analytical essay vce

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Language Analysis: The Perfect Essay Structure

Thursday 12th, May 2016

Lauren White

Language Analysis. It’s a third of the exam, and it’s one of the hardest parts of the VCE English course to master. Many schools complete their Language Analysis SAC early in the year, which means you’ll have months between your school assessment and the end-of-year task. Unfortunately, if you don’t keep up your skills in the meantime, it’s all too easy to fall behind and end up heading into October like “wait… what’s a language analysis and how do I do one!?”

(Sneaky plug for our L.A. Club if you’re looking for some valuable practice & feedback!)

What’s worse is that the kind of material you’re dealing with in your SACs probably won’t be very similar to what’s on the exam.  AND the advice you get from your teachers may not align with what the assessors expect of you.

So how can you write an objectively safe, ridiculously impressive, kick-ass 10/10 piece at the end of the year?

Well, let’s first look at what the task involves.  (NOTE: we’re mainly going to be focussing on Language Analysis in the exam as opposed to your SAC. Check with your teacher if you’re looking for an idea essay structure for your in-school assessment. This guide is to help you prepare for the big end-of-year task!)

What’s the point of a Language Analysis?

Luckily, there’s a pretty big clue on the Section C page of the exam. And by ‘clue,’ I mean VCAA have straight up told you what they’re looking for.

How is language used to persuade the audience?

That is what your whole piece should be geared towards. Not how many techniques you can find. Not how many quotes you can cram into your paragraphs. Not how many synonyms for the word ‘contends’ you can use. So long as your essays are addressing that core question, everything else is secondary.

However, there are different sub-criteria you’re expected to address, and those aren’t stated quite so clearly.

For one, you are required to  unpack the persuasive devices and the  language features in the material. You need to strike a  balance between the different types of material you’re given. You need to talk about the way these techniques  affect the audience and why the author would want them to think/feel/believe something. And you should also endeavour to discuss  tone (or tonal shifts), connections between written and visual material, and  the connotations of words and phrases.

For more on the different requirements in Language Analysis, scroll down to the end of this article for a complete checklist!

Introductions

Any introduction you write is going to be pretty important. In Language Analysis, your intro isn’t technically  worth any marks, but it is your chance to make a good first impression on your assessor! If your introduction is a rambly mess and takes three quarters of a page to express a whole bunch of useless information, then the person marking your work isn’t going to be too thrilled with you. Or, if you’ve misunderstood the author’s contention from the outset, you’re going to find it harder to recover later.

Compare this with an intro that’s clear, concise, and not bogged down by any unnecessary repetition.  Obviously  this neat intro is going to be a much better starting point.

Good Language Analysis introductions will usually be pretty straightforward. The most important thing is that you  outline the contention of the main written piece(s).

Generally, you should also touch on the background information and the ‘spark’ that prompted this author to respond to an issue, though this is more optional and shouldn’t take more than a sentence or two. From there, you can outline the main contention, as well as the arguments of any accompanying written or visual material.

Note that if you get multiple written pieces, you don’t have to go through  every single contention.  So if you were given, say, three comments along with a blog post, explaining the contentions of each of those comments wouldn’t be necessary. In those circumstances, it’s enough to just go through the contention of the main piece and then mention that ‘this piece was also accompanied by a variety of comments spanning different views from members of the public.’ Then, when you have to analyse these comments in your body paragraphs, you can just give a quick run-down of those contentions where necessary.

Consider the following introduction for the 2015 VCAA exam:

SAMPLE LANGUAGE ANALYSIS INTRODUCTION

At the 2015 ceremony for the recognition of Australian volunteer organisations, the CEO of bigsplash, Stephanie Bennett, gave a speech celebrating the altruism of volunteers and extolling the good they do for their communities, and society as a whole. The speech which was later televised addressed the groups of volunteers who were present and praised them for their selfless acts of generosity. ‘bigsplash’ also bestowed an award upon a group called ‘Tradespeople Without Borders,’ and their spokesperson Mathew Nguyen was invited to give an acceptance speech. In it, he contended that volunteering should be thought of as its own reward, and that although the praise was welcome, it shouldn’t be an expected part of the volunteering process. Both of these speeches were also accompanied by various visual aids.

Notice that this intro has focused more so on the contentions of the two written pieces and has only really addressed the visuals in that final sentence? That’s because, for this exam, the written content was way more dominant. It wouldn’t’ve hurt to briefly summarise what the visuals were, but in the interests of keeping the intro  short and sweet, we can just leave them till later.

Body Paragraphs

Now onto the  important parts of your Language Analysis essay – body paragraphs! This is where the vast majority of your marks are decided, and no matter how delightful your intros and conclusions are, the body paragraphs are your biggest priorities. Solid language analysis abilities are the strength of any Section C piece, so it’s crucial that you know how to conduct  detailed and efficient analysis.

There are many different ways to analyse the material, and it will depend on the kind of content you get given in the exam. But the way you format your analysis is also a pretty significant factor.

The most common strategy is to structure things chronologically (meaning you just start analysing the beginning of the material and go on till you get to the end and run out of stuff to say). The advantage here is that this method is pretty straightforward, and won’t require a whole lot of planning. You can essentially just read through the material once or twice and begin analysing straight away. But the disadvantage is that there’s a chance your essay could become really imbalanced. If the author’s arguments are all over the place, and you end up repeating yourself and jumping around unnecessarily, you could potentially lose marks for lacking cohesiveness.

Other methods involve structuring by  techniques, which is even riskier since it’s highly unlikely that you’ll be able to find a neat way to divide the material up into three or four paragraphs based on the language devices they employ. And if you just turn your ‘essay’ into a collection of disconnected paragraphs focussing on a heap of different techniques, you’ll definitely struggle to earn credit for your overall structuring of the material.

What I would recommend instead is that you structure your essay by  arguments  (or, more accurately, sub-arguments ).

How do you do that?

Well, if an author is trying to convince you that their contention was right, then they’d also be trying to convince you of various other supporting points.

For instance, if I were trying to persuade you to move to New Zealand, then it would make sense that I’d also want you to believe that:

– New Zealand is more livable than Australia.

– New Zealand has a strong economy and job prospects.

– New Zealand people are nicer and better looking.

…and so on. Whereas, if I were trying to persuade you NOT to move to New Zealand, then I’d be claiming that

– New Zealand is way less livable than Australia.

– New Zealand’s economy is dead and no one can find employment.

– New Zealand people are all cruel and ugly.

From this, we can conclude that  the sub-arguments are supporting the overall contention. Because if I were instead trying to argue that you SHOULD move to New Zealand, but I was saying that their economy was dead and that everyone who lived there was hideous, that wouldn’t help strengthen my argument.

So if you were to conduct a Language Analysis based on my argument, you might break things down into:

Paragraph 1: the livability of New Zealand

Paragraph 2: the strength of the New Zealand economy, and the potential job prospects

Paragraph 3: the appeal of New Zealand people

Then, in each of these paragraphs, you would discuss  how language is used to persuade readers of these sub-arguments.  And at the end of each paragraph, you can link these sub-arguments to the overall contention of the author. So you’d begin by outlining what the sub-argument is, and what the author is suggesting. Then, you’d analyse evidence from the material to demonstrate this. Finally, you can explain  why this sub-argument is supporting the author’s broader intention.

This will neatly get around the problem of needing to jump around the articles (since you’re grouping by ideas/arguments rather than going through it all line by line,) and it will usually make for a much clearer and more even dissection of the material. It’s reasonably quick, it’s easy to master, and it’s probably the most sophisticated way to format your analysis, so I’d definitely recommend this as your first resort.

That is, unless you get a comparative piece…

OMG COMPARATIVE LANGUAGE ANALYSIS WTF!?

Yep. Comparative tasks are not only very possible (as the 2011, 2014, and 2015 exams show,) but it’s also quite likely that you’ll have to deal with them this year. There’s no telling what VCAA will throw at you though. Maybe it’ll just be a single written piece with a couple of visuals (à la   2008-2013), maybe it’ll be one main piece with a comment or response (like in 2014 and 2015), or maybe it’ll be some kind of horrifically difficult task with half a dozen different written pieces (*cough 2011 cough*). Likewise, we don’t know whether there’ll be an opinion piece, a speech, a blog post, or something we haven’t seen before. Everything’s a mystery until 9:00am October 26th when about 50,000 kids turn to Section C.

But the fact that you don’t know precisely what kind of material is going to come up doesn’t mean it’s impossible to prepare yourself.

After all, you don’t know which exact numbers are going to be on your Maths exams ahead of time, do you?

Whilst you may not be able to predict what the exam material will look like, there are a couple of things we can safely assume.

1. There’ll be two pages worth of content to analyse.

2. There will DEFINITELY be both written and visual material.

3. Supplementary visual material (e.g. a slideshow presentation or an embedded visual) usually has the same contention as the piece it accompanies.

4. The material will be based on the same subject matter, even if the contentions of written pieces differ.

But guess what? Our sub-argument approach from above still works for comparative material!

All you have to do is  find sub-arguments that are present in different written pieces. Let’s take that New Zealand example from above, and assume that you were given two pieces on the exam. The first one argues that you  should move to New Zealand for those reasons we outlined. But the second piece suggests that you  shouldn’t move.

Your essay will consist of three paragraphs (if you’ve found three key ideas you believe to be important) and each one will focus on the same sub-arguments as before:

Paragraph 1: the livability of New Zealand.

Paragraph 2: the strength of the New Zealand economy, and the potential job prospects.

Paragraph 3: the appeal of New Zealand people.

But this time, you will spend time on both pieces within the same paragraph.

For instance, in your first paragraph, you would discuss how the first author depicts New Zealand as a wonderful island paradise. Then (using a linking phrase like ‘by contrast’ or ‘on the other hand,’) you’ll bring up the second author and discuss how they instead draw attention to how New Zealand is a nightmarish hellscape full of blood and gore and death, and no one would  ever  want to live there!

*Disclaimer: I have never been to New Zealand.

Point being:  your body paragraph contrasts the authors’ approaches, thereby ensuring you don’t have to do a clunky ‘comparison’ paragraph at the end.

Note that you DON’T have to mention every single article in every single paragraph of your Language Analysis piece. If you were given something like the 2015 exam, you might have:

Paragraph 1: the main speech + the first visual.

Paragraph 2: the main speech + the secondary speech.

Paragraph 3: the secondary speech + the second visual.

There’s no one correct structure; it’s all dependent on what YOU think is important.

By way of example, here’s a body paragraph for the 2015 exam that looks at the main speech, and the secondary one, looking at the way the two speakers position the award:

SAMPLE LANGUAGE ANALYSIS BODY PARAGRAPH

Bennett likewise lauds the role of the Volunteers Award as an important and necessary gesture of recognition. From the outset, she proclaims that it is her “great privilege” to present the ceremony, which aggrandises the award by implying that it is an honour to present, let alone to receive. She also clearly elucidates bigsplash’s intentions by directly stating that their “corporate ethos” has prompted them to try and “address [the] lack of acknowledgement” granted to volunteers. Hence, she engenders the audience’s respect for the organisation in order to solidify the award as being the product of a benevolent institution. This can also be seen in her use of definitive and pithy language in calling for the audience to “never forget or overlook” volunteers since “bigsplash certainly does not.” By contrasting words like “forget” and “overlook” and their connotations of neglect and disregard with the comparatively kind and fair ethos of ‘bigsplash,’ Bennett positions the award as something that corrects this injustice. And since she explicitly characterises the award as being “from bigsplash,” she is therefore highlighting the company’s social conscience and goodwill. Contrarily, although Nguyen in his acceptance speech does recognise the importance of the award, he instead sees it as an incidental part of volunteering rather than an integral force to redress the balance of acknowledgement. His colloquial opening of “thanks heaps” and “cheers” stands in contrast to Bennett’s formality, and instead creates a sense of casual humility as opposed to ceremonious grandeur. Nguyen also declares that the “pleasure” achieved through “seeing things improve for people” is in fact “better than [the] award” with the comparative word “better” eliciting a comparison in the audience’s minds in which volunteering is more beneficial and rewarding than receiving a formal commendation. Thus, Nguyen’s speech infers that volunteers should derive fulfilment by observing the positive consequences of their actions, and that bigsplash’s award is a welcome, but ultimately inessential part of their intentions.

See how that transition sentence made the connection between these two pieces nice and clear?  This is all the comparison you need! So don’t waste a whole paragraph going back and forth between different parts of the material. Just find a point of similarity or difference between them, and do a quick and simple transition within one of your body paragraphs.

Conclusions

Finally, there’s the conclusion of your Language Analysis essay. Much like the intro, it is a structural requirement meaning you should write one if you don’t want to lose marks. However, there’s not a lot at stake here. Provided you can wrap things up nicely and make a good final impression, you should be fine.

If possible, try and say something about how language has been used overall, or comment on a major appeal or big technique that the author uses. Otherwise, just build your way back out to the overall contentions, and make a brief statement or two about how the author wants the audience to respond. Don’t do any new analysis, and try not to just list various devices you’ve found. Instead, focus on the broad intentions of the author, and the way they are positioning the audience.

Here’s a sample conclusion based on the 2015 exam that deals with both written pieces:

SAMPLE LANGUAGE ANALYSIS CONCLUSION

By implying that volunteering should be done without expecting gratitude, Nguyen’s speech encourages the audience to consider acts of charity as being more rewarding than commendation. By contrast, Bennett suggests that bigsplash and their award is a potent symbol of the need to recognise and reward those who contribute to the community. Thus, whilst both speakers concur that volunteering is an admirable and selfless act, Bennett seeks to elicit the audience’s approval for bigsplash’s generosity towards the volunteers whose work goes unnoticed, while Nguyen instead encourages the audience to view volunteering as a philanthropic act that doesn’t necessarily require acknowledgement to be worthwhile.

