There are two main varieties spoken in the United Kingdom. They are associated with England and Scotland. In this e-lecture, we will concentrate on the English spoken in England and its main phonological dialect, received pronunciation. We will look at the history first, then we will provide, or at least we will try to provide, a definition. We will hopefully answer the question whether RP is a regional or social dialect and we will eventually look at the sound system of received pronunciation. Let's start with the historical aspects. The origin of English goes back to the 5th century after Christ, when Germanic tribes invaded Britain. Linguistically, this first period of English, referred to as Old English, is defined as from 600 to 1100. Old English was used in the area that was approximately identical with England today. There were already some varieties of Old English differing geographically and historically. Here they are, Northumbrian, Martian, Kentish and West Saxon. The most important dialect for modern scholars is West Saxon, in which the majority of texts were written. And its 10th century form became something of a standard for texts written across much of England. During the Middle English period, which lasted from 1100 to 1500, dialectal differences were becoming greater than during the Anglo-Saxon times. The new standard was based on London speech, essentially an East Midland dialect. Today, there are many phonological dialects in England. The most well-known and best researched one is called received pronunciation. Now, early in the 20th century, Daniel Jones, who you can see here, described received pronunciation as the accent spoken by the socially and economically dominant London society. This clearly reflects the social considerations of his time. He initially named this variant of English public school pronunciation. Now, by 1926, this label had become received pronunciation, so let's add 1926 here. Later, it has also been referred to as, well, BBC English, public school English, or even standard English. By the way, the term received, this is quite interesting. The term received originally meant that which is generally accepted, so it is equivalent to accepted, accepted by the best society. RP is also the accent that Americans and possibly other foreigners would probably refer to as the typical British accent. Over the years, a number of distinctions have been added. Here they are. Well, mainstream RP, upper-cross RP, adoptive RP, near RP, conservative RP, and so on. Regardless of the differences within these variations of RP, RP is a phonological dialect commonly recognized and one that has been taught as the standard English pronunciation model in schools for years. Thus, it can be considered as a reference system for all other phonological dialects used in England. A question that is often asked is, is RP a regional or a social dialect? Well, considering England, it clearly is a regional dialect since it is associated with England and not with other countries or parts of Great Britain, so in this context it is clearly regional. However, it is not associated with any particular location within England, if at all perhaps well with the wealthier south of England. Since RP is what might be thought of as an educated accent, it appears characteristically in upper and upper middle class speakers and is more sociologically defined rather than geographically. So, here is the symbol for sociological definition. Up until the 1970s, RP was the accent that was required, for example, to become a BBC announcer or someone who was employed by BBC television or BBC radio. Hence the term BBC English was used as an equivalent of RP. For this reason RP is an accent that is not localizable but is very much recognizable as being the standard, the neutral accent of society. Let's now look at the sound system of RP. RP has 12 monophthongs, we will look at them in a second, 8 diphthongs and 24 consonants. Well and in terms of roticity, it is very very low, perhaps one of the lowest phonological dialects of English around the world. Now here are the monophthongs of RP. The set of monophthongs can be subdivided into 5 tense monophthongs. See, bra, caught, to, fur and 7 lax monophthongs. Bit, vet, bat, caught, put, but, letter. Even though there is no phonemic length distinction in RP, the tense monophthongs are marked by a colon, since they are generally longer than the lax ones. Let's now look at the diphthongs. Depending on the tongue position of the second vowel, the 8 diphthongs can be grouped into front closing diphthongs or up gliding diphthongs. So here are the 3 up gliding ones. Into back closing or back up gliding consonants, here they are. And into the centering or in gliding diphthongs, those diphthongs where the second element is a central vowel, here they are. Finally, the system of the consonants. Now, in this unit on the virtual linguistics compass that you see right here, we have presented all consonantal phonemes of RP, including their allophones. We cannot show them all in this e-lecture, but let's look at some of them. For example, quite interesting is the configuration of the R phoneme, red. Now, as you can see, we have four allophones, the standard alveolar approximate, which is sometimes devoiced, after voiceless plosives, as in trick. Or it can sometimes interocalically be replaced or be realized by an alveolar flap, as in ferry, as a typical realization of RP. Another interesting phoneme is the alveolar lateral leg. Now, as you might know, it has three central allophones, the palatalized version at the beginning or before vowels, the velarized version as in pill. And finally, the devoiced variant after voiceless plosives such as p and k. Here is another phoneme, the labiovela approximate, as in wet. And this is sometimes, and this is a peculiarity of RP realized by a devoiced variant, as in examples such as witch. Most of the phonemes have no remarkable allophones they use, like in many other languages of the world. Here is perhaps some interesting one, the bilabial nasal, as in man, which has an interesting variant, especially if it is followed by a labial dental fricative, for example in words like comfort, where it is realized by an allophone that is a mixture between bilabial alveolar, namely a labiodental nasal. Let's return to our collection of phonemic and phonetic properties. Now, we said that roticity in RP is pretty low, whereas linking as in father and son is a feature that applies to most phonological dialects of present day English. The phenomenon of intrusion or the so-called intrusive R is a special phenomenon of RP. The phoneme R is inserted between two vowels, they must be back vowels though, even if it is not represented orthographically. An example would be something like the idea is India and China and so on. Let's summarize. Even though RP has often been critically judged as a social dialect, which is not used by a large percentage of the population, it is still the accent that most learners of present day English use as a reference model for the pronunciation of British English, even in the context of English as a global language. In our e-lecture, English in England beyond RP, you will not only see that there are other phonological dialects in England, but you will find out that there are recent developments that may even result in a new attitude towards what is the standard phonological variety of British English. See you then.


