Can you read my text and accentuate the stress syllable please?
PS: If you find any mistakes, could you correct me?
I'm going to talk about the notion of Myths and Heroes. First, I would like to remind that myths and heroes base the collective identity of a society. That's why we mainly talked about the British characters and especially about Britishness.
Most British characters relate to Britishness in a certain way and, since
they've become popular figures, these characters reflect the characteristics of
Britishness. The most famous British characters can be seen as Heroes since they do, in
facts, have become part of the popular British culture.
They give outsiders a glance at what defines Britishness. So we can wonder To what extent are The British characters reminiscent of the Britishness ? To begin with, I’ll try to clarify the essence of Britishness and the stereotypes associated with it. Then, I’ll show that the British rise above those clichés by asserting their cultrual identity and by exposing their way of life to the outside world.
So first of all, I want to define what Britishness is. Nevertheless, defining this word seems difficult at first sight. As a matter of fact, Britishness has emerged as a; hot topic over the last couple of years, with questions such as What is Britishness? and What does it mean to be British? Although defined on Wikipedia as 'a term referring to a sense of national identity of the British people and common culture of the United Kingdom' there is no single definition, and it is often a question which raises a plethora of responses from a variety of different people.But. British characters can define and embody Britishness Indeed, it’s through the way of life of these characters that the British have grown up and have developed their identity. For instance, in the novel Alice in Wonderland written by Lewis Caroll, some characters incarns Britishness. First, the Mad Hatter appears as the typical Englishman: he's very welcoming to Alice, he drinks tea all day, has a weird fashion sense and seems totally crazy. There is the white rabbit, who's always running out of time since he's constantly looking at his clock, Finally, Alice shows the politeness and the curtesy of British people. I have chosen this example because it’s interesting to observe that the stereotypes of the 19th century are still existing today. This is why we’ve studied cartoon illustrations from the how to be British collection created in 2004. We could see the classic stereotypes like their politeness and their love for dogs. We could also observe that they consider Englsih as the only useful language. Accordingly, they don’t want to learn any other language. So we can deduce that those stereotypes can define some aspects of Britishness.
Nonetheless, nowadays, British people manage to overcome the clichés thanks to the self-mockery. For instance, the « How to be British collection » aims to make fun of British prejudices. But the most representative example of this self-mockery is the film Johnny English. As a film, it’s a classic with a twist. Johnny English mixes the character of James Bond with the humour of Mr.Bean. All this made to deunk the myth and show that British people are not only serious but can also convey another image and appear less strict and rigid. The British humour used is far from being refined and made of visual gags, faces and slapstick. So British people prove they cab put a distance with their seriousness and appear funny. However, they also use British characters to show us to what extent they’re special. Consequently, the most brilliant and famous detextive Sherlock Holmes illustrates the singlar aspects of Britishness. Indeed, in the text that we’ve studied, he embodies the values of intelligence but also courage and politeness. As for his best friend Watson, he epitomizes the altruism because when Sherlock was indisposed, he wanted to stay with him. So we have seen that despite all the stereotypes associated with them, they keep their cultural identity and expose to the outside world what makes them special.
As a conclusion, I would say that the British characters are the mirror of certain aspects of Britishness. But it’s impossible to define all the aspects of Britishness It cannot be nailed down because, like all identities, it is evolving and re-forming with every moment.
As far as I’m concerned, I think all my generation have a part of Britishness because we have grown up with characters like Harry Potter and Johnny English. My family were huge fans of Mr.Bean. But personally I’ve never liked the imaginary worlds or the video gags. Unfortunately for me, I prefer the logic. Finally, we can tell that Britishness goes beyond the borders.
-I would like to remind "the reader", or remind "you"
-since they have in fact become part...
-reminiscent of Britishness
-cultural
=some characters are Britishness incarnate
-courtesy
-In conclusion
-finally we can say