Language Analysis Checklist

Length and coverage.

• Is the piece an appropriate length given the task material? • Does the spread of the analysis reflect the spread of the material? • Is the analysis balanced across the written and/or visual pieces with an appropriate amount of explanation for each? • Does the piece appear to have covered the most important facets or ‘gist’ of the material? • Does the piece take into consideration any relevant background information or structural features (e.g. it being a blog, speech, magazine interview, etc.)? • Has the piece avoided summarising the material, or evaluating it by casting judgement on the effectiveness of the persuasion or providing their opinion on the issue?

• Does the piece adopt a structure that is suitable to the task? • Are the paragraphs (if multiple) roughly even and balanced in terms of what they’re covering? • Does the piece begin and conclude in an appropriate way?

• Is the contention articulated in this piece accurate, and well-explained? • Has this piece expressed a comprehensive understanding of the overarching argument and sub-arguments? • Does the analysis in this piece help support the contention that has been identified?

Quality of Analysis

• Does this piece justify itself in terms of how language is used to persuade? • Does it use a method of analysis that maximises efficiency? • Does this piece examine persuasive language and explain how it is persuasive? • Are there a few examples of close connotative analysis, and has this piece taken the appropriate opportunities to explore this language? • Does this piece have sufficient explanations as to how the audience are made to think, feel, or believe? • Is the piece accurate in its assessment of the audience’s response and the author’s intention? • Do the points raised in this analysis culminate in a discussion of why the author has made certain choices in order to get their argument across?

Topic Sentences

• Does the piece have effective topic sentences that make the initial focus clear? • Are the topic sentences precise and well-worded? • Has the student avoided jumping into close analysis too soon? • Do the topic sentences outline a concept specific to the material as opposed to a very general concern relating to the issue instead of the material?

• Have the quotes been well-integrated, and do they fit the grammar of the sentences they’re in? • Has the student modified quotes with [square brackets] and ellipsis […] where appropriate? • Are the quotes the right length, and has the student selected the most relevant language to include as opposed to inserting a whole chunk of the piece in their own work? • Do the quotes support the analysis being conducted? • Does the piece use a sufficiently varied amount of evidence and avoid using the same language multiple times, where possible?

• Has the piece made succinct and obvious connections between different points of analysis? • Does the piece have a sense of flow in the way it transitions both within and between paragraphs?

Techniques and Metalanguage

• Has this piece correctly identified a variety of important rhetorical and persuasive devices? • Are these devices linked to an appropriate quote or example to demonstrate their application? • Does this piece use the correct metalanguage when commenting on language, tone, and argument?

• Does the analysis comment on any overarching tones in the material? • Does the analysis comment on any distinctive tonal shifts in the material? • Is this discussion on tone supported by quotes/evidence?

Visual Analysis

• Does the piece choose an appropriate moment to comment on the visual? • Has the piece correctly identified the contention of the visual, or, at least, has the piece conducted sufficient justification for its interpretation of the visual? • Does the piece use metalanguage to describe the visual features and explain how and why they persuade? • Has the piece made effective connections between the written and visual material (where applicable)?

Comparative Analysis

• Is the wording and syntax of this piece clear and concise? • Are the sentences an appropriate length with the right amount of information packaged into each one? • Does the piece flow effectively from one piece of analysis to the next, successfully avoiding the trap of feeling like a string of unconnected bits and pieces based on annotations? • Does the expression and grammar do justice to the quality of the analysis?

If you have any Language Analysis questions, feel free to drop them below. Alternatively, our English Q and A thread is always at your service!

How should I approach writing an introduction for my Language Analysis essay?

Your introduction serves as a roadmap for your essay and should concisely outline the main contention of the text(s) you are analysing. You can also briefly include the context of the piece, and any key arguments. If you were given multiple pieces (including comments) to analyse you can also mention this, but there’s no need to write out every single contention.  

What is the recommended approach for structuring body paragraphs in a Language Analysis essay?

Body paragraphs are where the bulk of your analysis takes place. A recommended approach is to structure your essay by arguments or sub-arguments rather than chronologically or by techniques. Identify key points that support the author's contention and group them into paragraphs. Each paragraph should begin with a topic sentence that clearly outlines the argument or sub-argument being discussed, followed by evidence from the text(s) and analysis. Ensure paragraphs flow logically and smoothly from one to the next.

How should I conclude my essay effectively?

Your conclusion should summarize the key points of your analysis without introducing new information. Reflect on the overall use of language to persuade the audience and restate the main contention of the text(s). You can also comment on major appeals or techniques used by the author and how they position the audience.

How can I ensure that my essay meets the necessary criteria for success?

Refer to the Language Analysis Checklist provided at the end of this article to ensure your essay covers all essential aspects. Pay attention to aspects such as length, structure, topic sentences, use of quotes, metalanguage, tone, visual analysis (if applicable), and comparative analysis.

How can I effectively analyze visual material in Language Analysis?

To analyze visual material effectively, consider its purpose, audience appeal, and any persuasive techniques employed. Use metalanguage to describe visual features and explain how they contribute to the overall argument. Examples of visual features include colour, line, shape, and size. Additionally, make connections between the written and visual elements where applicable.  

What strategies can I use to compare multiple texts in a Language Analysis essay?

To approach this effectively, identify common themes or arguments across the texts and group them into paragraphs based on these similarities. Use transition sentences to smoothly contrast the approaches of different authors within the same paragraph. Focus on analysing how each text employs language to persuade the audience while maintaining coherence and clarity in your analysis. 

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How do i structure my analytical commentary.

Looking to sharpen the structure of your Section B response? Look no further! English Language teacher Louise Noonan has you covered with some useful approaches to producing a well-organised and effective analytical commentary in the end-of-year exam.

As a relatively unfamiliar task with no set structure, the analytical commentary for Section B of the English Language exam can seem daunting. But, while it’s true that having no guidelines to follow can be liberating, this doesn’t mean that structure isn’t important; you still need to be able to organise your analytical commentary to ensure you meet the requirements of the task. In today’s post, we look at some handy templates for structuring your response that will help you prepare for the end-of-year exam.

At its essence, the analytical commentary requires you to analyse the salient features of a specific text. To score well in the task, you must include a discussion of register, social purpose and context (referring to at least two subsystems in your analysis) and show strong engagement with the text (regularly quoting examples throughout your response).

While you may feel confident about what you plan to discuss in your commentary, putting your ideas onto paper during exam conditions is an altogether different proposition. This is where planning out the structure of your response becomes important. Let’s look at some organisational ideas, beginning with the introduction.

Introduction

Your introduction must establish the key features of the text as per the question guidelines. While your introduction doesn’t have to be long, it should address the elements below.

• Register – is it formal, informal or mixed?
• Social purpose/s – what is the author’s intent?
• Context – what are the critical contextual factors?

Note: Use FARMS as a handy acronym to help you remember these.

• F ield (domain/semantic)
• R elationship between speakers, including relative power and social distance
• S etting/locale, such as where the text was published or heard

Body paragraphs

After a short introduction, it’s time to turn your attention to the body of the response. You should aim to write three body paragraphs, each around 200–250 words. Like the extended essay, each paragraph should start with a topic sentence that clearly states its focus. As far as the rest of the content goes, however, this is where you can choose between two different approaches: the thematic approach or the subsystem approach. Let’s have a look at both in turn.

Thematic approach

Each body paragraph using this approach should include:

• a topic sentence that identifies the theme
• two or three examples of linguistic features (including line numbers) and metalanguage
• a discussion of how each example contributes to a theme.

Structuring your analysis around register, social purpose and contextual factors provides a flexible approach that can be easily adapted to a range of texts. Using the thematic structure, you can also focus on salient features in the text as a whole rather than looking for particular features linked to a subsystem. Below is an example of a paragraph that uses the thematic approach.

This text has a mixed register as it contains both formal and informal features. A formal feature found within the text is the use of proper-noun phrases such as ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’ (lines 38–39) when referring to the first peoples of Australia. However, the use of verb phrases such as ‘copping it’ (line 7) and fragment sentences like ‘Because’ (line 20) are more informal, reflecting the author’s Australian identity. Despite the mixed register, however, there is still a logical progression of ideas throughout the text, and graphologically the paragraphs are effective at splitting up the text to aid coherence.

In this paragraph, the student analyses the register of the text using lexical choice and syntactic features. They then move on to the logical ordering of the text, which supports the register as the level of planning ensures the text is coherent. In this paragraph alone, the student is able to cover three different subsystems, showing that they understand how each works together to support the mixed register.

Subsystem approach

• a topic sentence that identifies the subsystem or subsystems
• two or three examples (including line numbers) and metalanguage
• a discussion of how each example contributes to the register, social purpose and context.

As an alternative to the thematic approach, the subsystem structure is sometimes regarded as a more time-efficient way of organising an analytical commentary essay. Formulating a paragraph that focuses on lexicology, for instance, might help you to access the text quicker. The risk of using this approach, however, is that the themes in the criteria might not be addressed in as much depth. Below is an example of a body paragraph that uses the subsystem approach.

Lexical choice contributes to the context and social purpose of the text. Australian-specific lexis reinforces the author’s identity as an Australian person with the intended audience of Australian readers. Examples of this are the more informal verb ‘copping’ (line 7) and the proper-noun phrase ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander’ (lines 38–39). These are examples of lexis that an Australian would understand, and reflect the context of tpublication on an Australian website. Furthermore, these terms support the social purpose as the lexical familiarity builds rapport.

In this example, the student is able to analyse lexical choice in relation to all three themes and demonstrate that they understand how context can drive register and how register can support a social purpose.

TIP: Remember to link the stylistic or discourse features back to register, social purpose and context and show the examiner you know how and why a particular feature is being used in the text.

Conclusion?

You don’t need one!

There is no single ‘correct’ way to structure your analytical commentary; what works for one student may not work for another, and what works for one text might not work for another. That being said, practising a number of possible structures you can use is invaluable for feeling prepared on the day of the exam.

Best of luck!

Need more help with the English Language exam? Purchase Insight’s English Language Exam Guide 3 rd  edition by Kirsten Fox. Featuring plenty of tips for exam success, as well as high-level sample answers and annotated essays, it’s a must-have for English Language students preparing for the end-of-year examination.

The English Language Exam Guide 3 rd  edition is produced by Insight Publications , an independent Australian educational publisher.

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Units 1 and 2

All assessments for Units 1 and 2 are school based. Procedures for assessment of levels of achievement in Units 1 and 2 are a matter for school decision. The determination of satisfactory (S) or not satisfactory (N) for each of Units 1 and 2 is a separate consideration from the assessment of levels of achievement. This distinction means that a student can receive a very low numerical score in a formal assessment task but still achieve an S for the outcome.

The decision about satisfactory completion of outcomes is based on the teacher’s judgment of the student’s overall performance on a combination of set work and assessment tasks related to the outcomes. Students should be provided with multiple opportunities across the learning program to develop and demonstrate the key knowledge and key skills required for the outcomes for the unit. If a student, in the judgement of the teacher, did not meet the required standard for satisfactory completion of the outcome through the completion of the set work and assessment task(s) then they should be afforded additional opportunities to demonstrate the outcome through submitting further evidence; for example, a teacher may consider work previously submitted (class work, homework), additional tasks or discussions with the student that demonstrate their achievement of the outcome (i.e. a student can demonstrate their understanding in a different language mode, such as through speaking rather than writing) as further evidence provided it meets the requirements and is consistent with the established school processes.

This table provides suitable assessment tasks for English and EAL Units 1 and 2

Eal students.

In Units 1 and 2, the determination of the status of an EAL learner is a school-based decision. If the school deems that a student with an EAL background would benefit from the differentiation of tasks at this level, the teacher can implement the most appropriate adjustments. The VCAA EAL eligibility criteria do not apply to Units 1 and 2.

Teachers should note the cognitive demand of the command terms in the outcome statements to determine the type of teaching and learning activities and evidence of student understanding that will be needed for students to demonstrate satisfactory completion of each outcome. Teachers should also be guided by the key knowledge and the key skills in each area of study.

Procedures for assessment of levels of achievement in Units 1 and 2 are a matter for schools to decide. Schools have flexibility in deciding how many and which assessment tasks they use for each outcome, provided that these decisions are in accordance with VCE English and EAL Study Design and VCE Assessment Principles (see above).

Samples of assessment tasks

Consider the scope of the area of study and the ways that it best fits the cohort. Determine which key knowledge and key skills will be formally assessed through the task, and how they map to the outcome statement. (Key knowledge and key skills that are not included in the formal assessment are usually explored in teaching and learning activities and achievement is determined through observation and discussion.)

Unit 1, Outcome 1: Reading and exploring texts

This area of study requires that students respond personally to a text.

1. Scaffolded task

Write a personal response to the set text.

Use one or more of the following statements to guide your response.

• Identify two key ideas from the text, explore how they are represented in the text and then connect those ideas and representations to your own lived experience.
• Identify two key characters from the text, explore their story arc and consider the ways the text resolves their story then connect those arcs and resolutions to your own understanding of the way individuals experience the society around them.

Throughout the area of study, students keep writing journals about the text. As the text is read or viewed, and discussed, explored and challenged in class, students record their impressions and make connections with contemporary or personal experiences or events. At the end of the area of study, students write a reflection in their journal, outlining the ways they have connected with the text throughout the study.

Unit 1, Outcome 2: Crafting texts

This area of study requires that students produce two texts and one reflection on the processes of writing.

There are many opportunities for assessment for this area of study. The following are two possible examples.