Yeah, it's more than just the Constitution. This is American Issues Take Two with Tim Apichella, co-host, and Stephanie Stowdahl, a regular contributor. Welcome to the show, you guys. Morning. Let me frame it like this. Kay, we talked yesterday on Take One about Trump's remarks about the Constitution that he wanted to terminate the Constitution. No confusion what he said. And he tried to walk that back, but it doesn't work because he said it. So the question is, where does that fit in the continuum of Trump's behavior, the behavior of the GOP, the Trump GOP, and the other GOP? And where does it go from here? I hate to call for speculation, but that's exactly what I'm calling for. So if you watch the Gantt chart that Ari Melber, the Gantt chart that Ari Melber presented on MSNBC, you know that Trump began with less illegal, less seditious initiatives. And each time he was rebuffed, he went to more seditious initiatives, more desperate initiatives. And now, by his comments around the Constitution and taking that on the heels of January 6th, we have a more desperate situation. And to add fuel to the fire doesn't look so good for him in Mar-a-Lago or for that matter on the January 6th investigation. So you could assume on the Ari Melber Gantt chart that it will be more desperate for him, more desperate times. And the question is, you know, how desperate will they get those times? And what will he say to his base, his old base, or his new, more extreme base? How will the GOP react to that going forward? And the bottom line question is, what will Trump do? And will it be successful? How damaging it will be for the country? Let's start with you, Tim. Can you wrap around the question of, how much support Trump is losing right now so as to make him more desperate? I think quiet support is peeling off. They're not still yet willing to come out in front of a CNN or MSNBC or Fox TV news cameras and say that they're done with them. They're still concerned about Trump's 33% base, the MAGA GOP, which still seems to be red hot and still quite powerful and to these politicians quite intimidating. So, but I think deep down inside, they know he's done. They know that after the midterm elections and certainly after the Georgia election, Trump influence as a kingmaker is over. And that most GOP, I think, most, maybe 66%, they have severe Trump fatigue. And they're looking for the new candidate to come out into the marketplace and take the GOP party into a new direction. And of course, that candidate's not out there yet. Everyone wishes and hopes that DeSantis is the one. They think that he will, my polls, he's already way ahead of Donald Trump, but it's premature for DeSantis to come out into the scene. So, we're stuck with Trump. They're stuck with Trump. And I think they want to move away as quickly as possible, but they just don't have anyone yet to rally around. You know, the Georgia runoff is kind of iconic in the sense that Herschel Walker was his candidate. He put him up there and supported him at least at first. And I guess then as a strategical matter, he backed away because he thought he was more of a negative factor than a positive one. But the Herschel Walker's loss to me is more than just Trump can't find a good candidate. I'll tell you what I think, and I like your opinion about it. It's that he used these primaries, these elections as a way to demonstrate his power and the threat that he could make against the sitting member of Congress was to say, I'm going to primary you. I'm going to bring in a Trump candidate and then I'm going to support that candidate and that candidate will bash you when you're out of a job. But after Georgia seems to me that the calculus for somebody who might be affected by this or that threat before may not be so affected now. What do you think? I can agree with you more. Just real quick, remember the old attorney's refrain is never asked the question, you don't have the answer to. Well, that applies in politics as well.  You don't think it's going to go in your direction. And certainly backing all these candidates was that political stunt? It was a barometer for Donald Trump to say, I still am the kingmaker and I'm still the head cheese here in this party. But it didn't work for him. It didn't go in his direction. So like the attorney that asked the question and got the wrong answer in the witness box. So Stephanie, according to the R.E. Melbur dance chart, at first the things that Trump was doing say before the 2020 election, were not necessarily provably illegal and they were not criminal necessarily. I mean, it was arguable. But then when he began to get desperate, and a good example would be January 6th, he went to more desperate measures, more criminal measures. And R.E. Melbur's analysis is that if you watch the dance chart, you will see that as he gets more desperate, the measures get more desperate and more illegal, more seditious. Okay, so somehow, you may or may not agree, but somehow his claim that the constitution should be terminated seems at least as desperate as anything he's done. Because it not only suggests that he doesn't believe in the constitution and the government, that he believes in himself, Uber Alice, and that he is organizing on that basis another attempted coup. So how serious is it in the continuum that he is now shoved off from the United States Constitution? And what is it portent? Well, I see what I consider, in contrast to all that's gone on at Doodle now, a virtual route of him.  And her big question about the loss is that, well, why weren't all the other 49 senators are out there, Republican senators helping him out? There wasn't enough help for him. But he's being completely eviscerated by Hannity and other Republicans for his requirements for Republicans to stop early voting and not use meal-in ballots.  So he's being taken on for that all around. So we're not, he's surely getting ready to come back something on that. But those are the major Fox people and commentators in on the smart news and like that is that he is seen now as a reprobate and one who got in the way of the Republicans winning all these elections and that if they hadn't listened to any of that, that it is counterintuitive and that the kinds of advice that he put out was illogical. They're saying the same things that were brought up during the time that he was recommending and demanding that his followers act in that way. So I see him as being moved into the corner, but that in no way belies your theory here that he's gonna come out fighting with something and we'll see what it is and it will probably be ferocious as it usually is as a first response to a very, very general route of him. So we're gonna have some interesting time and it looks like Romney's out there saying things. So slowly, slowly, slowly they're stepping up and I do believe I'm feeling that things are moving against him and he's gonna have to face up to some serious consequences here. Well, your reference to the remarks of Kellyanne Conway, I find very interesting. I remember she was some official, maybe a campaign spokesman person in 2016 and she's the one who talked about alternative truth and I remember my initial reaction as to holy moly, how can a presidential candidate lie and we found through Kellyanne Conway that that was a cornerstone of his campaign lying and then justifying it as alternatives. It was mad, it was insane and she was the spokesman for it. So fast forward six years, seven years, whatever it is. Now Kellyanne Conway who has been out of the administration and her husband George doesn't agree with her about anything, he appears to oppose Trump every time he gets a chance. God, I wonder how their marriage is doing. So now Kellyanne Conway comes back. She's been off the platform for a while, he comes back and she makes it and what floods my brain is that Trump could see all these people you mentioned backing away from. He's trying to find somebody who will come under the spotlight and support him. Okay, and- When Fox says too, that's why she's on the panel now. He tells a bunch of people, he calls all his old friends and he says, would you like to talk for me? I need a statement from you. And they say, you know, I'd really rather stay out of the limelight on this funnel.  I'm just gonna stay on the sideline and he looks and he talks and he calls and finally he finds Kellyanne Conway. This is Kellyanne, I need you to make one of those alternative truth statements for me now. He needs you back, Kellyanne. And she says, okay. And that's why we have Kellyanne, what do you think? Well, Jay, remember, you know, the love of money. I'm sorry, who are you talking to, Jay? Well, I was just gonna say, but yes. Okay, all right, I was gonna say, Jay is right on such an important point and a real signal of what's going on and that he may have had to do with that. But I see that Fox is sputtering too. I mean, for days and hours, you know, I'll check in on them and their coverage is like off the wall, Tanzania, you know, people's individual stories. Meanwhile, all this stuff is breaking on the other channels and Fox is kind of like, even on the five and all of these different programs, they're just ignoring so much of it. And I think that it's Fox too, that's helping Trump to bring people like Kellyanne back to your point, Jay, because they need somebody to speak for him. You know, Tim, you were talking about money and we know that whatever you wanna say, Trump has money right now. Well, yeah, I mean, what's the correlation between Kellyanne and Conway back on the airwaves supporting Donald Trump? She's getting a paycheck again from him. I mean, love of money is the root of all evil and people will sell their souls and that's what she's doing yet again. Oh my God, it's not a mystery, she's getting paid. So yeah, anyone who's getting paid, you'll see him in front of Fox cameras and defending the great Donald. But you know, that's great until Donald starts bouncing his checks, which he loves to do. Which hopefully he might have happened to him, Jay, because we've got that conviction. I mean, it is a civil case, but he's gonna owe millions of dollars on that because of the verdict on his company. That he's in deep doo-doo on that. But and that AG is not finished yet. This is just chapter one. So yes, that, but to your point, Jay, I still think that with the program, focusing the show, focusing on what is he gonna do because he's under duress now, more ever than he's been, really under duress. So you guys are talking about what is the potential here for his next round? I'm glad he doesn't have the nuclear codes under his control, I'm glad of that. Because I think he's gonna spin off into some real craziness. But here, so we have people pulling away from him and we have this obviously desperate move of Kellyanne Conway and for that matter, the constitutional argument that he makes, that seems to be desperate too. But Tim, let me go to you on this one. You know, yesterday on take one, we talked about how this constitutional initiative of his is a suggestion that the constitution should be quote, terminated, is a way to activate a new group of people for his base, people who were more extreme, more violent, more out of their squash. And I continue to feel that that was at least part of it. But the other part, let me ask you about the other part. He's testing the water, isn't he?  