Task 2.1 Speech Analysis: Boris Johnson’s Speech in Greenwich
In his February 2020 Greenwich speech, then Prime Minister Boris Johnson set out his vision of a free trading Global Britain after Brexit.
The speech:
“This painting above you was started in 1707, the very year when the union with Scotland was agreed – and does it not speak of supreme national self-confidence? Look at these well-fed nymphs and cupids and what have you. They are not just celebrating the Triumph of Liberty and Peace over Tyranny – the official title of the scene.
This is the settlement of a long and divisive political question about who gets to sit on the throne of England. And it is visibly resolved as you can see in favour of William and Mary and the result is stability and certainty and optimism and an explosion of global trade propelled by new maritime technology.
And above and around us you can see the anchors, cables, rudders, sails, oars, ensigns, powder barrels, sextants, the compasses and the grappling irons. In fact, the only important bit of kit that is missing is Harrison’s Sea Clock – also exhibited close-by here in Greenwich, and also commissioned in the same era that allowed every ship in the world to determine how far they were from this Meridian. So, this is it. This is the newly forged United Kingdom on the slipway: this is the moment when it all took off. […]
We are re-emerging after decades of hibernation as a campaigner for global free trade. And frankly it is not a moment too soon because the argument for this fundamental liberty is now not being made. We in the global community are in danger of forgetting the key insight of those great Scottish thinkers, the invisible hand of Adam Smith, and of course David Ricardo’s more subtle but indispensable principle of comparative advantage, which teaches that if countries learn to specialise and exchange then overall wealth will increase and productivity will increase, leading Cobden to conclude that free trade is God’s diplomacy – the only certain way of uniting people in the bonds of peace since the more freely goods cross borders the less likely it is that troops will ever cross borders. And since these notions were born here in this country, it has been free trade that has done more than any other single economic idea to raise billions out of poverty and incredibly fast. […]
We are embarked now on a great voyage, a project that no one thought in the international community that this country would have the guts to undertake, but if we are brave and if we truly commit to the logic of our mission - open, outward-looking - generous, welcoming, engaged with the world championing global free trade now when global free trade needs a global champion. I believe we can make a huge success of this venture, for Britain, for our European friends, and for the world.”
Source: Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Speech in Greenwich, February 3, 2020. Excerpts.
Task 2.2 Poetry Analysis: “Rule Britannia”
Rule, Britannia (James Thomson, 1740)
When Britain first, at Heaven's command
Arose from out the azure main;
This was the charter of the land,
And guardian angels sung this strain:
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
The nations, not so blest as thee,
Must, in their turns, to tyrants fall;
While thou shalt flourish great and free,
The dread and envy of them all.
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
Still more majestic shalt thou rise,
More dreadful, from each foreign stroke;
As the loud blast that tears the skies,
Serves but to root thy native oak.
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame:
All their attempts to bend thee down,
Will but arouse thy generous flame;
But work their woe, and thy renown.
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
To thee belongs the rural reign;
Thy cities shall with commerce shine:
All thine shall be the subject main,
And every shore it circles thine.
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
The Muses, still with freedom found,
Shall to thy happy coast repair;
Blest Isle! With matchless beauty crown'd,
And manly hearts to guard the fair.
"Rule, Britannia! rule the waves:
"Britons never will be slaves."