1. Workshop task

Students develop a text and document the writing processes. They produce a:

• plan for their text
• draft of their text
• sample of feedback from a peer
• final version of their text.

2. Responding to stimulus task

Students, under timed and supervised conditions, craft a text (drawn from work completed in class) in response to a stimulus and within set parameters. ‘Conflict’ is the idea that has shaped their exploration of writing.

Stimulus:

• ‘Conflict cannot survive without your participation’ (Wayne Dyer).

Audience: Peers

Craft a text, written for your peers, that incorporates the idea of conflict. You must include one of the pieces of stimulus in your response (and you can include both).

The text should be shaped around a purpose (express, entertain, argue, inform) and must consider the concerns and the language of the indicated audience.

Unit 2, Outcome 1: Reading and exploring texts

This area of study requires students to produce an analytical response to text.

Students choose between two essay topics on their set text list and write an analytical response to demonstrate their understanding and knowledge of the text. For example: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

• ‘The chaos in Frankenstein does not come from acts of creation but from acts of neglect.’ How is this idea explored in the novel?
• How does Shelley both condone and condemn the 'acquirement of knowledge' in  Frankenstein  .

Unit 2, Outcome 2: Exploring argument

This area of study requires students to produce an analytical response to persuasive text and to create a persuasive oral text.

Analytical response

Students are provided with persuasive texts and, under timed and supervised conditions, write an analysis of the ways contention, argument, language and persuasive techniques work together to create a persuasive effect on the reader / audience.

Oral presentation

Students work in groups and decide on an issue they would like to explore. They choose a form for their presentation (debate, discussion or dialogue) and develop individual scripts or speeches to explore the issue through different points of view, for persuasive effect.

Units 3 and 4 (from 2024)

Differences between english and eal, school-assessed coursework.

In VCE English and EAL, students demonstrate their understanding of outcome statements, key knowledge and key skills through School-assessed Coursework (SACs). Each area of study is linked to assessment tasks and an allocation of marks (see Unit 3, p. 28, Unit 4, p. 34). These assessment tasks and their allocated marks are deliberately distinct from the assessment tasks students will face in the external examination. While these tasks will have commonalities, it is important for teachers and schools to distinguish their internal assessment tasks from the external assessment tasks set by the VCAA in the examination. School-assessed Coursework should offer breadth in opportunities for students to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of their learning. Teachers should therefore consider designing assessment tasks with diverse conditions and through different language modes.

While it is acknowledged that students require preparation for external examination tasks, they should have opportunities to extend themselves in their learning and their assessment. School-assessed Coursework should be seen as both formative and summative assessment and students should be given feedback on their understanding of the content, on their skills in writing or speaking, and on possible avenues for improvement. Internal assessment should provide scope for ongoing dialogue with students about their learning.

School-assessed Coursework must be part of the regular curriculum and assessment program and must not unduly add to the workload associated with that program. Assessment tasks must be completed mainly in class.

Teachers must consider the condition in which School-assessed Coursework is completed and the authentication strategies relevant for each assessment task.

Students should be provided with clear, written instructions about the conditions for each assessment task. These instructions should include the key knowledge and key skills that will be assessed in the task, how the task will be structured, and any materials or resources that will be allowed when completing the task.

The requirement for an oral presentation is mandated in Unit 4, Outcome 2. The language mode of speaking and listening represents critical skills for young people emerging from the secondary school environment. In this study, the oral presentation invites diverse ways in which students can engage with these skills. They are able to present an individual, formal speech to a class or others on an issue. They can also present by engaging in a debate with other members of the class on an agreed issue, or through a dialogue, where the issue is explored through a number of points of view. In this area of study, students can develop podcasts or some other digital form.

Teachers are reminded that the assessment task must be clear to all students and that all students must have access to the same conditions and supports. Teachers should also carefully consider the assessment tool they employ to assess the oral presentation. If, for example, students are presenting though a digital form, elements such as eye contact and gesture will be more difficult to formally assess.

Assessment tools

Assessment tools (performance descriptors or rubrics) are important for moderation between teachers, to communicate the levels of achievement to students and to provide feedback to students. All teachers should be using some kind of assessment tool for each assessment task.

The VCAA publishes performance descriptors for each assessment task in Units 3 and 4. These performance descriptors provide advice only and teachers are welcome to modify them or develop their own.

Teachers should note that, in modifying or developing unique performance descriptors, they should work from the study design and the key areas of outcome statements, key knowledge and key skills. Clearly, not all key knowledge and key skills will or can be formally assessed in an assessment task – some key knowledge and key skills are observable in classroom engagement and learning – but all criteria in any assessment tool must be drawn directly from the study design.

Units 3 and 4 Sample approaches to developing an assessment task

Unit 3, outcome 2.

Demonstrate effective writing skills by producing their own texts, designed to respond to a specific context and audience to achieve a stated purpose; and to explain their decisions made through writing processes.

This sample approach focuses on the first part of the outcome.

Step 1: Define the parameters of the outcome and the related assessment task options

Read the outcome and key knowledge and skills for Unit 3 Area of Study 2: Creating texts carefully and consider what evidence could be gathered to demonstrate student learning. It should be noted that each key knowledge and skill does not need to be individually identifiable in the task nor should the task focus on too narrow a range of key knowledge and skills.

Step 2: Examine the assessment advice in this handbook

Unpack the performance descriptors as they provide a clear indication of qualities and characteristics that you are looking for in a student response.

For example, a written text for this outcome would need to demonstrate the ability to generate and use ideas, employ voices appropriate to purpose, context and audience, experiment with and extend vocabulary and draft, refine and complete individual writing.

Step 3: Design the assessment task

The requirements of the task will be determined by the selected idea from the Framework of Ideas and the selected mentor texts. The following is an example of an assessment task based on the idea ‘Writing about play’.

Writing about play

Drawing on the writing you have drafted, explored and completed over this unit of work, create a written text that explicitly incorporates one of the items of stimulus (below), for an audience of your peers in a public context. The purpose of the written text is to be determined by you.

“Play is, by definition, a safety space. If a designer or artist can make safe spaces that allow the negotiation of real-world concepts, issues, and ideas, then a game can be successful in facilitating the exploration of innovative solutions for apparently intractable problems.”  – Mary Flanagan, Critical Play: Radical Game Design

“According to the pianist and essayist Stephen Nachmanovitch, play is sometimes conceived as a threat to normativity precisely because it wastes time. A game of amateur soccer or netball is measurably productive: it is good for our physical health, it develops teamwork skills. Similarly positive outcomes can be matched to more intellectual games like chess or cryptic crosswords. But if we devote too much time to this kind of play at the expense of family or work duties, we open ourselves up to criticism. I wonder about this, and about the double-edged nature of my radically altered state since play became such a large part of my everyday life. 'Play is not the way to maintain a tightly controlled society,' writes Nachmanovitch, 'or a clear definition of what is good, true or beautiful.' No, it isn't. And that's what makes it so delightful. That's what makes me want to defend it.” Julienne van Loon, ‘ The play of days’ ,

“I went to great lengths in that environment to hide my sexuality while I was playing footy, I didn't want any of them to figure it out. And what that looks like to give you an idea was I would second guess everything that I said or did — I wouldn't get involved in conversations about relationships or what I was doing on the weekend out of fear that they might figure it out. And I even went to the extent of creating a separate Facebook list, so that just my teammates wouldn't see photos I was tagged in, places I was checked into or what my relationship status was. And it probably limited the kinds of friendships and bonds that I could have developed with my teammates growing up. Cause I was always hiding a big part of my life.”   Jason Ball, ‘ I Played Better ,

Step 4: Determining teaching and learning activities

For Unit 3 Outcome 2, the teacher plans a sequence of teaching and learning activities that will enable students to develop knowledge and skills. This will include opportunities to plan, explore, draft, revise and complete written texts

See Teaching and learning for additional activities that could support students to prepare for this assessment.

Other considerations

When to assess the students

The teacher must decide the most appropriate time to set this task. This decision is the result of several considerations including:

• the estimated time it will take to cover the key knowledge and skills for the outcome
• when tasks are being conducted in other subjects and the workload implications for students
• where there are multiple classes in English/EAL, a common School-assessed Coursework scheduling is advisable.

Marking the task

The marking scheme used to assess a student's level of performance should reflect the relevant aspects of the Performance descriptors and be explained to students before starting the task.

Sample assessment : English Unit 3, Outcome 1 and Unit 4, Outcome 1: Reading and responding to texts

Outcome statement –

analyse ideas, concerns and values presented in a text, informed by the vocabulary, text structures and language features and how they make meaning (Unit 3, Outcome 1) analyse explicit and implicit ideas, concerns and values presented in a text, informed by vocabulary, text structures and language features and how they make meaning (Unit 4, Outcome 1)

Assessment mandated in the Study Design - An analytical response to text in written form

Sample approaches

Offer students two or more essay questions from which they choose.

Examples of questions

Propositional

‘There are no heroes or heroines in In Cold Blood ; only victims.’ How far do you agree?

Quotation based

Al Dewey is determined to learn “the why and the who” of the Clutter murders. He succeeds with ‘the who’ but not ‘the why’. Discuss.

What role does family play in In Cold Blood ?’

VCE English examination papers (Section A) can also provide inspiration for teachers when writing essay questions. It is important to always modify the examination questions for internal assessment tasks to maintain the integrity of the assessment task and to provide fair and equitable conditions for students.

Sample assessment: EAL Unit 3, Outcome 1 and Unit 4, Outcome 1: Reading and responding to texts

listen to and discuss ideas, concerns and values presented in a text, informed by selected vocabulary, text structures and language features and how they make meaning (Unit 3, Outcome 1) discuss ideas, concerns and values presented in a text, informed by selected vocabulary, text structures and language features and how they make meaning (Unit 4, Outcome 1)

Assessment mandated in the Study Design – An analytical response to text in written form

Comprehension of an audio / audio visual text focused on historical, cultural and/or social values in the set text, through:

• short-answer responses
• note form summaries (Unit 3, Outcome 1)

An analytical response to text in written form (Unit 4, Outcome 1)

An analytical response to text in written form

‘No one really wins in In Cold Blood ; there is only loss.’ How far do you agree?

Dick Hickock always maintained that “Perry Smith killed the Clutters”. Does In Cold Blood support Hickock’s view?

• short-answer responses 
• note form summaries

Locate a short audio or audio / visual text with a clear focus on the set text. Examples could include an interview with an author, a discussion about or review of about the text in a podcast episode or on radio.

Example:

Sunday Feature – Literary Pursuits Truman Capote: In Cold Blood (the discussion begins at minute 3.00)

This podcast episode runs for 48 minutes so an extract would be appropriate. Students can listen to the extract of this podcast and either answer a series of short answer questions or can produce a summary of the extract in note form.

Sample assessment: English and EAL Unit 3, Outcome 2: Creating texts

Outcome statement -

demonstrate effective writing skills by producing their own texts, designed to respond to a specific context and audience to achieve a stated purpose; and to explain their decisions made through writing processes.

Assessment mandated in the Study Design – Two written texts constructed in consideration of audience, purpose and context

Written texts constructed in consideration of audience, purpose and context

Students maintain a writing journal for three or more mentor texts during the teaching and learning program for this outcome in which they develop their ideas, explore text structures, language features, vocabulary and conventions and draft their written texts.

Teacher provides a set of seen/unseen stimulus materials based on the idea selected from the Framework of Ideas. Students determine the context, the audience and the purpose of their written piece and construct it over two supervised lessons.

Teacher provides a set of unseen stimulus materials based on the idea selected from the Framework of Ideas and determines the audience and context for which the written text is constructed. Students develop a written text within those parameters but determine their own purpose.

As a class, students develop set of stimulus materials based on the idea selected from the Framework of Ideas. These stimulus materials are shared with all members of the class. Students select from the stimulus materials and produce a written text incorporating their chosen stimulus, in consideration of an audience, a context and a purpose. Teachers determine an appropriate process of authentication for the submitted text. (See the VCE and VCAL Administrative Handbook , pages 77 and 78 for support.)

Sample assessment: English Unit 3 Outcome 2 

A commentary reflecting on writing processes

Students write a commentary on the writing processes they used to develop their written text(s) in a supervised classroom environment.

Students maintain a writing journal over the teaching and learning sequence, adding to it after each class and in consideration of the mentor texts under examination. Students submit a set of these written entries. Teachers determine an appropriate process of authentication. (See the VCE and VCAL Administrative Handbook , pages 77 and 78 for support.)

Sample assessment: EAL Unit 3 Outcome 2

A set of annotations reflecting on writing processes

Students annotate one of their written texts, identifying structural elements, language features, vocabulary and convention employed and indicating the processes they used in creating the text.

Students develop a series of mind maps. They select key passages or sentences from their text and then map them to:

• mentor texts
• structural elements
• language features
• early drafts of the passage/sentence

Sample assessment: English and EAL Unit 4, Outcome 2: Analysing argument

analyse the use of argument and language in persuasive texts, including one written text (print or digital) and one text in another mode (audio and/or audio visual); and develop and present a point of view text.

Assessment mandated in the Study Design – An analytical response to argument in written form

A point of view oral presentation

Analytical response to argument in written form

Teachers provide students with at least two persuasive texts (one written, in another mode). The text in a mode other than written is supported with a transcript. Students watch and/or listen to the text in a mode other than written (twice). Students write an analytical response to the texts considering argument, language, persuasive strategies and effects.

Point of view oral presentation

Students write and individually present a point of view speech to an audience. The audience can be peers or parents. The presentation can take place in person or online.

Students write and present, in groups, point of view speeches. These speeches can be presented in a debate format or can take the form of a discussion / dialogue.