He knows that some members of Congress will push back. But the question is, is he getting pushback from people who are in his base or could be in his base, people who are way over to the right extremists? Because if he doesn't get pushback from them, it means, yes, Donald can try another insurrection or something along those lines to actually break the government. So it's more than just, you know, he's going over the side, which I don't think you could make that because he's too clever to go over the side. There's always a reason for it in his perverted way of looking at things. And by the way, what do you think might be the secondary purpose of that, of that? Well, I really agree with you that he likes to test the waters, say outrageous things to see what kind of reaction he gets. Because in Donald Trump's own little mind, he thinks that people forget. No one has forgotten, remember yesterday's show, in the introduction, I started bringing out his classic hit parades of famous things, he said, and people will find deplorable. And one of them was good people on both sides, veterans or suckers and losers. I mean, so there, although of the thousands of things he said that were just deplorable, there are those salient points that people do remember. But in Donald Trump's mind, they don't remember. So when he said that, you know, basically we can terminate the constitution, it's just one more thing that he thinks the American public won't retain and won't remember. But I also think in Donald Trump's world, if I say it enough times, I'll desensitize my listening audience and they'll be get used to it. And then when I do it, they won't have a reaction to it. And this is the good old fashioned, the march and the, you know, the march to fascism is to make outrageous statements, do outrageous things until my audience becomes desensitized and just goes along with it. So we may hear more from Donald Trump as pertains to undermine the rule of law and the constitution, because now he's got it out once and what's to prevent him from doing it again? So I think it was within the last couple of days the Supreme Court had argument on the Hopper case. The one that would change again for the worst federalism in this country as originally expressed by the founders. What implications does the decision of Supreme Court have on that? I mean, if they rule, for example, in favor of this kind of states' rights, you know, that make it harder to preserve rights to vote, right, right, right to vote. How does that affect Trump's initiative to undo the country and the constitution? Yeah. Oh, great things because he could call, get on the phone as he does with many state legislators that are of the MAGA GOP, of the loyal following and influence them directly, where you may not be able to get away with that so easily with, you know, through the federal process. You can't just get on the phone with the Supreme Court justice. So yeah. Oh no, oh no. Well, he can when he interviews them for the job and he did. Just call their wives. Yeah. Well, good point. Through cocktail parties in Washington, D.C. Good point. But yeah, I mean, that would go greatly for Donald Trump. But let's remember what Neil Cotier did. He used Justice Thomas' own court case against Justice Thomas. And what a great thing that was to basically say to Clarence Thomas, hey, you can't really support this because your previous ruling in another case was just the opposite. K-PASA. That's a good point. And so Stephanie, you're talking about really important things here when you're talking about, you know, the various possibilities for indictment against him. We've heard recently that there were yet other documents that he had, has. And we've heard that the declaration by counsel back in early 2022, that there were no more documents. They didn't have any other than they made some sort of diligent search so no more documents was untrue. Of course, the benefit of that is that those, that lawyer is in trouble now. That lawyer, you know, could be indicted herself for that false statement. I don't think they have a lot of trouble getting an indictment against her for the false statement. They can trade that off. They can trade that off for, you know, prosecutorial purposes to get information about him and to further implicate him. And then at the same time, you know, we have the committee report coming out in a few days and they indicate that, A, there's more in there than we know, maybe nothing profound, but maybe they connect the dots better. And they always have Ari Melbers, I can't start to help them, you know. And, you know, it may be when they announce which is going to be the 21st of December, that it's worse. So he's got all kinds of reverses going on lately. But the question I put to you is, you know, he's tough on that. He almost enjoys it. He's Bonnie and Clyde, American folk hero for a lot of people. He wants to be on the headlines and he gets on the headlines, you know, and at least half the country is devoted to following him and enjoying his machination. Bonnie and Clyde. So query, is any of that going to make a difference? Well, Jay, that's exactly what I'm delighted to have. You asked me because what has not been covered and had me in a tizzy yesterday morning when I woke up because I was worried about it of the night before, which is, this was a close election. I mean, barely a percentage point between Wenarki and Walker. What, that was hugely close. I mean, that could, that seems that it would be eligible for a recount. But I'm just saying, so what does that mean? Nobody's talking about all the base came out. I mean, as many Republicans as probably are in Georgia must have voted for him. The count was so high. There must, if there were 1.45 total, there must have been, you know, half of that or a little bit less than half were all the Republicans. So where are we going on that? Nobody's talking about what that means. I mean, they are slicing and dicing it in interesting ways and you are seeing some patterns and trends and everything. But nevertheless, that was way too close or comfort. And so when they called that, even with 99% of the vote in, I thought, wait a minute, this thing could turn like the worm. So I think he could pick up on a lot of this and do a Cary Lake thing and his own thing all over again because something is not being really examined here like it needs to be. So what do you, I'm interested to hear as a little talk about what that means to you all. I'm terribly afraid of it. And I think he'll use that.  Has it happened yet? I haven't seen that in a press. Let me just jump on that statement, Stephanie. Stephanie, you're right. It was too thin and I found the Democrats celebrating way too much. Because you looked at a quality candidate like Warnock to a horribly flawed candidate. And to your point, it was unbelievably close. It should not have been that close. It was 100,000 votes. No way should have been that close for a candidate of such horrible composition. And a candidate was a total insult to the black African-American community and 100,000 votes, really? And the Democrats are celebrating excessively? Come on. Really good points, Tim. Really, yes, go on. Because that is just a fluke election. You can't say, they can't take credit for any big advance in their work in his campaign. It's a fluke. It was even less than 100,000. Anyway, I'll be interested to see more discussion. The fact that there's been no talk about challenging it just yet. Has it been, I haven't heard anything about a challenge to that election? I think you have to be a lot closer in the votes. 100,000. And I think it is 100,000, Stephanie. I think I've read that somewhere. It's a percentage point, and that probably gets him over. That does it. I don't want to agree. I'd like to go to one other thing. It's my Charles Dickens question. You might have heard this question before. What is the ghost of Christmas future here? And let's assume, okay, that he's not kidding when he takes off after the Constitution. Let's assume that he's satisfied with the level of feedback and he starts conspiring with his old friends who are still all around him, mind you. The same people, same organizations, same level of dedication or more, now more sophisticated than they were in January 6th. And so he wants to start another January 6th. And we've already agreed it's not gonna look exactly the same, it'll be different. And likelihood is it'll be violent. And it'll be in wider around the country, not just at the Capitol. So let's assume he does that. Let's assume he grabs the headlines, grabs these extremists into his new base. And nobody stands against him. And he makes some traction. Let's assume that he is able to somehow get in power again, whether it be in the 2024 election or before. I know this is something that's hard to imagine right now and we don't wanna imagine it, but let's imagine it for this discussion. He gets back into power, okay? And he's gonna try to stay in power as long as possible. Sort of like Xi Jinping or Putin. And he's going to cut down on all kinds of civil rights right away. He's gonna play to his base. He's got a transactional thing with them where he's supposed to do certain stuff. And it's all bad, okay? So what is it gonna be like? In the New York times, there was a video article about a priest in a nowhere town in rural Russia who spoke to a community of a congregation or something like 10 people in this nowhere town and said he opposed the war, okay? And they came for him because he said that. And he wound up getting interrogated for hours and hours and hours. They wrote him up, they charged him, they organized a show trial for him. They defrocked him and now he's an unemployed priest.  