaper (online and in print) more adults/ older audience

• Purpose/meaning: inform and explain his reasons for having a break from his column. Expose the issue of the internet allowing people to have too much of a voice within society/ people who use their platform for negativity.

• Mode: article in a newspaper, in print and online

Article Genre conventions:

• magazines, websites, printed publication, broadcast media, newspapers (tabloid or broadsheet)

• presents the writers views and opinions which can be subjective or biased

• longer and more detailed than news programmes on the television

• normally written about current affairs to do with political events, current interest and news is usually immediate

• Limited space- concise and economical, more stories = more environmentally friendly + increased publicity