Students write and record a point of view speech. There are options for students to present this point of view speech as part of an ‘imaginary’ podcast or similar.

For all examples, teachers determine an appropriate process of authentication. (See the VCE and VCAL Administrative Handbook , pages 77 and 78 for support.)

Units 3 and 4 Performance descriptors

English and eal general advice.

Performance descriptors can assist teachers in moderating student work, in making consistent assessment, in helping determine student point of readiness (zone of proximal development) and in providing more detailed information for reporting purposes. Using performance descriptors can assist students by providing them with informed, detailed feedback and by showing them what improvement looks like.

Teachers should note that, in modifying or developing unique performance descriptors, they should work from the study design and the key areas of outcome statements, key knowledge and key skills. Not all key knowledge and key skills will or can be formally assessed in an assessment task – some key knowledge and key skills are observable in classroom engagement and learning – but all criteria in any assessment tool must be drawn directly from the study design.

Performance descriptors are developed for each outcome statement and reflect the key skills that underpin that outcome statement. Key skills are allocated a row and each row describes five progressively higher levels of performance for that key skill. Teachers can infer an increase in progressively higher difficulty by reading the performance descriptors left to right, but not a similarity of difficulty reading the performance descriptors top to bottom.

Performance descriptors and outcome statements

In general, there is one set of performance descriptors for each outcome statement. Each set of performance descriptors includes the key skills underpinning the outcome statement that relate directly to the task mandated in the study design. However, Unit 3, Outcome 2 and Unit 4, Outcome 2 have outcome statements that require students to demonstrate two distinct sets of skills.

Unit 3, Outcome 2 requires students to produce individual written texts and to reflect on their writing processes. To support these separate skill sets, there are two sets of performance descriptors, one to assess the requirement that a student ‘ … demonstrate effective writing skills by producing their own texts, designed to respond to a specific context and audience to achieve a stated purpose’ and another to assess the requirement that a student ‘ … explain their decisions made through writing processes’.  

Unit 4, Outcome 2 requires that students analyse the use of argument and language in persuasive text and develop and present a point of view text. To support these separate skills sets, there are two sets of performance descriptors, one to assess the requirement that a student ‘ … analyse the use of argument and language in persuasive texts, including one written text (print or digital) and one text in another mode (audio and/or audio visual)’ and another to assess the requirement that a student ‘ … develop and present a point of view text’.

English as an Additional Language (EAL) students

The VCE English and EAL Study Design outcome statements have been differentiated to provide for a more scaffolded approach to teaching and learning for EAL students. The EAL performance descriptors have been developed to include the key skills relevant and specific to the tasks to be completed by EAL students.

Advice for using performance descriptors

In designing School-assessed Coursework assessment tasks, teachers can adapt performance descriptors. Performance descriptors should be able to capture the skill level of every student being assessed and will help provide the allocation of a range of marks. Thus, the lowest quality performance should be something most or all students can do, and the highest quality performance should be something that extends the most able students within the parameters of the outcome statement. These descriptors can also serve as a guide for how to describe student performance.

Teachers can also explore the performance descriptors with their students, unpacking the levels of expected performance so students have a clear understanding of what can be possible in terms of development and achievement.

English as an Additional Language (EAL)

Analyse a film for VCE English like a pro!

Are you a VCE student feeling totally lost when it comes to analysing a film? If so, you’re far from alone. Many students aren’t sure how to approach analysing a film, especially if the only texts they’ve studied previously have been the more typical books or plays.

Thankfully, analysing a film doesn’t need to be difficult. One of the best ways to remember what to look for and comment on when analysing a film the acronym ‘CAMELS’.

C: Camera techniques,

M: Mise-en-scene

L: Lighting

If you remember to analyse and write about these six areas, your VCE English film analysis essays will improve significantly.

Analysing VCE English films like a pro: The CAMELS technique

For a printable PDF copy of this guide, please click here:  Film Techniques Analysis and Worksheet PDF .

Camera techniques

‘Camera techniques’ refers to how the camera is used to tell a story. There are a number of different types of camera techniques to look at when you analyse a film for VCE English including:

• Camera movement: This refers to how the camera moves.  Terms include: Crane, dolly, doll in, dolly out, handheld, pan, pedestal, point-of-view shot, snorricam, static, steadicam, tilt, tracking, vertigo effect, whip pan, zoom.
• Shot size: This refers to the proximity of the camera to the subject or scene.  Terms include: Extreme long-shot, long shot, full shot, mid shot, close up, extreme close up.
• Camera angle: Refers to the camera’s angle in relation to the subject or scene.  Terms include: High angle, eye level, low angle, point-of-view shot, tilted angle, neutral angle.
• Focus: This refers to the clarity or precision of the shot.  Terms include: Deep focus, depth of field, pull focus, shallow depth of field.

Ask yourself questions like “What does this particular camera technique tell us about the character?” or “What is the director trying to communicate through this technique?”.

Nearly everything an actor does is part of a scripted performance which has been directed down to the smallest detail. When you analyse a film for VCE English, you must pay attention to small details of an actor’s performance including:

• Facial expressions: These help the audience understand the character’s emotions and personality.
• Body language: Body language can communicate a lot about a character to the audience – a character who routinely bows her head, for example, may lack self-confidence.
• Tone of voice/accent: How a character speaks often reveals important information, such as their personality or socioeconomic background.

When analysing acting, ask yourself questions like “What effect does this facial expression have on my understanding of the character?” or “What does this character’s accent tell me about their background/life experiences?”

Mise-en-scene

‘Mise en scene’ refers to what appears in the frame – the actors, lighting, décor, props, costumes, colours – and how it is arranged. Everything in a frame is a deliberate choice and often helps the audience piece together important information about characters or the plot.

When analysing mise en scene, ask yourself questions like “What does this costume tell me about the character?” and “How does the use of colour add to the mood of the shot?”

When films are edited, filmmakers think carefully about how the sequences of shots, pace of editing, and use of editing techniques contribute to the narrative.

When you analyse a film for VCE English, look at editing techniques such as:

• Fast motion: Here the rate the story is told is sped up. A good example of this is montages, where often many months of in-film time are compressed into a few minutes.
• Slow motion: This is where time is slowed down. This often gives the audience time to absorb a dramatic event or dramatizes a particular scene.
• Fade in/out, dissolve, wipe
• Cuts , including jump cuts (where the camera remains stationary while the subject is in motion) and cross cutting (where multiple events occur at the same time and the film switches back and forth between them)

Ask yourself how these techniques communicate messages to the audience about characters or the plot.

Although lighting in a film often appears natural, filmmakers go to great lengths to achieve particular lighting effects to create mood and atmosphere in a scene.

• Soft: Lighting that is soft and diffused, not harsh.
• Hard: Lighting that creates harsh, obvious shadows.
• High: A scene is well lit with minimal shadow
• Low: Lighting is poor, lots of shadows are cast
• Warm: Lighting with a warm yellow or orange hue.
• Cool: Lighting with cool blue or green hues.

Ask questions like “What type of lighting is used?” and “What does the lighting tell the audience about the character?” – a character who is always cast in shadows, for example, may have sinister motives.

Visuals are not the only thing filmmakers think about. The use of sound is also incredibly important. The sounds in a film are deliberately chosen: each sound contributes to the narrative, character development, and audience engagement in some way.

When you’re watching a scene, think about how sound contributes to character development by asking questions such as “What type of music is used when this character appears on-screen?” and “What impact do the sound effects have on the narrative?”

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The Ultimate Guide to VCE Literature

February 11, 2023

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Go ahead and tilt your mobile the right way (portrait). the kool kids don't use landscape....

Updated for the new 2023-2027 Study Design!

AoS 1: Adaptations and Transformations

Aos 2: developing interpretations.

• AoS 1: Creative Responses to Texts

AoS 2: Close Analysis

This is your ultimate guide to everything you need to know to get started with VCE Literature. We will be covering all the sections within Units 3 and 4, and have included resources that will help improve your skills and make you stand out from the rest of your cohort!

Scope of Study

Here's what the VCAA study design states...

'The study of VCE Literature fosters students’ enjoyment and appreciation of the artistic and aesthetic merits of stories and storytelling, and enables students to participate more fully in the cultural conversations that take place around them. By reading and exploring a diverse range of established and emerging literary works, students become increasingly empowered to discuss texts. As both readers and writers, students extend their creativity and high-order thinking to express and develop their critical and creative voices.'

'Throughout this study, students deepen their awareness of the historical, social and cultural influences that shape texts and their understanding of themselves as readers. Students expand their frameworks for exploring literature by considering literary forms and features, engaging with language, and refining their insight into authorial choices. Students immerse themselves in challenging fiction and non-fiction texts , discovering and experimenting with a variety of interpretations in order to develop their own responses.'

...but don't worry if the above is vague, we'll take you through exactly what you need to know for Year 12 Literature! Let's get into it! ‍ ‍

In Unit 3, students consider how meaning is created through form, and how different interpretations may be developed out of a singular text. First, students understand how writers adapt and transform texts, and how their interpretation of the text impacts this transformation into a different form. Secondly, students use another text to develop their own interpretations of a text with regard to its context , and views and values . Unit 3 School-Assessed Coursework is worth 25 per cent of your total study score!

This task is designed for you to critically analyse and actively engage with the text, understanding its nuances inside and out in order to decipher its meaning. Be individual in comparing and contrasting the two texts – avoid the obvious similarities/differences everyone in your class will also notice. It is the insightful analysis of the subtleties of how meaning is altered that will help you stand out!

Here are some important aspects to consider and questions to ask yourself while tackling this SAC:

• Identify the unique conventions in the construction of the original text
• Now do Step 1 with the adapted/transformed text
• How do the two text forms differ ? How are they the same ? The most crucial step is what meaning can be derived from the similarities and differences? How does the meaning change? ‍
• Note additions and omissions (and even silences) ‍
• Historical context and setting ‍
• How does the change in form impact you as the reader/viewer ?
• Incorporate pertinent quotations from both forms of text to substantiate and support your ideas and key points.

Most importantly, share your original interpretation of what meaning and significance you can extract from the text, and how you believe it changes once the form alters.

Also ask yourself these questions:

• ‍ What makes the text in its original form interesting or unique?
• Is that quality captured in its adaptation/transformation?

‍ For more detailed explanations on these 7 aspects, you might want to check out Adaptations and Transformations Lit SAC: A How To Guide.

Developing interpretations is an AoS that focuses on investigating the meaning and messages in texts, as evidenced by the text itself, it’s author and their context . As per the study design:

'Students first develop their own interpretations of a set text, analysing how ideas, views and values are presented in a text, and the ways these are endorsed, challenged and/or marginalised through literary forms, features and language. These student interpretations should consider the historical, social and cultural context in which a text is written and set. Students also consider their own views and values as readers.'

Following this, you investigate a supplementary reading which will offer another interpretation of the text, which may enrich or challenge your interpretation by agreeing or disagreeing with your interpretation. Using this supplementary reading, you reconsider your initial interpretation and apply your new understanding of the text to key moments. 

The SAC for Developing Interpretations is a little bit weird. It’s worth 50% of unit 3 (or 25% of your total study score), but is split into two parts:

• Part A: An initial interpretation of the text’s views and values within its historical, social and cultural context.
• Part B: A written response that compares/interweaves and analyses an initial interpretation with a subsequent interpretation, using a key moment from the text.

Your teacher might do the two parts together, or separately. In any case, Part B will include the use of a passage from the set text that you must engage with. How does the passage help you to interpret the text, and how does that interpretation agree or disagree with the interpretation presented in the supplementary reading? 

The most difficult part of the SAC for this AoS is balancing your interpretation, the textual evidence, and the alternative interpretation of the supplementary reading. It is vital that if you are doing Literature this year, that you know your 3.2 text like the back of your hand, and that you practice writing loads and loads. It is also worth trying to make your interpretation incredibly specific, so that you can go in-depth into one idea, rather than simply skimming over 3 or 4 big ideas. 

For more on Developing Interpretations, you might want to check out VCE Literature Study Design (2023-2027): A Guide to Developing Interpretations which explains in detail what the new AoS is about and what you need to do.

And, if you're studying Alias Grace you'll find our Developing Interpretations SAC Guide on interpreting Alias Grace especially helpful.

‍ Unit 4: Interpreting Texts

Aos 1: creative response & reflective commentary.

The most important part of this task is that you must have a highly convincing connection between the original text and your creative response .

There must be a tangible relationship present, through an in-depth understanding of the original text’s features. These features include characterisation (what motivates these characters), setting, context, narrative structure, tone and writing/film style.

You can establish this relationship by: ‍

• Adopting or resisting the same genre as the original text
• Adopting or resisting the author’s writing/language style
• Adopting or resisting the text’s point of view
• Adopting or resisting the original setting, narrative structure or tone
• Writing through a peripheral character’s perspective
• Developing a prologue, epilogue or another chapter/scene
• Rewriting a key event/scene from another character’s point of view: Does this highlight how important narrative perspective is?
• Recontextualising the original text

For detailed explanations on how to establish these relationships, read "Creative Response To Text" Ideas .

The VCAA Literature Study Design also determines that students must submit a ‘close analysis of a key passage’. This aspect of the assessment counts for 20 of the 60 marks available for the Create Response outcome. The study design elaborates that students must produce:

‘A close analysis of a key passage from the original text, which includes reflections on connections between the creative response and the original text.’

In short, VCAA wants you to not only analyse the original text and use it as the basis for your Creative Response, they want you to be able to closely analyse a section of the original text, and link it to and reflect upon your creative response. This is different from previous years and the same task in English, the Reflective Commentary. You must use the skills of close analysis in this task. To include these things, look to the key knowledge and skills outlined in the study design. 