So instead of 10 people, we got 100 million people around the world who heard about this priest. His name is Burdan, B-U-R-D-I-N. So what I'm saying is we have freedom of the press seems to be a low-hanging fruit target in this, you know, Charles Dickens scenario. But can you imagine what that scenario would be like to him if Donald Teflon Don gets back in there? Well, we've talked about it for six years, you know? Him in power, then out of power, back in power. And, you know, you framed this question by the Christmas of Christmas future, which I asked where I respond every time, in the same words of Ebenezer Scrooge, is this the future that may be or will be? And what may be is the scenario which you've just painted. He won't waste time filling the agencies of law enforcement, the DOJ, with lackeys, loyal lackeys that are more forthright in their loyalty to Donald Trump, certainly more than Bill Barr was. He won't waste time of trying to hamstring the media. He won't waste time trying to install, you know, thugs, his chosen thugs in the immigration and Homeland Security Department. These are very bleak things. That's why the DOJ, I hate to say it, and not to act in a political way, but to act within the guidelines of the rule of law needs to keep Donald Trump off balance. And certainly off balance enough that his chances of reelection are zero to nil. And that's gonna be only through, you know, earnest prosecution, and which always starts with an indictment, which I expect to happen in two weeks or less. Okay, but would an indictment stop him? It's the first footstep to prosecution. It will rattle his cage. It's never been done before. Yeah, well, we have Congress's report. We have the possibility of the indictment, say, within two weeks. It's gonna be Christmas cheer all around if all those things happen. On the other hand- December 24th would be great for me to see it. Yeah, yeah, I think that'd be good. It was. You know, it's an important holiday. Holiday of joy sort of thing. But Stephanie, you know, you were talking earlier about, you know, what he could do and how quickly he could set up some kind of distraction to distract us from the distraction that distracted us from the distraction before. Something that would change, you know, change the whole picture and change what people are thinking and saying and what the media is writing. And you said, you were talking about how long it would take him to do that. Well, let me ask you this, you know, if he knows or if he watches stink tech and he knows that something is gonna happen by Christmas, then he can do that by Christmas too. What are the chances that he will come up with some enormous play-grantee distraction before Christmas? Well, Jay, you're suggesting and insinuating that this man's following is serious. It's validated even in the last Georgia election. They're all there still for him. So I don't know what it is we're thinking is gonna happen, but that hasn't changed. And did he inspire the Germans? Is this an inspiration by Donald Trump? So can he plug in, as you say, or tends it internationally even, get the broader audience, the point you're making, he's got lots of pieces to plug into that.  Could he? I mean, it is just amazing. So if that's the kind of big, I mean, you're making a suggestion here about there's a lot of big more stuff he could do it and it could go international. And that is just horrifying. Your reference is the group in Germany that was arrested. On a January 6th, and look what they did. They went right out and got them. No, no, no, within the last couple of days. Yes. And we got all those French. Yeah, yeah. And then there's the whole French group that came that was standing around waiting for their election. So if you stop and think about this, it's another threat, it's another jeopardy that we could be in. And is Elon Musk gonna encourage that? I mean, if Elon Musk is gonna put him back on Twitter that's worldwide. I mean, so this is very frightening to stop and think about the Gantt chart going forward what could happen, Jack. What you're, you know, instilling. If he pulls off stunts like that that are even more threatening, even more illegal. This is an interesting question. Let's assume he does. Let's assume he pulls off another January 6th, okay? Judging from what we have learned from the way DOJ and Joe Biden work, what will be the government's response and how soon will the government be able to organize that response? Now granted, you know, he doesn't have any control over the police or the military or anything the way he did in January 6th. But I would be concerned that DOJ wouldn't move fast enough on it. And it would take the headlines without a count availing response from the administration. I'd be concerned about that. But you know, Jay, actually, don't we have more tools for international issues of terrorism? Maybe we have more tools there to actually bring to bear on it, which they say we have no tools domestically and how are we gonna get those inserted to handle domestic terrorism? I hope there's somebody out there thinking about these things, Stephanie, really. This is huge, yes. I mean, now that I'm thinking about it, it's really very frightening because there aren't groups, the groups are everywhere that would be responsive and may are influenced maybe by him. So, Tim, I would never disagree with Stephanie. Well, almost never. It's part advice.   What about some Democratic candidates? None of them rises to the level of DeSantis, simply in, you know, name recognition. But what about the Democrats? Where are they? What happened to them? Why can't they come on the stage also and feel the candidate who would be a credible, likely candidate in 2024? Why can't they do that? And for the lack of that, you know, what is the effect on this interim period? Well, gee, Jay, we need another show for me to criticize the Democrats. Let me just start with Meek, Timid. They can't stand on their hind legs. Let me just, you know, many adjectives I can go down the list with. They just don't know how to sing off the same song page and walk in unison like the Republicans do. And they just don't know how to do it. You got the Progressive Party that's always out there on a tree limb. You have the Bernie Sanders out there on a tree limb. They're not in lockstep. That's one reason. Two, it's just premature. We're only had two more years to go. So you've got at least another six to eight months before you start getting into those conversations. And we'll see if Iowa is the first primary over it's North Carolina. You know, South Carolina, excuse me. All right, we're running out of time. Let me go to you for final comments, Stephanie. And, you know, see what you think about the future. Let me frame it by saying, you know, Trump may be down and he has lost a certain amount of support. That's in the paper every day, but he is Teflon and he has a lot of tricks up his sleeve. And so he may be back. And I guess the question I would put to you was, you know, what was your frame of mind at this point? Are we at another damn inflection point? And where's the inflection going? Exactly, I'm scared myself to death on the international bigger picture scene where what Elon Musk opening up those resources to him and encouraging him and backing him. So, you know, I think all the points are well taken. He's got another, he's not going anywhere at this point. He's getting, as I said earlier, he's getting trust up on this loss in Georgia, but it's not so big a loss. And I think he's gonna rectify that view of people in the country to remind everybody how close it was. And then he's bringing out his minions, Kellyanne and there are many others. And maybe Fox is gonna get yanked back because Hannity was pretty going off the script there yesterday about changing the Republican stance on voting and mail-in voting and absentee ballots. And what did they also call this other thing, harvesting voting? He wants all of the Republicans to get on board with all of that. So we'll see if Fox is gonna go forward with that. But yeah, probably they're waiting to hear from him too because there's been a bit of a lull here.  Yeah, you know, and one thing we've talked about, always talked about with the factor into any look into Charles Ticken's future is it's very hard to predict with all of these variables, all these people, all these strange things happening on the horizon. It's very hard to get a handle. Very hard to look retrospectively from the future. And so, you know, whatever we say, it really depends on the right people waking up alive tomorrow morning and excluding any remarkable, you know, events that we simply, simply could never, well, not likely predict. So Tim, your final comments on all that? My final comments kind of goes back to the previous question about the Democrats. And I guess what's on my mind is for any Democrat leader that says, we like to see Donald Trump as the GOP nominee, that needs to stop because Donald Trump is wily. He's unpredictable. He could pull a rabbit out of the hat and he could be the next president again. So I'd like to hear any and all Democrats stop that kind of talk, saying that we'd like to see Trump as the nominee because we think we can beat him. I'd say you take this, the president, the former president needs to be taken off the stage and let him implode or let the DOJ do it from enforcing the rule of law. But let's not take the man for granted. Okay, you know, seems to me that there's going to be plenty of content for us to examine. Plenty of events, plenty of knock your socks off kinds of things happening in the year 2023, which is coming soon. We can predict some of it, we can connect the dots as it happens, but very hard to get a handle on it. Which means Tim and Stephanie, we have our work cut out for us. They're counting on us out there to continue to connect the dots and make sense of all this. And I think we're going to have more work doing that next year. So stay happy, stay healthy, stay on Think Tech and we'll see you next week. Tim Apachele, Stephanie Stoltzahl, thank you very much. Aloha.


