Passage To Africa Flashcards
”- like a ghost village”
Simile, highlights the sense of death around Gufgaduud and foreshadows the horrors to come
“fleeting meeting”
Phonology, emphasises the briefness of the meeting and therefore highlights what a pivotal moment it was for him that it could be so short and still impact him in the way that it did.
“between, between, between”
Anaphora and tricolon, shows the division between Alagiah and the people he was reporting on, emphasising the false fictional divides created by people to separate them from other people.
“appalled,” “no longer impressed us much,”
Stative verbs, highlight how addictive Alagiah’s job was but also show that with the scale of death and horror that they see that desensitising himself is the only plausible way to cope with what he sees.
“I saw 1000 hungry, lean, scared faces,”
Beginning of piece, highlighting the scale of the problems and the scale of the horror that Alagiah was seeing, but the impersonal reference to the people as “1000 hungry…faces” highlights the need for desensitisation and the lack of individuality between people living through these horrors.
“Habiba had died”
Short sentence, highlights impact of the sentence whilst also emphasising how quickly her death happened in a place like Gufgaduud.
“And then there was the face I will never forget,”
One sentence paragraph, highlights the turning point in Alagiah’s point of view, when he began to humanise the faces he was seeing and when the piece begins to become more uplifting.
Ending paragraph:
switches from formal to informal from the start to the end of it mirroring his own emotional change.
“nameless friend”
ending by directly addressing the smiling man as his
this, highlighting how he has broken the divides between “rich and poor” and showing how the experience changed him as he genuinely cares and is less desensitised.
Other Key Quotes
“Power and purpose” (plosive alliteration)
“The journalist is active the subject is passive”
“turned the tables”
“it was rotting; she was rotting” (parallel sentences, change in pronouns show humanisation)
“mixture of pity and revulsion”
“and then it clicked”
Moment of clarity and realisation, highlights humanisation of the “nameless friend”
“unwritten code between the journalist and his subjects in these situations. The journalist observes, The subject is observed. The journalist is active, the subject is passive. But this smile had turned the tables on that tacit agreement”
Parallel sentences, highlight the power inequality between the journalist and those he observes, also invites introspection when he too is observed