Key Knowledge:

• Understanding of the point of view, context and form of the original text
• The ways the literary form, features and language convey the ideas of the original text
• Techniques used to create, recreate or adapt a text and how they represent particular views and values

Key Skills:

• Discuss elements of construction, context, point of view and form particular to the text, and apply understanding of these in a creative response
• Analyse closely the literary form, features and language of a text
• Reflect on how language choices and literary features from the original text are used in their adaptation

As you write, ensure you are discussing how the author uses point of view, context, form, elements of construction and stylistic features in their text. It is imperative that you describe how you have similarly used such device in your creative response. Ensure that you also discuss how you are involving the ideas and themes of the text in your creative piece, and how you are discussing them further, or exploring them in greater depth. Obviously only talk about those that are relevant to your creative response!

To read a sample Reflective Commentary, check out Elly's blog post on how to Score 10/10 On The Reflective Commentary ‍

From the VCAA study design:

'In this area of study students focus on a detailed scrutiny of the language, style, concerns and construction of texts. Students attend closely to textual details to examine the ways specific passages in a text contribute to their overall understanding of the whole text. Students consider literary forms, features and language, and the views and values of the text. They write expressively to develop a close analysis, using detailed references to the text.'

In plain words, your teacher (and eventually examiner in the end of year exam) will give you 3 passages from your text. You'll be asked to read each of these passages, identify key ideas or themes present in each of the passages, and write an essay in response.

Writing the Introduction

Introductions are an excellent way to showcase your ability to provide an insight into your personal “reading” of the text, interpret the passages and allow you an avenue through which to begin your discussion of the material.

When constructing introductions, it is important to note that the VCAA Literature Exam Criteria is as follows: ‍

• Understanding of the text demonstrated in a relevant and plausible interpretation
• Ability to write expressively and coherently to present an interpretation
• Understanding of how views and values may be suggested in the text
• Analysis of how key passages and/or moments in the text contribute to an interpretation
• Analysis of the features of a text and how they contribute to an interpretation
• Analysis and close reading of textual details to support a coherent and detailed interpretation of the text
• Considering these points, your introduction should feature these 2 elements: your personal reading of the text and your interpretation of the passages.
• In terms of structure, try to begin with a sentence or two explaining your personal reading of the text. The key to doing so in a manner befitting Close Analysis however, is to utilise quotes from the passages to supplement your assertion.

Head over to Jarrod's blog to read a sample introduction: VCE Literature Close Analysis: Introduction ‍ ‍

Extra Resources

Views and Values

VCE Literature Essay Approaches - Not a Language Analysis

What is Authorial Intent in VCE English and Why Is It Important?

The Importance of Context in Literature ‍

Study Techniques: How To Approach a Text That You Hate

Why Genre Matters in VCE Literature: An Analysis of Dracula

Developing Interpretations SAC Guide: Interpreting Alias Grace

Get our FREE VCE English Text Response mini-guide

Now quite sure how to nail your text response essays? Then download our free mini-guide, where we break down the art of writing the perfect text-response essay into three comprehensive steps. Click below to get your own copy today!

Access a FREE sample of our Literature study guide

• Focused on Developing Interpretations and Close Analysis , both of which you need for your exam
• Covering what it means to ‘interpret a text’, how to breakdown critical essays, different Close Analysis structures and more
• Includes sample A+ essays with EVERY essay annotated and broken down on HOW and WHY past authors achieved A+
• Essays written by multiple authors all scoring 40+ so you can learn different strategies and implement the advice that resonates with you most

Literature is probably one of your hardest VCE subjects. If it’s not, then go you! (please tell me your secrets).

However, if you’re anything like me, then you probably look a bit like this when you begin considering the overall meaning of a text, the author’s views and values, and how any three passages in the text create the meaning.

When I became awash with confusion, like our old pal Ryan Renolds, the first thing I did (after eating a whole block of chocolate), was ensure I understood the context of the text. Without a clear understanding of the context of your text, you cannot fully comprehend the views and values of the author, nor the overall meaning of a text (it’s also part of the criteria for literary perspectives)!

So if you want to be feeling like this after you write a piece for literature:

Consider the following:

AUTHOR’S CONTEXT VS. READER’S CONTEXT 

Austen was hunched over her small writing desk in the village of Chawton during England’s Georgian era as she wrote  Persuasion.  You are more likely reading it in a cozy bed, listening to Taylor Swift and half considering what you’re going to watch on Netflix later. Remember, your current social and cultural context can have a great influence on how you read a text, so it’s always important to imagine the author’s own context – whether this be very similar, or very different from the context of their text. It’s as easy as a Google search!

For a more in-depth look into how authorial intent and context is important in VCE English, read Context and Authorial Intention in VCE English .

SOCIAL CONTEXT

The social context of a text is the way in which the features of the society it is set in impact on its meaning. There are two aspects to social context: the kind of society in which the characters live, and the one in which the author’s text was produced.

Charlotte Brontë’s  Jane Eyre  was set in the same social context she herself lived in. It was one in which women were seen as the lesser sex, there was a great divide between the wealthy and lower class, and strict class boundaries were enforced. All of these societal features are key in determining Brontë’s views on the importance of social inclusion, and her championing of the strength of women. Or just listen to Phoebe:

HISTORICAL CONTEXTS

The historical context of a text is entangled with its social context, as underlying norms and convention are historically specific. The historical context is important to note especially when large changes have occurred between the time the work was produced, and our current day, so it is not assessed by our own concerns alone.

Aeschylus’ Agamemnon was first performed in 458BC, in Ancient Greece, a time vastly different from our own. Therefore, it is important to be aware of how the play was delivered, at the festival of Dionysus as part of a trilogy. Also have an understanding of the myths surrounding the Trojan War as well as those surrounding Agamemnon, Cassandra and Clytemnestra.

CULTURAL CONTEXTS

Culture refers to a particular ‘way of life’, involving religion, race and nationality, as well as things like food, dress code and manners. Furthermore, culture can relate to art, music, writing and literature itself. Cultural context, which is similarly linked with social, historical and ideological context, is especially important to note if the author is attempting to make a comment on an aspect of culture, or the clash of two cultures.

Cross cultural contact between an Indigenous tribe in Western Australia, and the British colonizers of this land, is explored by Kim Scott in his novel  That Deadman Dance.  He reveals aspects of culture largely unknown to current members of Australian society, as well as explores whether assimilation can be seen as a harmonious sign of friendship, or an intrusive loss of culture. The evolution, damage and protection of culture is an important context in this novel, and has a large bearing on the overall meaning of the text, as well as Scott’s views and values.

IDEOLOGICAL CONTEXTS

Ideology refers to the systems of beliefs and ideas that underpin our attitudes and behavior. Such ideology may be valued by society as a whole, or be the basis of conflict. Ideology is a context that is in many ways ‘invisible’. This is because our own is largely internalized and normalized, we act accordingly to our assumptions and social norms.

Many texts explore ideological context, either challenging or championing it. In his play  Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?  Edward Albee challenged perceptions at the time of the family unit, portraying a couple that symbolizes the immense dissatisfaction caused by idealistic portrayals of marriage, and the fallacies of the American Dream. He illuminates how George and Martha escape from meaningless by creating fantasies and illusions, but how these eventually lead to the breakdown of their mental health.

So next time you’re struggling to get started on a literature piece, remember to think deeply about the different aspects of your text’s context!

Introduction

Arguably one of the greatest modern playwrights of our time, Tennessee Williams produced some of the best post-war 1950’s American plays that have now engrained themselves as classics. After the conclusion of the second world war, America was pervaded with hypermasculinity, deep levels of insecurity and a desperate need to regain the pre-war success of the 1920s. During the 1950s, the United States began to regain its economic success and spirits were high as ever; however, this may only have been ostensible. Beneath the surface of such success lurked unshaken expectations on both men and women and deep-rooted bigotry. 

In this article, we will get to know how these concepts are explored in ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ and examine why this text is important in the context of Lit Perspectives and Close Analysis. ‍

Characters Analysis

Brick is too numb to feel much of anything any more; he is a drunk and cold shell of what he once was. Since the death of his friend Skipper, Brick has retreated into solitude and emotional aloofness, and the only emotions that he can express are disgust and boredom. The other characters can only coax an emotional response out of him when they mention Skipper

Maggie is a traditional 1950’s beauty, she is lively, gorgeous and has a deeply sexual presence. She spends the majority of the play trying to get Brick to sleep with her- both to satisfy her own needs, and to allow her to conceive a baby. This which would guarantee her share of the Pollitt family wealth. 

Big Daddy, like Brick, gets a lot of undeserved attention and love; this is because he sits upon the Pollitt wealth he built. He worked hard for economic success, and now he wants to enjoy it. He is uninterested in Big Mama and treats her with little affection or respect.

She is an older version of Maggie - more dramatic, needier, having let herself go. She loves her husband unconditionally despite his cruelty and indifference to her. Like Big Daddy, she cannot help but prefer Brick to Gooper because he is so much like Big Daddy. 

Brick’s older brother but has lived in his shadow since the day he was born. While Brick got the attention with looks and football, Gooper married into society and became a successful lawyer. But the unfair attention and focus on Brick has made Gooper vengeful and petty, and so it is out of both greed and spite that he actively campaigns for control of Big Daddy’s estate. 

Gooper’s wife who has all of his greed and sourness, without any of his justifying history. She taunts Maggie’s lack of motherhood by parading her plethora of children around the house. 

Concepts and Concerns 

TIP: Concepts and concerns should form the basis of your analysis whether you are doing a close analysis or a literary perspectives essay! 

MENDACITY VS TRUTH  ‍

The central tension in the play is underscored by mendacity, lying and deception. The repressed truth is constantly on the verge of being unleashed and it is the “inadmissible thing” that pervades the family. The two primary sources of mendacious repression are Brick’s homosexual desires and Big Daddy’s imminent death from cancer. Ironically, it is these two who value integrity and honesty the most. 

When Big Daddy finally finds out the truth about his impending death he exclaims: “By all the goddam lies and liars that I have had to put up with, and all the goddam hypocrisy that I lived with all these forty years that we(big mama) been living together”

In a final moment of existential dread and disgust, Brick resignedly claims that “mendacity is a system that we live in. Liquor is one way out and death is another”. These are the fates that are destined for Brick and Big Daddy respectively. 

The truth (if there can be such a thing) is that both Brick and Big Daddy are loved so ardently by their partners, but they blinded by their dishonesty to themselves. It is because Brick cannot come to terms with his own sexuality and Big Daddy cannot fathom his inevitable death that lies, and deceit is perpetuated in the text. 

MASCULINITY AND HOMOSEXUALITY

Williams himself was gay and lived in a society that constantly repressed and shamed it as a deeply sinful practice and associated it with failed masculinity. Thus, he explores the deep turmoils of homosexuality in the 1950s and its implications on manliness, bigotry and society.

Whilst not stated explicitly, it is implied that Skipper confessed his love to Brick; whilst Brick felt the same way, he knew this would not be accepted by society. Consequently, he shuts Skipper down and later that night, Skipper commits suicide. Brick cannot admit the truth to himself because in his mind “purity” and “homosexuality” are mutually exclusive, due to his own internalized homophobia and even when Big Daddy makes Brick face his desires and the guilt that pervades him; he cannot escape the bigoted societal norms imbued within him

Williams paints an image of distress, pain and grief caused by the prevailing homophobia of the 1950s. Brick is crippled both by his failure as a man and his failure to be true to himself. 

THE AMERICAN DREAM 

Back in the 1950s, the American Dream was the dream that everyone was expected to aspire for was much more conservative. It included a traditional family with a stay at home mother, hard-working and masculine father, 2-3 children, a home and money, lots of it!

The Pollitt family truly embodied the American Dream. With their self-made fortune, successful sons (though Brick is now a mess) and even grandchildren. In many aspects, Gooper and Mae fulfil the expectations of the American Dream much more than Brick and Maggie do; they have children, success and ambition. They attempt to use this to their advantage in their bid to win over Big Daddy’s estate but even that fails to sway Big Daddy’s favouritism for Brick. 

Brick is as resigned and aloof to the idea of wealth and tradition as he is to his wife Maggie. His repressed homosexuality already divorces him from the ingrained social expectation of the American Dream and it disappoints him to pretend to desire the same things his brother Gooper does. This, ironically, only makes him more favoured by his parents. 

In a world of strict expectations and immovable bigotry, there is no room for homosexuality, and this disappoints no one more than Brick himself. In his world, the very essence of his being contradicts the dream that everyone is taught to value. Williams asks readers to consider the consequences of such restrictive beliefs, he questions the American dream at a fundamental level by asking: so why do we all have to want the same thing?  

MOTHERHOOD AND FEMININITY 

What does it mean to be a woman? For Mae, that means being a loving housewife and being able to bear children. In the petty feud for Big Daddy’s will, she insults Maggie’s childless state, she is less of a woman because of it. Of course, the reason Maggie cannot have children is that Brick is unwilling to sleep with her. Again, even though Mae has provided Big Daddy and Big Mama with a plethora of grandchildren, they still prefer Maggie’s young and sensual energy. 

Williams attempts to undermine the characteristics that were supposed to define women as feminine through Maggie. Moreover, women were supposed to be passive players in the family, to do their husbands bidding and to be polite and proper at all times. Maggie is none of these things. She is unapologetically sexual, unwaveringly ambitious in her pursuit of the Pollitt family wealth and determined to cement herself as Brick’s partner although she knows of his homosexual desires. In a society where women were not supposed to have dreams let alone pursue them, Maggie is a “cat on a hot tin roof”, chasing her dreams with careless disregard of established hetero norms.

