assignment
Exercise 6.6
Below is the beginning of a charity appeal letter. This is written as if addressed to an
individual, although of course it is sent to many people. Identify the T-unit Themes
and group them according to the kind of entity that they refer to. Can you see any
patterns in the way Theme is deployed?
(1) You might wonder why three RSPCA Inspectors should be sitting in a van in
the middle of the night, wide awake, just watching and waiting.
(2) For Inspectors in our Special Operations Unit (SOU), it’s all in a day’s
work. (3) I lead the team, (3a) and I’d like to tell you about the extraordinary and
sometimes heroic work they do.
(4) You probably haven’t heard of the SOU before. (5) That’s because we fi ght
cruelty undercover and the success of our work depends on keeping our operations
top secret. (6) But today, I’m going to tell you all about our work, because we
need your help.
(7) There are eight of us in the SOU. (8) We’re plain-clothes Inspectors (8a)
and we’re known as the Animal Squad. (9) Ours is a highly specialized job: (9a)
we’re on the trail of criminals responsible for the worst kind of cruelty, where
animals are exploited for profi t and so-called pleasure.
(10) We’ve all been uniformed Inspectors for at least fi ve years, (10a) so we’ve
seen some pretty horrifi c things in our time, (10b) but nothing compares to the
kind of vicious abuse we’re fi ghting against now.
(11) Take the men who dug badgers out of their sets, took shots at them and
set their dogs on them. (12) Or the man who tried to smuggle parrots into Britain
by stuffi ng them into cardboard tubes and sending them from Australia sealed in
a box.
(13) Catching these kind of criminals and bringing them to justice is never easy.