LANGUAGE ANALYSIS GLAMOUR GURLZ

In the article Glamour girls find jobs charms soon wear a bit thin, Wendy Squires contends that a career in the glamour model industry is short-lived and in vain. Squires highlights this opinion using various persuasive techniques, including anecdote, emotive language and metaphor. Wendy uses various tones throughout this personal story of hers, changing from one of condescension to hostility and even that of despair. The photo used above gives the reader a visual representation of the types of people Squires talks about in her anecdote and, by incorporating fairly different looking people in said photo, shows how universal this problem and misconception can be. Wendy Squires uses a personal anecdote to carry most of her points across. The entire article is written in a narrative style. This open, almost conversational language gives the reader a sense of familiarity and comfort with the narrator of this story and, as with most stories, makes the reader want to know what happens next. This anecdote format develops a bond between the reader and writer, making Squires contention seem rational. The use of emotive language in this article is quite frequent. An obvious example is the paragraph following the comments made by other models, including phrases such as shallow bitches or humiliation. Shallow bitches is clearly a negative term that was directed at the other models mentioned in the piece. By using such a phrase, Squires shocks her audience and turns them to her side. In conjunction with the ongoing anecdote, Wendy has built a trust with the reader and so the term shallow bitches will be automatically applied to the models in the story by the reader. By seeing the models in a more negative light, the reader turns to the second party Squires for an answer and happily accepting her contention. Metaphor is also used frequently used by Squires. In the top-right paragraph on the second page, Squires says you could grate cheese on their collarbones. This powerful metaphor provides another mental image for the reader to associate with these models they have now come to hate. Anything likened to a kitchen utensil cannot be very human, therefore taking some of the humanity of these antagonists. The reader will want to side with the more-human of the argument, in this case Squires. Wendy Squires has taken persuasive techniques from across the board and, paired with this lengthy anecdote, really degraded the life of a model. Using metaphor, emotive language and anecdote she has successfully brought people around to her point of view and in agreement with her main contention.