Literary Perspectives 

Now we get into the tricky stuff! This is one part of your exam and is the Unit 4 Outcome 1 SAC so it’s important that you get a competent grasp of the task! TIP: Follow this link to get an overview of the literary perspectives task (I’m thinking of linking the ultimate lit perspectives guide here, let me know what you think) 

Some prevalent perspectives should jump out at you immediately just by looking at the Concepts and Concerns. Remember that you don’t have to choose just one perspective, it’s more important that you develop an overall interpretation of the text and incorporate the buzzwords that reflect your perspective. Use your perspective/interpretation as a lens to the concepts and concerns mentioned above as a springboard for your analysis

Now we get into the tricky stuff! This is one part of your exam and is the Unit 4 Outcome 1 SAC so you must get a competent grasp of the task! TIP: Follow this link to get an overview of the literary perspectives task  (I’m thinking of linking the ultimate lit perspectives guide here, let me know what you think) 

Here are some general perspectives that you might want to think about:

Think about the role the women in this text play and how they are portrayed. You have three vastly different women who all reflect the social standards that defined the 1950s in varying degrees. 

Maggie does not seem to care much about what Brick wants as much as she cares about her own needs proven when she attempts to force him to do things he doesn’t care much for (pretending he remembered Big Daddy’s birthday or sleeping with her). She stands in diametric opposition to Big Mama and Mae who are both stereotypical women of their times, always forgoing their own desires for their husbands’. In this sense, our sympathy for Maggie only confirms Williams’ notion that women should be able to freely chase their ambitions and break free of restrictive stereotypes. 

These societal standards that reinforce traditional gender roles, heterosexuality and the pervasive male gaze form what literary critics call  heteronormativity.  This is a key notion in feminism and extends this perspective to more than just an analysis of women in society. It also asks us to question how these hetero norms may influence overarching definitions of masculinity. We can see how these hetero norms have forced Brick into an empty cripple whose only clutch is alcohol and the “click” of peace he drinks for. 

TIP: Heteronormativity can also be linked to Marxism as it forms part of the superstructure (institutions and culture considered to result from and reflect the economic system underlying society) that perpetuates the belief that men must be the breadwinner to support their housewives and children. In other words, if you are not supporting your family financially, you are not considered a true man.

Some might argue that the central conflict in the play comes down to who will inherent Big Daddy’s wealth after his death and is only inflamed by Brick’s repressed sexuality.  The American Dream is literally underscored by the chasing of money! 

Consider how the class impacts the tension in the story. Because of their high social status, Brick’s sexuality is only more scandalous. Funnily enough, despite the fact that Maggie knows he does not love her, she could not care less. As I’ve probably hammered in enough by now, she has more regard for the money than Brick (though she does love him). Furthermore, Gooper’s job as a lawyer, in his mind, only further cements him claim to the Pollitt family throne because it pays well and is highly respected. 

Psychoanalysis

Pain, trauma, guilt, desire, gaze and the unconscious. All these things come into play when thinking about psychoanalysis. Popularised by Sigmund Freud who believed (and I’m simplifying here) that psychological theories and techniques could help people better understand their unconscious thoughts, feelings and desires. This is turn, would help them explain their behaviours. 

The best way to start a psychoanalysis of ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ is to think about what each character wants, how they are behaving and how their past might influence this. Brick’s homosexuality and the guilt he feels at Skipper’s death is a great place to start. This is also a great way to integrate to touch on other perspectives if you think about the ways in which heteronormativity or social status may have influenced his decisions back then.

Close Analysis 

TIP: Just because it’s close analysis, doesn’t mean you can forego an overall interpretation!! Remember the Concepts and Concerns of the author! Here is a link to help you out with more general close analysis advice (again same idea as previous section, to

Some might argue that the central conflict in the play comes down to who will inherit Big Daddy’s wealth after his death and is only inflamed by Brick’s repressed sexuality. The American Dream is underscored by the chasing of money! 

Consider how the class impacts the tension in the story. Because of their high social status, Brick’s sexuality is only more scandalous. Funnily enough, even though Maggie knows he does not love her, she could not care less. As I’ve probably hammered in enough by now, she has more regard for the money than Brick (though she does love him). Furthermore, Gooper’s job as a lawyer, in his mind, only further cements him claim to the Pollitt family throne because it pays well and is highly respected. 

The best way to start psychoanalysis of ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ is to think about what each character wants, how they are behaving and how their past might influence this. Brick’s homosexuality and the guilt he feels at Skipper’s death is a great place to start. This is also a great way to integrate to touch on other perspectives if you think about how heteronormativity or social status may have influenced his decisions back then.

TIP: Just because it’s close analysis, doesn’t mean you can forego an overall interpretation!! Remember the Concepts and Concerns of the author! Here is a link to help you out with more general close analysis advice (again same idea as the previous section, to link the ultimate guides) 

The close analysis essentially wants you to analyse the nitty-gritty of your text. Demonstrate to VCAA that you understand how language creates meaning and can support the overarching values of the author. Questions of form, structure, language devices and literary techniques all come in to play when thinking about how Tennessee Williams created meaning in the play. Think of yourself as a detective who must find the most forensic examples in supporting your overall perspective. Here are a few things you might want to consider when closely analysing ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’. 

The Form – Play

The Play as a form is one of the most distinct types. It is a show for an audience and does not have as much intimacy as a novel. It has stage directions that the audience does not see and even minute punctuation that must be portrayed by actors. It is important that you can demonstrate you understand this!

Different stage directions will impact the audience in a multitude of ways. For example, Williams had detailed ‘Notes for the Designer’ that closely depicted the setting and atmosphere of the play. In it, he detailed the story of “Jack Straw and Peter Ochello, a pair of old bachelors” who were rumoured to be gay. This instantly establishes homosexuality as a backdrop of the play, it is woven into the setting. 

Or you might want to analyse the stage directions that constantly punctuate Brick’s dialogue; every time he speaks it is “absently”, “dreamily” or “vaguely”, which further emphasises his cool and aloof nature. This is in contrast to when he speaks about Skipper in which he suddenly becomes defensive; his dialogue graduates from resigned one-liners to profuse emotional rants. 

Structure – The Acts, the Setting, characters, timeframe

Whilst the form of a play is unique in itself, there are certain aspects of ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof’ that differentiates it from others. 

For example, the play in its entirety occurs within one day. This emphasises the extent to which the Pollitt family had already been teetering on the edge of unleashing the secrets of the family. The confirmation of Big Daddy’s death only opens this up further and unwinds the atmosphere of secrecy, denial and mendacity in merely a few hours. 

This is only heightened by the fact that the entire play occurs in one room, the “bed-sitting-room” of the plantation home. Therefore, no matter how hard the family tries to escape the truth, the claustrophobia created by having so many of them in one room together acts as a catalyst for the truth to be revealed. 

Also, consider how these characters are established! What has been said explicitly and what has been alluded to. For example, it is never explicitly said that Brick is gay or that Big Daddy will die (to his face at least). In some ways, despite the fact that everyone knows the truth, it is still a truth too difficult to bear and speaking it out loud will only confirm what they have been in denial about for so long. 

For an overview of the Literature Study Design as a whole, be sure to check out our Ultimate Guide to VCE Literature . 

What’s Changing?

The largest change is that the Literary Perspectives area of study has been removed and replaced with an area of study called ‘Developing Interpretations’. Literary Perspectives introduced you to literary theories like marxism, feminism and post-structuralism. These might still be relevant if your teacher decides to use them, but for the most part, they have been cut. 

Developing Interpretations (Unit 3.2) is about differing opinions of texts. You are being asked to develop an interpretation of your text and to use the evidence available to you to support that understanding of the text. This process is difficult, and TBH is something that teachers, tutors and scholars of literature (and humanities) take for granted. It requires understanding the text, its form, its context, the author, the views and values, the aspects of texts and (if that isn’t enough) to be able to understand how they all connect together , before writing an essay that makes your understanding of all of that stuff coherent.

This new AoS also asks you to take your interpretation and consider it alongside another interpretation, because you get to read a supplementary text ! This supplementary text is heavily implied to be a piece of academia. The supplementary reading is supposed to offer an interpretation of the text, and you need to consider how that changes your interpretation. Does it? Was an idea fundamental to your interpretation debunked? Was there something you overlooked? Does the addition of a theoretical framework (like post-colonialism or feminism) impact your understanding?

What Do I Need To Do?

According to the study design, Developing Interpretations involves ‘develop[ing] interpretations of a set text informed by the ideas, views and values of the set text and a supplementary reading’. This means there are two key sections , first is the development of an interpretation, and second is the reconsideration of that initial interpretation. Let’s look at each section in turn:

Developing an Interpretation

2008’s Ironman, directed by John Favreau, is the story of a billionaire weapons dealer who, after a life-altering event, dismantles his weapons-manufacturing business in order to use his genius-level intellect to construct a suit of armour and become a superhero.

Ironman demonstrates the evils of the American war machine whilst showing that moral individuals are capable of redirecting resources and energy into genuine ways of improving people's lives.

Let’s not pretend that Ironman is the pinnacle of modern storytelling. But what we can see in the statement above is an example of an interpretation. We can offer an opposing interpretation that’s a bit more critical:

Ironman demonstrates, falsely, that the altruism of one ‘good guy with a gun’ can compensate for a systemic ravaging of the Middle East by the American colonial war machine.

Both of these interpretations deal with the same text and the same aspects of that text. They both comment on Ironman ’s exploration of weapons-dealing, and the protagonist’s response to that issue. The first interpretation is - arguably - the message the screenwriters, Fergus, Ostby, and Marcum intended for us to take away from the story. The second interpretation is considering the efficacy of that take-home message: Is Ironman actually the good guy, or is there a larger systemic issue at play, beyond the morals of one man?

To come up with an interpretation, you must consider views and values , aspects of texts and the context the text was created in. Aspects of texts like genre and characterisation demonstrate how the author views a certain issue or idea, and these issues or ideas are usually aspects of the author’s context. At this stage of developing an interpretation, VCAA wants you to focus on close analysis of the text, so ask questions about how a certain motif might reveal something about the author’s views and values. Or, how does a minor character relate to a historical figure that is contextually relevant to the text? For an excellent example of such an analysis and interpretation, I highly recommend the Coraline Bug Theory by Karsten Runquist (YouTube). 

For an in-depth look at how to combine views and values, textual features, and context, check out LSG’s A Killer Literature Study Guide .

The Supplementary Reading 

So, you’ve developed a unique and plausible interpretation of your text using the evidence available to you, the context , and the author’s views and values . At this stage, you might have a SAC where you defend your interpretation. No matter how the SAC is done, after developing the interpretation, you will be given a supplementary reading . This can take multiple forms, being a piece written by your teacher, an ‘explication of a literary theory’ or an academic article. The ‘explication of a literary theory’ basically means a work explaining a literary theory, like Marxism, feminism or post-modernism.

After you have read and considered the supplementary reading in class, you will have to see how your initial interpretation holds up, and either adapt or defend your interpretation in light of the new information. If you’re struggling to rethink your ideas, try these steps:

1) Free your mind, dude. Be open to the possibility that you were wrong. Be willing to abandon ideas that you thought were really interesting. They probably were really interesting and different, but unfortunately, they just might not hold up in light of the new piece.

2) Rebut the article. If your ideas are being completely dunked on by the article, can you dunk on the article? Don’t be egregious, but there may be things where you feel that your argument is stronger, why? What has the author missed about a character or event that actually helps to better support your argument?

3) Make room for nuance. You might have an article that mostly agrees with you but helps you to see where you might have been too absolutist. Sure, the text’s views and values are pretty homophobic, and your supplementary reading agrees, but maybe the text is showing that homophobia in a way you hadn’t initially realised.

Pro Tips for Reading Academic Articles

One of the options for the supplementary reading is academic articles (also known as critical readings/articles/essays). These are the kinds of essays that incredibly well-educated and fancy university people with monocles write, and as such, they can be quite difficult to read, especially if they are new to you. Because academia is likely new to you in Years 11 and 12, we want to give you some pro tips for reading and understanding these articles, which will help you all the way into university!

When you’re first given your supplementary reading, it can be really daunting. The most important thing to remember here is to take it slow. You will not understand it immediately, and no one is expecting you to. Here are some cheat codes to be able to understand academic articles faster.

1) Read the Whole Thing

Front to back. Including and especially the abstract, introduction and conclusion. You will not understand a word, but maybe some things will jump out; nice phrases or sentences that kinda feel like something. It might be as simple as a statement like: ‘Mina Harker not only escapes the fate of the other women: she is also largely responsible for the capture and ultimate destruction of Dracula.’ (Senf 1982, p. 34). This statement isn’t Senf’s entire point in the article, but it does help me to interpret Mina’s character in Dracula .

While you’re reading, look up words you don’t understand and write their meaning in the margin. Whilst some might suggest doing this on a second read, it really makes no difference, so you might as well get it out of the way here.

2) Re-read the Introduction and Conclusions

And read them closely. Where is the author commenting on previous peoples’ work, and when are they making their own argument? The introduction usually does a few things:

1)  Introduces the text

2) Does a literature review wherein the author looks at previous works of academia and considers their merits

3)  Introduces their main argument and their supporting arguments

The conclusion does what your conclusions should be doing! It restates the core arguments and supporting arguments, connecting them in a way that leads to a clear interpretation.

Reading the intro and conclusion helps you understand the whole piece because it’s the same arguments without all the extraneous wordiness and verboseness of the actual body paragraphs. It lacks some nuance and the logic behind the arguments, but it signposts what the author is actually saying.