Lecture 17. Assalamu Alaikum. Welcome to the Virgil University's course on business and technical communication. In today's lesson, we look at different types of letters. We will be looking at letters of inquiry, which is basically a letter when somebody is asking for specific information. In some cases, such as a request for promotional material, the recipient will have a clear interest in responding to your letter. In other cases, such as a request for specific information on a product, the recipient may or may not be as motivated to respond quickly. Consequently, always make the tone of the letter friendly and make it easy for the recipient to identify and provide the information you need. In some cases, if you are asking for information, the recipient will want to give you that information immediately. For example, if you are asking for promotional material or if you are asking for information about the company, the recipient will respond immediately. In some cases, the recipient may or may not be as motivated to respond quickly. So, whenever you write a letter of inquiry or a letter of inquiry, the recipient may or may not be as motivated to respond quickly. The letter of inquiry has a specific format. We looked at some formats in the previous lesson as well. In this lesson, we will look at particular formats specifically for letter of inquiries. In the first paragraph, you will identify yourself and, if appropriate, your position and your institution of firm. So, first of all, in a letter of inquiry, you will tell who you are and in what capacity you are writing this letter. If you belong to an institution or a company, then what is your role in that company or institution? In the second paragraph, you will briefly explain why you are writing the letter and how you will use the requested information. You will also offer to keep the response confidential if such an offer seems reasonable. If you feel that you will get information, then the person who is writing the letter wants to keep that information confidential. If you want to keep it secret, then you can offer to send this information to your own letter. If you send this information to me, then I will use it only for this particular purpose and I will keep it confidential if you want. If that information is such that the person who is writing the letter wants to keep it confidential, then you can offer to keep it confidential. It will be more comfortable to share that information with you. In your letter of inquiry, you will list the specific information you need so that the reader finds it easily. You can phrase your requests as questions or as a list of specific items of information. In other case, make each item clear and discrete, which means that each item should be listed independently and there should be no overlapping of items. So whatever it is that you are requesting, you can either ask that request as question form. You can say something like, may I have information about your institute? May I have information about the different products that you manufacture? Or you can put it as a list where you can say, please send me information about the following and then you can list the names of the products. But in either case, you will make sure that there is no overlapping between the different items that you are requesting. Also, you will try to conclude your letter by offering your reader some incentive for responding to you. If your reader knows that they have some benefit by responding to you, then they are more likely to respond to your request more promptly. So if the reader has any idea that they have some benefit, then they will respond more quickly. So you can tell them what their benefit is at the end of your letter. We are going to have a look at a letter of inquiry which is written by a computer programmer requesting specific information about an upcoming release of a software product. Now as you can see in this letter, there is a letter head which we talked about in the previous lesson. Then there is the date and the name of the person to whom the letter has been written which is the customer relations department in a software company. And the letter starts with their customer relations because there is no particular person, one person that the letter has been written to. Or at least the writer does not know the name of the person that he is writing to. So he has addressed it to the whole department. In the main body of the letter, the writer has introduced himself. He said I am a systems engineer at Arlington Heights Programming Associates and what he is doing. In the second paragraph he talks about what his team is working on and how they are going to use their product. In the third paragraph he says that he needs some information about the particular product that the company is producing. And he gives a list of the specific information that he needs. And then finally he ends by two sentences saying that he will be grateful if they could send the product and how he will be contacted and then the close. Note that he is also indicated who the matter of the sent to apart from this main, the primary addressee in the form of C.C. Mr. R. Williams. So obviously a copy of the letter is going to Mr. R. Williams as well although the letter is not addressed to Mr. R. Williams. So he will put a C.C. note as well. Now apart from letters of inquiry, in a business situation we would also be required to write technical information letters and memorandum. Technical information letters and memoranda are short documents that announce new technical information such as a software bug and its solution or a new feature for example. You will use the memorandum format if the information is being sent inside an organization and you will use the letter format if the document is to be sent out to individuals outside your organization. We have already talked about memorandums, short notes, short messages which are used within the organization. So if you are giving any technical information, if you want to share it with your own company then you will use the memorandum format. And if you are giving technical information to people outside your organization then you will use the letter format. We are going to have a look at an example which is adapted from a technical information memorandum written by information systems at MIT, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The document informs users of MIT's network of a change in the protocols of MIT's main world web app server that allows users to place shorter uniform resource locators or URLs as you would be more familiar with under www pages. Now as you can see in the main body of the letter or the memorandum there are three paragraphs. The first paragraph talks about what the URL is. The second paragraph talks about what it does and then the third paragraph talks about what MIT's information systems has come up with and it gives the web page as well. So as you saw a memorandum, a technical information memorandum or letter can be pretty long and it can give very detailed information. However as I said earlier according to the purpose and the type of audience that it's addressed to you will determine the format. The main structure within the body will remain the same, the information that goes out will be the same. But if it's to be sent to people inside your company then it will be in a memo form. If it's to be sent to people outside the company then it will be in a letter form where you will have the address of the person that is being sent to and your name, the date, the CC notations etc. And the memo format as we saw in an earlier lesson how the memos are addressed. Apart from these two types of letters in a work environment you will also be required to write references and letters of recommendations. You should follow standard procedures in obtaining references and use conventional formats in writing letters of recommendation. Now you can be in a position of either writing letters of recommendations for people or you might be in a position where you need to ask people to write a letter of recommendation for you. Where you need to obtain a reference for yourself. So you will be writing letters to people asking them to write a letter of reference or you will be giving out a letter of reference yourself. So depending on what position you are in or what situation you are in you will follow the formats. References are an essential component of almost all admissions grant employment processes. Wherever you apply, wherever people apply for admission for a grant to have the applications process they will need some form of reference. And you might need to, as I said earlier, you might need to acquire those references for yourself or you might be writing those references for other people. Managers and other individuals in any selection process need evaluation from individuals who have had long and close contact with applicants in order to assess accurately their abilities and accomplishments. Obviously someone can write a reference that has been contacted with those people and knows them very well. If I ask someone to write a reference then I can only ask them to write a reference that I am confident to know. Because we know them and we can give them some guarantees and we can tell them how they will be doing their job. Those people who don't know me can't give any reference about me. So when you ask for a reference then you only ask for people who know you very well in the work environment. And if you give a reference then you only give a reference for those people who know you very well and can confidently talk about them. Also you must keep in mind that the number of recommendations required by employers and universities usually ranges from one to five. Most commonly it's three. So most people require three recommendations, three references, but it can vary from anywhere from one reference to five references. The two basic forms of references, oral and written. That means a lot of people can give oral references. They can recommend a lot of people with written references. Most often oral references are conducted by telephone. A lot of the times people will just call up, pick up the telephone, call other people and ask for oral references. It's very rare that someone asks for a reference personally face to face. If you have applied for a reference then your prospective employer will take your reference on the telephone. For example, your previous employer will not physically go to him. So therefore the name, professional title and affiliation, the address and phone number of each referee is included in the list of references. Which is often mentioned in resumes and application letters. But it's always kept separate from them as well. It's not always a main part of application letters. There's a separate section which says who the referees are. For example, if there's an application form, there will be a separate section on it. In which the people who give the reference know the name, the telephone number etc. You can write the names of the referees later. So that the people who want to contact you can easily contact them via letter or telephone and take reference about you. So also you need to give your list of references to a potential employer or to a selection committee only when requested. If your selection committee or the employer does not ask for references from you, then you don't need to give a name to anyone for your references. You also need to keep in mind that the recommenders, the people who are giving the reference to you are doing your favour.  