3) Try to Summarise the Author’s Interpretation

After reading the article a couple of times and focusing heavily on the intro and conclusion, discuss with your classmates what they got from the piece. Try to state or write down the core argument of the author and the ways they defend that contention. This is a practice that you will do all the way to university, so it’s worth getting some practice in! Most articles use the same structure you do at school, which is an introduction, three arguments and a conclusion. It’s just that those three arguments are a lot more complex and long-winded. If you’re lucky, the author has used subheadings to separate the arguments.

4) Read More Academic Articles

This is a little bit of a cheat, and definitely more effort, but trust me: it pays off . The best Literature students are well-read. Reading fiction (especially the classics) allows you to see how your text fits into the wider literary world. Things like genres, literary movements, historical ideas and pop culture references can only be gleaned from a text if you have the knowledge of other texts: It’s really hard to watch the later Avengers movies without having seen Ironman ! Same goes for Literature. Academic authors do the same thing - How does Dracula compare to Edgar Allen Poe? How does Alias Grace fit into a wider feminist discourse in the late 90s?

Reading more academic articles gives you a way to practice engaging with academia and to repeatedly expose yourself to the language, forms and ways of thinking that are common in academics. If the best Literature students read loads of fiction, imagine what reading loads of university-level academia could do!

The SAC for Developing Interpretations is a little bit weird. It’s worth 50% of Unit 3, but is split into two parts:

Your teacher might do the two parts together, or separately. In any case, Part B will include the use of a passage from the set text that you must engage with. How does the passage help you to interpret the text, and how does that interpretation agree or disagree with the interpretation presented in the supplementary reading? Here are some of the possible ways that your teacher may decide to design the SAC:

1) Part A and Part B are assessed in separate tasks

Part A is assessed after sustained study of the set text. Students are invited to explore a key idea or value in the text and consider how the text has presented and represented that concern or value. They could, for example, explore the ways a text has presented and represented isolation or power or marriage.

Part B is assessed after students consider the supplementary reading. Students revisit the key concern or value through a passage from the set text and provide an enhanced interpretation informed by the supplementary reading.

2) Part A and Part B are assessed as one task

Students are provided with a passage from the set text and a specific question that relates to one of the text’s key ideas. Students engage with a close reading of the passage based on the key idea, offering an interpretation drawn from the language of the text and from the views and values of the text. They then build on that initial interpretation by engaging with the ideas and/or position they have considered through the supplementary reading.

The most difficult part of the SAC for this new AoS is balancing your interpretation, the textual evidence and the alternative interpretation of the supplementary reading. It is vital that if you are doing Literature this year, that you know your 3.2 text like the back of your hand, and that you practice writing loads and loads. It is also worth trying to make your interpretation incredibly specific so that you can go in-depth into one idea, rather than simply skimming over 3 or 4 big ideas. 

Check out our Developing Interpretations SAC Guide: Interpreting Alias Grace blog post for more. Even if you're not studying Alias Grace, this blog post will further clarify what to expect from the Developing Interpretation SAC.  

Going Forward

I highly recommend that you begin engaging in interpretative and analytical exercises that you can apply to your everyday life. As a Literature student, there is an assumption that you’re interested in Literature (obviously!), film and visual media, history, current affairs and even visual arts. In the wonderful age of the internet there are unlimited free resources that can support your engagement with these fields in interesting ways. I like to say to my Llit students that analysis should be something you can’t turn off - you should be watching TV and disassembling the ways in which Love Island manufactures drama and keeps you engaged. Why does this advertisement make me want to eat KFC? How has this author made me cry after this character’s death? To develop strong interpretations of literature, you need to be cognizant of the history, construction and theories of literature, and so engaging with as many texts as possible supports your ability to recognise things like genre, historical literary and artistic movements and emotionally manipulative language. 

These resources should help you see how skilled literary and media critics analyse fictional worlds.

Death of the Author by Lindsay Ellis (YouTube). Discusses authorial intent and whether we can view ‘the art without the artist’. Ellis also has fantastic interpretations of film and TV.

Nerdwriter (YouTube). Likely one of the best examples of closely analysing text. Check out his video on Shakespeare’s Sonnet 116 , and on how Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders answer questions.

literarydevices.net . Literally my favourite website. A database of every imaginable literary device, how they function, and popular examples. Invaluable for the lit student.

Databases. Go to your school library and ask your librarian what Arts and Humanities databases your school has access to. JSTOR, ProQuest and AusLit, are all databases that host the kinds of articles you should be exposing yourself to. If you are tutoring with Lisa’s Study Guides , then your tutor may be able to help you gather resources from some databases.

Film and Television

Pop Culture Detective (YouTube) especially his videos on the Marvel Universe and the status quo , and misogyny in the Big Bang Theory (CW: discusses sexual assault).

Super Position by David Grueber (Article). Referenced in Pop Culture Detective’s MCU episode and interprets the narrative form of the superhero genre.

The Coraline Bug Theory by Karsten Runquist (YouTube). An excellent example of developing an interpretation of a text and using a minor textual element to explore that interpretation.

CineFix (YouTube) especially their “What’s the Difference” and “Top 10” series. Although presenting film ‘for the masses’, their Top 10 lists constantly consider how an idea (like family or cars ) contribute to the messaging of the film.  

Written expression is often overlooked in our essays. Often, if we are made aware of clunky or awkward expression, we are also not quite sure how to go about improving it. Although sophisticated and pertinent ideas serve as the foundation of a successful essay, how we construct our sentences and express these ideas may be what distinguishes a good essay from a great essay.

These differences can be rather subtle, but the small things can and do matter.

1) USE YOUR VOCAL CHORDS  

(to read out loud, not sing… unless you really want to)

Take your essay and read it out loud. Let your own conscience guide you in terms of whether a particular sentence flows well, is complete and makes sense. Keep your eye out for these small errors in particular: Grammar: Does your sentence actually make sense? Let’s have a look at an example: Although Funder suggests that the act of telling one’s story, especially one of victimisation, can catalyse the internal confrontation and healing required to move on.

(This is not grammatically correct! This is because this example only contains a subordinate clause and is lacking a main clause.)

But wait… what is this ‘subordinate clause’ and ‘main clause’?

A clause includes a subject and a verb .

Melissa ate an apple.After Wendy ate an apple.

What is the difference between the two clauses above?

‘Melissa ate an apple’ makes grammatical sense on its own. This is what we call a main clause (or an independent clause). On the other hand, ‘ After Wendy ate an apple’ is an incomplete sentence as it does not make sense. What happened after Wendy ate her apple? This is the information that is missing from the latter clause, making this a subordinate clause (or a dependent clause).

So now let’s try again…

Although Funder suggests that the act of telling one’s story, especially one of victimisation, can catalyse the internal confrontation and healing required to move on, ultimately, these individuals can never be truly free from the past that has irrevocably defined them.  

(Hooray! This is a complete sentence now.)

Spelling : Are the title of the text, the author or director’s name, characters’ names, publisher’s name, etc. all spelt correctly (and capitalised, underlined, and italicised appropriately)?

Did you use the correct there, their and they’re? How about it’s and its? (and so on).

Sentence length: Did that sentence just go on for 5 lines on a page and you are out of breath now? You can most probably split that overloaded sentence into two or more sentences that make much more sense. Check whether you have a clear subject in your sentence. If you have three different ideas in one sentence, give each idea its own opportunity (ie. sentence) to shine. The opposite also applies: if it is for a very short sentence, did that sentence pack enough content or analysis?

One spelling error or half-finished sentence in an essay will not severely affect your mark, but they can easily add up if they occur often enough. Consequently, this will distract the reader from engaging with your ideas fully and thus disrupt the flow of your essay.

By being aware of these aspects, you are now able to easily fix them and boost your writing.

2) BE SUBTLE

Try not to be casual or overt in your writing as it can be quite jarring to read and unfortunately give readers a potentially negative impression of your piece.

Try not to use phrases such as:

- In my opinion… (You do not need it as your entire essay should be your implicit opinion!)

- This quote shows that… (Embed the quote and link to its implication instead)

- This technique is designed to… (Identify the technique and be specific, especially in Language Analysis)

- I think that…, I believe… (Avoid using first person in a formal essay. Use of first person in creative writing is fine though if required)

They are redundant and do not add much to your ideas and analysis. Try omitting them and see whether that helps your sentence flow better and seem more formal.

3) LINK ‘EM UP

Sentences that seem disjointed or a clear connection can make it difficult for your teacher or the assessor to join the dots between an idea and an implication or consequence. Use linking words as they are fantastic for explicitly showing the reader how your ideas are related and thus allow your writing to proceed smoothly.

Therefore, hence, thus, thereby, consequently, subsequently, in addition, additionally, furthermore, moreover, on the other hand, on the contrary, however, henceforth, and so on… The list is endless!

4) ADD OOMPH (through vocabulary)

In general, having a wide vocabulary will allow you to express your ideas and analysis more accurately as you are likely to have access to a precise word that can capture the essence of your idea. Make a vocabulary list for a particular text or for Language Analysis (such as tone words) and aim to use varied language to convey yourself well.

If you’d like to see a list of sentence starters and essay phrases to help you get a headstart on expanding your vocabulary, check out this blog .

Focus on verbs and expanding your list of synonyms for words such as shows, demonstrates, highlights, emphasises, suggests and so on. An individual, character, author or director may not only be conveying but also denigrating or remonstrating or bolstering or glorifying or insinuating . Adding precision to your writing through careful vocabulary choice will distinguish your writing and also add complexity.

BEWARE! There is a fine line to tread with sophisticated vocabulary - do not overload your writing as you can risk writing convoluted sentences that hinder the reader’s ability to understand your piece. Also make sure that you understand the nuances of each synonym and that they are used in the correct context! (They are synonyms after all - not the same word!)

If you are debating whether to use a word, ask yourself: do you know what it means? 

If yes: Go for it!

If no: Do not use it until you know what it means.

Reading sample essays, The Age Text Talks, reviews and more of the texts you are currently studying will expose you to not only a multitude of interpretations of your text, but also to different sentence structures, writing styles or vocabulary that you could incorporate into your own writing.

I would also highly recommend that you read outside of the texts you are studying if you have time, whether that may be novels by the same author or even newspapers. Your written expression will only benefit from this exposure as the ways you can express yourself through writing continue to increase upon seeing others’ eloquence.

6) GET WRITING

If you do not write, you will never be able to improve your written expression. Put pen to paper (or hands to keyboard) and start constructing that essay. You can only fix your writing once you have writing to fix.

The idea of critical lenses in literary perspective essays can often be tough to fully grasp. Is sticking to just one ok? Are there enough examples in the text to support a purely feminist viewpoint? Or a Marxist one? What about post-colonialism? Sometimes it’s difficult to find a clear through line, especially when the concepts you’re attempting to discuss are so complex.

Luckily when it comes to Shakespearean texts, Twelfth Night in particular, a lot of people throughout history have already studied these ideas and critical lenses, and there are many more resources out there for you to utilize than you might think.

Thus, we are faced with the extremely helpful nature of published critical readings. These critical essays are pieces often published by university professors or scholars which offer an in-depth analysis and examination of a given text. While much of the language is complicated and a bit overwrought at times, the content within the essays can give you helpful ideas and can help you gather a repertoire of vocabulary and evidence for your own literary perspectives essay. In fact, if you type in “Twelfth Night critical readings” into your google search tab, there will be pages of valuable content at your disposal.

Literary perspectives

For instance, the critical essay Rethinking Sexuality and Class in Twelfth Night by Nancy Lindhiem, gives insight into both the Marxist and the queer lens.

Here is an extract from Lindhiem’s reading in which she discusses the idea of “androgyny” and sexuality (noted specifically in the bolded words):

“While Viola is barely male except in attire, the dual aspect of Sebastian’s androgyny is carefully explored. The Elizabethan audience’s first, external, impression – he looks like his sister! – is reinforced ‘internally’ in his conversation with Antonio. His exquisite sensitivity to the quality of his friend’s feelings and the obligation it lays upon him might well be seen as a woman’s trait. ”

After reading Lindhiem’s discussion of the “androgynous” twins within the play and how this displays a disparity between gender identity, this student then decided to expand on in a similar idea in a part of their paragraph below (queer lens). In the first part of the sentence, the student outlines the idea of androgyny (shown in bold) specific to the character of Viola. Later on, the student also explores the idea of different behaviours contributing to certain gender traits much like Lindhiem’s notation of it in the above paragraph (shown in bold in the last sentence), however concludes on a broader outline of sexuality as a whole, rather than focussing on just female traits.

Viola’s mediatory role between Olivia and Orsino’s households, coupled with her androgynous performance as a woman playing a man (adding further confusion to the Elizabethan stage convention of a male actors playing women on stage) evokes a form of genderbending and identity perplexity that pervades the play’s dramatic trajectory and opens up what is possible, if not overtly permissible, on a spectrum of sexuality.

Another way of making use of these critical readings is to draw from some of their sophisticated vocabulary. The following is an example of how a student was able to adjust and expand her vocabulary specific to their chosen lens by reading critical essays.

After studying a couple of feminist and queer critical essays to Twelfth Night , the student highlighted some repetitive language and terms used within the essays, and was able to use them within their own essay.

Casey Charles’ Theatre Journal exert Gender Trouble in Twelfth Night uses the phrasing

“ the phenomenon of love itself operates as a mechanism that destabilizes gender binarism and its concomitant hierarchies”.