So if you subject them to too many intrusions, if you give out their name to too many prospective employers and they are constantly being hounded by people who want them to give reference for you, then you may find that they are not too willing to help you. So if you have a previous employer or teacher who is coming to you the next day to tell you how they are, how they will be doing their job, how they are students, how they work with you in the company, then eventually they will come to you and may be they won't give you that much of a reference. So think a lot and give the names of the people who will give your reference and when you understand it is important. Now coming to the other form of recommendation letters, the written references. These are more formal and often they are written to a specific individual for a specific position. So in this case you will ask your referee or the person who is writing your recommendation letter to write your letter and you will inform them what it is that you are applying for so that that letter can be specific to that position and can be addressed to a specific person or company. In other cases, letters of recommendation are written for a general type of job or for graduate school for example and are included in a collection of letters of recommendation called a dossier. What happens in this case is that you do not know where you will be applying. So you go to your previous employer or your previous teachers and you ask them for a general recommendation letter for education, for the education or you ask them for a general education letter for a general type of a job or job as a computer programmer for example. And in this case the heading will say to whom it may concern and the letter will be more general letter which will not name any specific company where you are applying and it will form a part of your collection of recommendation letters. This type of recommendation letter you can get from a variety of people and include with your application. Now when you are obtaining your letters of recommendation make your candidacy as strong as possible by carefully soliciting references and letters of recommendation. You need to be careful who you are asking to write your letter so that you are seen to be as strong a candidate as possible. Obviously you will get letters of recommendation from those people who think that they will give you strong recommendation letters. If you will ask from such people who may not have a good impression about you then it is better that you do not ask them for recommendation letters because the letter you are writing will be very vague or you may include some negative things about you. So it is better that they do not write anything about you. So you will ask only those people who will give you favorable letters and who know you very well and your impression is also positive. Because obviously after reading the recommendation letter the impression about you will be made by your employers. That is a recommendation that is extremely important in decisions to hire or admit an individual or to avoid a scholarship or a grant so you have to be very very careful who writes that letter for you and that you are sure that when they write that letter it will be a well written positive recommendation. So consequently be sure that you are spending enough time and effort to ensure that your letters of recommendation are effective.  You do not have to write the letter, you do not have to write the letter because the letter that you write will be written by the referee who has to give you recommendation. But you will have to spend time in such a way that you will have to go to him or request him to tell him where you are applying why you are doing it and why it is important that you get a good letter from him. So if you will make a time and effort then you will get a good letter. In some cases you list an individual as a reference and the organization or individual who is considering your application will contact that person. Often this will happen only if you have found a list for a position if they are very very sure that they want to have you then they will contact that person may be for an oral reference or in other situations they might ask for form a letter of recommendation from each of the person that you have named as a referee. So in either case you need to make sure that the people who will be giving out the reference actually know what you have applied for and remember you and I am in a position to give a positive reference for you. So if possible also a general guideline is that if possible you should ask one or two more persons than required to give you a reference because in case the person or the two people or three people you have named and you have said will be your referee are not available then you have somebody else who can give a reference as well. Also ask a range of persons who can testify to different abilities and accomplishments relevant to the position or award. Basically this means that if for example you have applied for a job which requires that you have specific skills for example as a computer operator or computer programmer then don't name people who can only satisfy to your computer programming abilities only give names of people who can certify to the different range of abilities that you have or name people who are name two or three different people who can certify to different types of abilities.  Try to give names of people who are named as references so that you can cover the different areas of your personality. Also if possible ask someone in person to write a recommendation or to be a reference go to them, talk to them and ask them directly if the individual is far away not accessible personally ask him or her by phone or through a written letter inform them personally don't send a message through people so make the effort to be as direct with them as possible so that they give you a positive reference letter generally unless you know the person extremely well do not ask someone to be a reference or to write a letter of recommendation through email because it just it shows it seems more careless it seems more casual in fact and if you know the person very well and you are on casual terms with that person then an email will suffice otherwise it may be something that will not be taken very seriously it may be something that the other person will not respond to very quickly so try that when you are asking for a letter of recommendation then go to them and talk to them request them or call them if they are far away try not to email them just email them in that situation if you are very informal with them also never list a person as a reference or as someone who will provide a letter of recommendation until the person is agreed to do so first of all we talked about taking a letter of reference to write a letter for you secondly we talked about that in your resume or letter of application you don't give anyone's name, address or phone number that you contact them they will give you a recommendation never list a person as a reference until the person is given a phone number first of all don't take permission from them you have not clarified that are they really ready to be your reference or not so make sure that whoever you are naming as a potential reference or recommender they know that you will be doing this and they agree also give each person serving as a reference or who is writing a letter of recommendation the following information you need to give them a description of the position or award that you are applying for number two give them a short statement of your professional goals longer than a one sentence career objective statement included as part of your resume you would have in the resume you would have that one sentence objective statement you need to give them a longer statement a longer statement of your professional goals it should be very long, should be short but longer than one sentence so that they know what it is that your objective is also give them a current resume which means that an updated CV number four give them a background material to refresh the recommender's memory of specific work you did including your letter of recommendation now for example if under this person you did some particular work name that give them the material background information about what it is that you have done what it is that they should remember you by so that in case they have forgotten it becomes clear for example if you are going to a principal or teacher of your college to take a letter of reference then you should give them a short objective statement in which they are applying so give them a little in writing what were the achievements in your college and what work did you do with them if for example you were active in your debates in the society's head then you should remind them that I did this work with you so that they can then mention that in the reference letter if they are able to mention about you then it seems more personal and it seems a more effective letter of recommendation rather than giving a vague letter saying yes he or she was a good student only generally people give more weight to recommendations that contain a waiver of your right to see the recommendation i.e. if your recommendation letter is and you say that I don't want to see it I will directly send a prospective employer so I will send it without seeing it so when your employers will consider it to be a more correct reference then the person who will know what you have seen may be your own and you may have told that it should be included so if it is a confidential reference then it is much better it is more effective however sometimes it may be prudent don't waive of the right to see it especially if you are unsure of your recommender's attitude towards you or of his or her writing ability so if you feel that when you are giving a reference they may not give a very positive reference or you feel that their writing ability is not so strong or the language is not well phrased then it is better to see it once if your employer is applying for your submission because if you feel that the reference is ineffective or unimpressive then you can choose not to give a reference to that person if it is a confidential reference then you don't know what your prospective employer is also remember that recommenders are busy people so ask a person to write the recommendation and give him all the necessary material at least 3 weeks before the recommendation is due because don't put people in a situation where you go to them or write them a letter saying I want a reference from you in 2 weeks because they might not write it because they won't have the time or if they write it it will be a very hurried reference maybe nowadays if you are writing a reference then you can change your name but it won't be personalized so at least 2-3 weeks is better for them so that they can write a proper reference and remember that you give as much time as you want so sometimes recommendations are sent to a central office such as a university career center and who then forwards the recommendations to specific individuals in these cases you may be able to ask someone in the office to review the recommendations on file and suggest which combination of recommendations you should use which present the best overall picture of your abilities and accomplishments for your job or your career objectives now this basically means that if you have collected a number of references many people have written references and if you are sending your application through or if someone has a central career placement or an office through which you are sending your application then it would be better to show 2-3 better references to choose which are better for that position you can reflect also if appropriate provide each recommender with all required recommendation forms there are many cases that you don't have open letter of reference but you have your own forms so make sure that all the references you are writing to them that you have completed all the parts of the form that you are required to fill out when there are reference forms there are some sections that you have to fill out and some sections that your referee has to fill out so when you give your referee the form then you have to fill out your own section also give them a sheet stating to home or where the recommendation should be sent if appropriate include an addressed and in some cases also the postage so that the referee does not have to pay for the postage and does not have to have the hassle of addressing the envelope to where the recommendation has to go one week before the recommendations are due tactfully ask each recommender if he or she has sent the recommendation as I said earlier give them 3 weeks to write the reference and one week before just remind them that they need to send it but don't remind them don't call them up and say have you sent it or not remind them and just ask very tactfully that the reference was due on a particular date and you hope that it has been sent and if not it is anything you can do to assist after the letter of recommendation has been sent or the references have been given write a short letter thanking the recommender this is important because it is somebody who has done your favor and you might even need to ask them to do this favor or similar favor again so it is important that you thank them and that you are courteous now the recommender has spent time helping you and such a recognition of his or her efforts not only is polite but also makes it easier for you to request further recommendations so that thank you letter is important and remember that you should keep all your references and letters of recommendations current in general written recommendations that are older than 3 or 4 years whole little wait so try to that your references are very recent, new because 3 or 4 old references have no importance when you have to write a letter of recommendation for yourself you need to make sure that you are providing relevant information and that you are presenting an individual truthfully and positively first we talked about when you have to write a letter of recommendation now we will talk about when you have to write a letter of recommendation for someone in this case you have to try whatever you say is true and for which you are writing reference if you think it is true if you can really say something positive then you can say positive negative things and try not to include and if you feel you don't have anything positive to say then you refuse to write that letter you say sorry write it from someone else in most cases agree to write a letter of recommendation only if you can honestly write a supportive letter there is no point in writing a negative letter of recommendation because that would be doing the person harm rather than any good then in that case it is better to decline the request ask as a recommender ask for a current resume and as complete description as possible of the position that the person is applying for assemble and review all the relevant information about the person you are recommending and try not to overlook important accomplishments because it is very easy to overlook important accomplishments if you are not very familiar with them so get all the necessary information from that person and try to make sure that you include all their important accomplishments in the letter as I said earlier represent the person truthfully but positively try not to paint a very unrealistic positive picture of the applicant because if it is a letter which is giving too much positive points which seem untruthful then it may not be counted it may be disregarded also if you are writing an untruthful letter of recommendation then you lose your credibility as a reference as a recommender for future candidates so make sure that you are focusing in positive but you are not focusing unrealistically on the positive you are not writing about things which are not true and avoid writing negative letters of recommendations is better not to write them as a as a referee you should try to tailor the recommendation that the person is applying for a letter for example recommending a person for a position as a camp counsellor should contain different information from that in a letter recommending a person or an individual for a job as a computer programmer one person can be who is applying for different jobs but the information that the person is recommending will be different for example if a camp counsellor is applying for a summer camp counselling job then when you are writing information for that job then you will write different recommendations whereas if the person is applying for a computer programmer then you will write different recommendations for him because then you will enhance his computer programming skills counselling job skills counselling skills his people skills will be highlighted when you actually get down to writing the letter by describing how you know the individual that you are recommending and the specific context upon which you are basing your evaluation in what situations have you known the individual for how long have you known him and how closely have you had contact with this person so the beginning should always be giving the background of your relationship with that person present the individual's general qualities relevant to the position along with one or two detailed examples including vivid detail will make the recommendation much more effective so instead of writing in just general terms give some vivid examples give some vivid detail highlight points that are that you have noticed in that person and that you feel will make the recommendation much more personal in the sense of it will let the reader know that you actually know this person well and that this recommendation has been written specifically for this particular person and it's not a recommendation that you use for all your ex-employees who come to you in most cases a letter of recommendation should consist of three or four paragraphs and should not be over one page in length because if it's a very long recommendation letter probably nobody will read it so it should be three or four consistent paragraphs which should be similar in length with the first paragraph talking about how you know that person and then subsequent one or two subsequent paragraphs talking about what you know about that person and then the final paragraph wishing that person in more detail about maybe his personal qualities and wishing that person well in the future so in this second lecture on letters we looked at letters of inquiry we talked about the different types of letters of inquiry and how different people can have subject reactions based on what type of inquiry it is we also looked at the format of inquiry letters where I told you that you need to identify yourself in the first paragraph and explain why you are writing in the second paragraph and how the information will be used and in the list the specific information you need and then conclude by offering your readers some incentive we also looked at a sample request letter inquiry letter secondly we looked at technical information letters and memoranda we talked about the fact that there are short documents and that if you are writing about technical information within a company you will use a memorandum format and if you are writing to people external to your company then you will use a letter format we also looked at an example of a technical information memorandum from written by the information systems at MIT the third type of letter that we looked at in this lesson was the letter of reference and letter of recommendation now in this we looked at it from two different aspects we looked at requests for letters of reference and what you should include what you should give the person who is going to be writing the letter of recommendation for you how you should request it whether you should be requesting the reference by telephone or email or letter or face to face depending on the context it was agreed that it is best to either to visit the person yourself or telephone or write a letter and it is least desirable to request for reference through email only do so when absolutely necessary we also talked about what needs to be included what information needs to be given to the person who is to be writing your reference and that included current resume brief information detail about what you have done what work you have done with that person name of the position that you are applying for the company that you are applying for and a short statement of objectives longer than what is included in your resume today we also talked about the etiquettes of how to request a reference and how not to infringe on your recommender's time how not to push them to give your reference too early or too soon and that you need to give them at least three weeks to write the reference for you so that they are able to actually write your good reference now on the other side of the coin was when you have to write a reference letter or a recommendation in this we looked at the different parameters that you will be looking at what is it that you need to know in order to write an effective reference for a previous student or an ex-employee also you need to remember if you cannot write something positive anything positive about a particular person then it is better to decline the request to write the reference there is no point in writing a negative reference for somebody it is better to say I am sorry I cannot write your reference instead of writing a bad reference for them ask that person to give you the list of accomplishments that they have achieved under you or with you so that you are able to refer to them also refer to key points about that person particular details particular examples so that the reference looks more personalized and it is actually more individual and the person who is reading the reference also realizes that you actually know the applicant well and that is why you are talking about them however you need to make sure that you are not writing untruthfully about a person if you are writing positively especially even if you are writing negatively which you shouldn't but if you are writing positively please stick to the truth please stick to the realistic truth and don't sugarcoat what you are writing for them because that will by doing that you will lose your credibility as a recommender and your reference will also seem untruthful so with this we come to the end of our sessions on writing letters until next time Allah Hafiz


So lately I've been giving a lot of thought to how so much dating advice, particularly for women, is centered around how women must change for men, how they must pretzel for men. In addition, there's a lot of rhetoric going out there that women act very entitled, they act superior to the senses that they don't look at themselves and where they're at in their life and they're seeking the highest quality type of man. You know, the best looking, the most successful and everything, and yet they don't show up with any of those traits or attributes of ambition or character, that sort of thing. So there's a lot of rhetoric going on around there about that. And while there might be some truth to all of this, there might be some truth to all of this. I also think for those of us in midlife, and that's the category or that's the demographic I speak to, I think it's a completely different ballgame when it comes to relationships. But this is partly because roughly 75% of singles who are in the dating marketplace over 45 years old are divorced. And so it's not that women must change for men and show up a different way. I believe men must also contribute to the process of being relationship ready. So today I thought I'd lean into the conversation and why what isn't happening, what should happening and all that good stuff related to respect and commitment. Because ultimately, I believe what's the point of dating, what's the point of dating someone if there isn't the idea of this being something more substantial. That's right. That's where my, that's my philosophy. That's the point of investing time with someone if it isn't going to be substantial. Now I recognize and when I say substantial, I mean real serious commitment. Because ultimately, when you think about it, can a man be in a committed relationship with someone he doesn't respect, can they respect someone and not be in a committed relationship. Let's explore that for a little bit because today we're seeing so much casual relationships more so than committed relationships. We see way more situationships than we see fully committed relationship. We see way more friends with benefits than we see fully committed relationships. We see way more cyber relationships than we see fully committed relationships. And I believe when a man genuinely respects a woman and desires commitment, desires that sense of fully committed, it's usually a reflection of feeling a deep level of respect for this person. So why isn't this happening? Why isn't this happening? Well, folks, I think it's time to wake up to the understanding that human beings desire companionship, desire connection, they desire sex. And they can get all that without any level of commitment about that. You can get companionship, connection and sex without much of a level of commitment. You might have a agreement to be monogamous and exclusive. I was going to say that you might even get a promise of monogamy and exclusivity. And yet oftentimes those are hollow words, especially today when people can easily replace a person through our devices, through our devices, think about that. This didn't used to be the way 50 years ago, you couldn't just say, oh, I'm unhappy in this relationship, I'll just easily replace someone. You know, when we have this level of belief that we can just easily replace someone, that's not showing a level of respect for that person. That's not showing a level of care for that person. That's not showing a level of genuine desire to explore a fully committed relationship. Think about that. The desire to explore a fully committed relationship. What does that look like? What does that look like? How do we get to being a stranger to a relationship that's fully thriving? So that's a question I've been pondering lately. And I've come up with my formula, and by the way, this is not what I'm about to share is just my experiences by reading so many different books and such. But this is critically important for understanding where respect and commitment comes from. And I call it the four stages of a relationship readiness. And while this is an order, I think it's important to understand why this order makes sense. So number one is to be your best self, to be your best self. I think to be your best self includes mind, body, spirit, and emotions. And to be our best selves, I think it's important to recognize that most of us have suffered childhood wounds and traumas as well as adult traumas that can affect our relationship readiness. It can affect our emotional maturity. It can affect our relationship skills. And this is why I continually recommend human beings investing in some personal development work. This is why I continually recommend the book, The Hoffman Process. This is a deep dive into healing childhood wounds and traumas and adult traumas that makes it difficult to actually be emotionally ready for a relationship. In addition, physical health, I think that's an important component to actually invest in your physical health. Your self care, meaning taking good care of your body, exercising, eating better because especially for those of us in midlife, many I've heard from women, particularly, I don't want to be a nurse or a purse to someone. Well, man doesn't want to do the same for you. So I think human beings, this isn't gender specific. Should be in a state of doing some work to prepare themselves to be in a relationship. Now, the second piece is what I teach in my private coaching is helping understand who's truly compatible with you because in a sea of meeting strangers, we can't make assumptions that someone is compatible with us. And I'm going to tell you something. Women go through my private coaching program and they all say, Jonathan, I know what I want. I know what I want. I know what I want in a relationship. And they go through this proprietary program. You know what happens? They say to me, wow, I didn't know what I wanted.  Going back to that piece I talked about before. And one of the things I teach in my private coaching is learning which questions to ask based on your personality to determine if is this person right for me? That's the second piece. The third piece is meeting people, being yourself out there, learning good flirting skills. You know, we human beings operate from this assumption, especially women. I'll be candid with you. Many of you operate from the assumption that it should just be easy. That you should be able to snap your fingers and the perfect person will just show up without any effort of work. And let me tell you something, in a sea of strangers, it's going to require putting a lot more effort and work into the process. And like this coffee mug says, I don't want to work anymore. I want to just be put up on it. I just want to be cherished, put up on a pedestal and taken care of. Many operate from that perspective. And let me just say this, finding a mate, finding a life partner, someone that's going to hold hands with you and go the distance is going to require effort on your part. And I'm sorry to say you should treat it like a part-time job, not cavalier in this process. And the job is to be relationship ready. And by putting yourself out there and learning skills to actually the skills to communicate with someone, many of you operate from a fantasy that you're good at communication. And I've often said just because women can vomit their feelings doesn't necessarily mean that they're good at articulating their feelings. The fourth and most important piece once you've met someone is how to make this relationship thrive. Because respect comes from understanding how relationships work. And this is true for men and women alike. And by the way, it only takes one person to initiate the lead in this. So I want to share with you some notes I made in this regard. And this starts from the first date all the way through being fully committed, whether you're living together or married to make the relationship thrive. You're going to have to have regular, intimate time together, intimate physical time together. Many of you who are in long distance relationships have an intimate relationship with your telephones. And not the actual person. It's going to require face to face intimate time. In addition, it's going to require having good conflict resolution skills. Every relationships have some differences. And without good conflict resolution skills, this is one of the critical pieces to gain respect for another human being is do they have a capacity to listen to what I have to say? Do they validate what I've said? And do they acknowledge that what I've said might be true for me? Might be true for me. And by the way, both parties doing this. Number three, share duties in the relationship. You know, whether it's my mom and dad, my dad paid the bills, my mom took care of the home, but having a healthy relationship has an understanding that there are duties involved in the relationship. And you each share in their duties. Folks, you guys are operating, many of you operating from this naive place and not really seeing the big picture of how a relationship works. Share duties is one of them. Number two, play in flirting, play flirting romance with one another. This is critically important to make a relationship thrive. And this is going to gain respect for one another when you're operating from this play and flirting. Why is it going to gain respect because it's going to build a bond of greater friendship with one another and let's face it, most of us respect our friends. Otherwise, they wouldn't be in our lives. And the fifth piece that I share is integration into your each other's lives. That's why cyber relationships don't work very long because there's little or no integration of family and friends and work life. Because here's the thing, when I came up with the title, I said to myself, what is it that makes a man respect you? First, he has to be in the capacity, your backtrack to respect and commit to you, respect and commit to you. He has to be in a capacity to respect himself and be in a capacity to want commitment. He has to want commitment and be capable of commitment. So here's the deal, folks. If he's going through a contentious divorce, if he has issues at work, if he's if he's got physical ailments, the ground underneath him might not feel solid to actually invest in a fully committed relationship. He may not be capable of one. OK, so that has to be there. His life has to be in order just like your life has to be in order. Because ultimately, for a man to go that level of commitment and respect, he has to feel this one emotion. It's not an emotion, a desire, I should say. And that's the desire of I want to take care of you. I want to take care of you because when you think of the words, I love you. How many people say the words I love you? By the way, you might have known each other two months and two people might say, I love you. But don't you think I love you means I'm here. You matter. We are important. I've got your back. I'm not going anywhere and I only want you. And that comes from monogamy, commitment, trust and loyalty. That's the only way this is going to go the distance for a man to want to take care of. There has to be that monogamy. There has to be that commitment to wanting to do something greater than just casual dating. There has to be that level of trust, meaning it's not just about fidelity. It's about your feelings matter to me as much as my feelings matter to you. And that loyalty piece is saying, I want to take care of you. It doesn't have to be taking care of someone financially per se, but better folks, think about wedding vows, rich or poor, sickness and health. It means I'm going to be there for you in not just the good times, but also the tough times. This isn't going to happen unless there's real, honest communication with one another, real, honest communication with one another. This is why, listen, there's a picture of my beloved nine on our third date and for three days straight, we laid our cards on the table. We operated from a place of radical honesty. And you know what I respect right in that moment? I respected her because she operated from what I believe was a place of transparency. She shared things with me that she didn't have to share with me. She shared things with me. She didn't have to share with me. And I thought to myself, wow, I respect this person. And I believe I did the same. Transparency is critically key. Vulnerability, authenticity and transparency. Look, I know you can follow the dating rhetoric and it's all about attraction and how to make someone attracted to you. So you get to the stage of having sex together. I get it. A lot of rhetoric is out there. But how much of that rhetoric is looking beyond the sex piece? How much of that rhetoric is looking to form a fully committed relationship? A lot of that rhetoric makes a lot of assumptions that men are just so chivalrous and they're going to take care of you. Like really, well, we know that's not true. Why is the divorce rate 50% for first marriages and 65% and 70% for second and third marriages? Obviously there isn't that level of monogamy, commitment, trust and loyalty. So how do we build those? Well, folks, this is why I say continually. It takes on average spending three or four days and nights a week together doing shared activities, hobbies, mutual interests, spending time with family and friends, traveling together, teamwork, building skills both in your personal and your professional life, intimacy, both physical and emotional intimacy. That's how you build the deep roots of trust by doing things together and developing the most important piece for respect. And that's ultimately, have you built a friendship with one another? Have you built a friendship with one another? Stop operating from a naive place and start being in charge of your relationship, Destiny. Folks, I continually recommend the book. Why men love bitches? Why?  Yes, this starts from an empowerment place. You are empowered to make your choices as much as you want men to lead the process. I'm here to say you are in charge of your relationship, Destiny, not the guy. And to go back to the beginning, let me just say, if you're not in a place where you genuinely love yourself, genuinely love yourself, this is why I wrote my book.  A journey of personal development, self help and spiritual work. Why?  And when you can operate from a more intuitive place that you are, who are, as I teach in my private coaching, who are really the relationship ready men versus those men that want companionship, connection and sex without any direction. I call those guys the spenders. They'll spend time with you. When you can stand in your power and say, I don't want this in your life and you start with the standard you want, you will gain a man's respect who's capable of respecting you because he respects himself. Is this sinking in? Is this resonating with you? Please let me know. Please share something so I know this is actually, this is landing on you. I'd like to hear your thoughts on this. Wouldn't it be great if this was easy? Yeah, it'd be great if it was easy. I also believe there's a reason why it's hard work. Because you know what? The fruits of that hard work done in advance will lead to success. For many of you, and let me just say this, good men do exist out there. They really do exist. When you are in that best you, as I started before, and you can learn how to ask better questions and you actually put yourself out there. And then now you have the tools or at least the blueprint of how to make a relationship work. You have a greater chance for success than most everybody is. Winging it, winging it. All right. I think I've pontificated enough for today. We've got to see this beautiful sunrise. I hope you appreciated that. I thought it was fun watching it on my screen. I do enjoy these morning videos having coffee with you all. If I'm making a difference for you, go to the description below. Check out my links to a free discovery call with me to see if working with a coach is right for you. If you can't afford coaching, check out my private group where you can access to me on a regular basis. Check out my book recommendations. Check me out on Instagram. And also below is the dating vows. Read those. It's in the description in the show notes. All right. I think this will be a great place to wrap up today. First off, I'm going to give myself a big, gigantic Jonathan Barrett of self love. I'm going to reach into the camera and give you a hug of love if that's okay. I'm asking you to turn to someone. I've had a teddy bear pillow and give it or them a hug of love because hugs are a great source of love. And let's face it. We could all use more love in our lives right now. Thanks a bunch. Bye now. Bye-bye.