The student went on to use the term gender binarism in one of her essay’s sentences:

In all, Twelfth Night delineates the true fluidity within gender binarisms as well as the way in which societal structures are enforced and reiterated…

Alternatively, the critical essay Gender Ambiguity and Desire in Twelfth Night by Maria Del Rosario Arias Doblas makes use of the terms “homoerotic” and “heterosexual” throughout its text - “homoeroticism residing in theatrical transvestitism… and homosexual allusions and so on pervade the play to create the “most highly intricate misunderstandings”’ - thus outlining the type of high-level language specific to a queer reading of the play that the student was able to implement in their own work:

In fact, Shakespeare oscillates between reinforcing patriarchal ideology and heterosexual language, and the deconstruction of such romantic ideals, simultaneously closeting and disclosing the queer possibilities typical to conservative societies that use violence to repress homosociality and police the safe expression of homosexual exploration within heterosexual norms.

As you can see, the student’s language is now specified to the type of lens they are using in their literary perspectives essay, and is also of a high register.

External or Contextual references

Another benefit of going through critical readings is the external or contextual references they make. An example of this is in Rethinking Sexuality and Class in Twelfth Night by Nancy Lindhiem, where the author makes reference to Narcissus, a character from Metamorphoses – a Latin narrative poem from 8 AD:

“For all the likelihood that both Olivia and Sebastian are seduced by a visual perception, we probably feel that Olivia succumbs mainly to Cesario’s way with words.9 Several critics have commented on the allusion to Ovid’s Echo in Cesario’s ‘babbling gossip of the air’ (1.5.277)”

Noticing this reference as a motif in many other critical readings too, this student decided to insert it into their own essay here:

These central relationships therefore reapply the idea of self-reflexivity while blurring the structured boundaries of identity stability, central to the Narcissus myth of which Echo from Ovid’s Metamorphosis forms a part ; “a very echo to the seat/ where love is throned” invokes a doubling motif, as well as the troubling foundation of representation over reality.

See how the student was able to discuss it in their own way? Referencing external texts in your literary perspectives essay can prove very useful if done once or twice, as it demonstrates that you are able to apply the values within the chosen text to wider elements of society and culture.

Getting started

One of the most efficient ways of going through these sorts of essays (which are often quite elaborate and at times difficult to understand fully) is to print them out, grab a highlighter and pen and skim through as much as possible. Highlight words, terms or phrases which spark your intrigue, or ones you feel you may be able to manipulate as evidence to support your own essay.

Overall, reading as many of these expert-written critical essays as possible can be extremely beneficial in developing a greater understanding of the critical lenses, the ideals and context of the Elizabethan theatre, and the way both dialogue and staging can be used as evidence in your own essays.

The more you know about the play, the more you’ll be able to write about it. So, get reading!

Links to the readings:

Rethinking Sexuality and Class in Twelfth Night, Nancy Lindheim

Gender Ambiguity and Desire in Twelfth Night, Maria Del Rosario Arias Doblas ‍

Gender Trouble in Twelfth Night, Casey Charles

Theme vs. Motif vs. Symbol

Themes, motifs and symbols are different kinds of narrative elements - they’re parts of a story that help to shape its overall effect. However, even though they’re words we use all the time in our English studies, it isn’t always easy to tell the difference!

This post will take you through some definitions , give you some examples and show you how you can use them in essays too. Let’s start with the broadest of the three…

What Is a Theme?

A theme is an idea or a subject that an author wants to explore. Themes appear throughout a work, and they’re often abstract ideas rather than concrete images that you can explicitly identify. Themes usually appear in interactions: for example, a parent reuniting with a child might evoke the theme of parenthood or family, an experience of discrimination might evoke the theme of prejudice or racism, a character facing a difficult choice might evoke the theme of morality or conflict, and so on. As you might be able to see, themes can require us to read between the lines because they are usually implied.

What Is a Motif?

A motif is something a bit more specific. Rather than an abstract idea, we’re looking for a concrete object (usually physical items, but also potentially sounds, places, actions, situations or phrases) that returns time and time again throughout a text. This repetition of motifs helps to create structure for a text - it can tether parts of the story to or around a central image. Because motifs are often linked to a theme , they can also serve as a reminder of that theme’s importance. For example, if the central theme was family or parenthood, the author might create a bird’s nest outside a character’s room; as we watch the bird and the chicks grow throughout the text, parallels are also drawn back to the theme.  

What Is a Symbol?

You can think of symbols as motifs minus the repetition . It’s the more default word we use when referring to an object that represents an idea, and unlike a motif, symbols only need to appear once to have an impact. They can simply tell us more about a character or situation in that instant, at that specific time, rather than being a parallel or recurring throughout a text. However, they’re still identified in a similar way to motifs: symbols are also concrete objects and they’re still connected to themes. 

Examples of Themes, Motifs and Symbols

Here are some text-specific examples for a closer look at these terms: 

Check out our Macbeth , Rear Window and The Great Gatsby blog posts for more on these texts. If you’re studying other texts, have a look at our list of text guides in The Ultimate Guide to Text Response .

Identifying and Using Themes

Themes usually come across in interactions , and a possible first step to identifying them is thinking about if an interaction is good or bad, and why. For example:

In Rear Window , one of the neighbours berates everyone else for failing to notice their dog’s death.

This is a bad interaction because:

• a dog dying is never any good
• it tells us that none of these neighbours are looking out for or really care about each other
• someone may have killed the dog

The theme we might identify here is duty. The film might suggest that we have a duty to look out for our neighbours (without sacrificing their privacy) or to do our part to keep the neighbourhood safe from potential criminals.

Another example might be:

In The Great Gatsby , the Sloanes invite Gatsby over for dinner without really meaning it.

• it tells us how nasty the Sloanes are
• Gatsby still seems to be a misfit despite his wealth
• Tom is at best complicit in the Sloanes’ insincerity 

The themes here might be society, wealth and class . This interaction shows us where these characters really stand with regard to these categories or ideas. Because he is ‘new money’, Gatsby cannot understand or fit in with the cruel and disingenuous customs of ‘old money’.

Most interactions in a text will fit into a theme somewhere, somehow - that’s why it’s been included in the story! Try to identify the themes as you go , or maintain lists of interactions and events for different themes. Because themes are so broad, they’re useful for guiding your understanding of a text, particularly as you’re reading it. They also provide a great foundation for essay planning since you can draw on events across the text to explore a certain theme.

Identifying and Using Motifs & Symbols

While themes can generally appear in texts without the author needing to make too much of an effort, motifs and symbols have to be used really consciously . A lot of interactions might just be natural to the plot, but the author has to take extra care to insert a symbol or motif into the story.

To identify either, pay attention to objects that might feel unusual or even unnecessary to the scene at first - from the examples above, Gatsby showing Daisy his shirts might seem like a strange detail to include, but it’s actually an important symbol in that moment. Then, you go into the brainstorming of what the object could represent - in this case, Gatsby’s newfound wealth. Symbols in particular often appear at turning points : the relationship between two characters might take a turn, an important sacrifice might be made or perhaps someone crosses a point of no return - all of these are potential plot points for the author to include symbols. For motifs , look more for repetition . If we’re always coming back to an image or an object, like Daisy’s green light or Lisa Fremont’s dresses, then it’s likely that image or object has significance.

Symbols and motifs can be more subtle than themes, but they will also help to set your essay apart if you find a way to include them. You’d usually include them as a piece of evidence (with or without a quote) and analyse what they tell us about a theme. For example:

‍ On the surface, Gatsby appears to be financially successful. Over several years, he has acquired many material belongings in order to demonstrate his great wealth. For example, Fitzgerald includes a scene featuring Gatsby tossing his many ‘beautiful’ shirts onto Daisy, who sobs as she admires them. This display of wealth represents the superficial natures of both characters, who prize material belongings over the substance of their relationship.

You don’t need a quote that’s too long or overpowering ; just capture the essence of the symbol or motif and focus on what it represents. This is a really good way to show examiners how you’ve thought about a text’s construction, and the choices an author has made on what to include and why. To learn more about text construction, have a read of What Is Metalanguage?

To the Lit kids out there, you already know that VCE Literature is a whole different ball game – You’re part of a small cohort, competing against some of the best English students in the state and spots in the 40+ range are fairly limited. So how can you ensure that it’s your essay catches the assessor’s eye? Here are some tips which will hopefully give you an edge.  

• Constantly refer back to the language of the passages

Embed quotes from the passages into both your introduction and conclusion and of course, throughout the essay. Don’t leave any room for doubt that you are writing on the passages right in front of you rather than regurgitating a memorized essay. A good essay evokes the language of the passages so well that the examiner should barely need to refer back to the passages.

Here’s part of a sample conclusion to illustrate what I mean:

  In comparison to Caesar, who sees lands, the “’stablishment of Egypt,” as the epitome of all triumphs, the lovers see such gains, “realms and islands,” as “plates dropp’d from his pocket.” It is dispensable and transient like cheap coins, mere “dungy earth” and “kingdoms of clay.” This grand world of heroic virtue is set in the past tense, where the lover once “bestrid the ocean,” once “crested the world,” but it is the world which will arguably endure in our hearts.

So, you can see that analysis of the language does not stop even in the conclusion and yet it still ties into the overall interpretation of the text that I have presented throughout the essay.

• If appropriate, include quotes from the author of the text

A good way to incorporate views and values of the author in your writing is to quote things they have said themselves. This may work better for some texts than others but if you find a particularly poetic quote that ties in well with the interpretation you are presenting, then make sure to slip it in. It shows that you know your stuff and is an impressive way to show off your knowledge of the author’s views and values.

Here’s a sample from an introduction on Adrienne Rich poetry which includes a quote from her essay, “When We Dead Awaken.”

Adrienne Rich’s poetry is the process of discovering a “new psychic geography” (When We Dead Awaken) with a language that is “refuse[d], ben[t] and torque[d]” not to subjugate but as an instrument for “connection rather than apartheid.”

• Memorise quotes throughout the text

Yes, there are passages right in front of you, but don’t fall into the trap of not memorizing significant quotes from the text as a whole. Dropping a relevant quote in from another section of the text demonstrates that you understand the text as a whole.

The originality of your ideas and the quality of your writing come first and foremost, but these are little ways in which you can add a little extra something to your essay.

1. Don't focus just on ideas and avoid language engagement.

Language engagement is every bit as important as ideas. Sometimes, when you get stuck in philosophical musings, you might find yourself in a place where you're spouting on and on about solipsism or the intrinsic desire for independence in the 19th century Norwegian working class. Literature essays are all about finding balance, and here, that balance means language engagement. Whether you are writing about literary criticism or a passage analysis, you have to be able to support your interpretations with textual evidence.

Often, this requires some creative thinking. You can have a lot of fun with it and the examiners like you to pick up on small details and connect it to a grander scope.

Here's an example from Jane Eyre.

“my eyes seemed as if they had beheld the fount of fruition, and borrowed beams from the lustrous ripple.”

“I was not surprised...to feel...the breathing of a fresh and fragrant breeze...The rooks cawed, and blither birds sang; but nothing was so merry or so musical as my own rejoicing heart.”

In this passage, Jane is rejoicing over her marriage proposal, but readers are led to understand that this may be a false, idealistic dream of hers. Note the patterns of alliteration – the fricative 'f' shifting to the plosive 'b' in “fount of fruition” and “borrowed beams” then again from “fresh and fragrant breeze” to “blither birds”. What could it possibly mean?

Fricatives tend to indicate freedom, whereas plosives tend to indicate an abruptness – a harsh change. Perhaps, Jane's wild, free joy is immediately followed by plosive alliteration so as to illustrate how her happiness is cut short and her dream is a false one – she will attempt to achieve freedom through this romance, but she will be abruptly and unceremoniously prevented from attaining it.

Regardless, in any passage, there are always things to talk about and little language quirks to exploit to figure out an interpretation. Start from these little details, and build out and out until you tackle your big ideas. All of these ideas should be rooted in language.

2. Don't prioritise complicated language over ideas.

Often, when you think that expressive, complicated writing takes priority over ideas in Literature, you tend to end up with flowery material that becomes more convoluted than it is effective. If you are one of those people (I know it's hard) but kill your darlings. Focus on coming up with original ideas, and express them clearly. Cut out redundancies. Be expressive in a way that is natural and in a way where you know that first and foremost, your language is accurate. Don't go around using metaphors purely for the sake of sounding intellectual when you can express something equally eloquently and beautifully with simpler, fluent text.

Remember: this is not to say that you shouldn't be expressive in Literature. In fact, writing style and the ability to write well is a fundamental component to doing well in this subject. It is just vital that you strike the right balance. This is a good lesson to learn sooner rather than later - and you'll be steering into prime territory for the exam.

3. Don't treat Literature like an English essay. Be free!

Good Literature essays generally tend to be more lively and expressive than English essays. Why? Because Literature just doesn't operate under the same criteria, and it shouldn't be treated as such. 

Don't feel like putting in an introduction/conclusion? No need! Don't feel like sticking to a TEEL structure? No problem!

Your focus is creating writing that moves along at a natural, expressive pace, moving through textual evidence to broader ideas. You don't have a structure. You don't have a paragraph quota. You have free reign over a lot of how you write your Literature essays – so find out what works for you.

4. Come up with original interpretations and don't stick with popular readings.

Literature is one of very few subjects in the entirety of VCE that rewards original thinking. You don't need to go with the crowd consensus on how to read your text: as long as you have the evidence to support your reading! The examiners will reward complex, creative, and unique ideas. Every passage analysis you write should be approached with a fresh perspective – base your interpretation around the text in front of you, and not a dogmatic set of ideas that you bring with you.

5. Let the text before you provide you with the ideas, don't force your ideas into the text.

By reading literary criticism and expanding the scope of your ideas, you can apply original readings to each set of passages you have. Your essays stand out when they cover new, uncharted territory.

Literature is all about balance. If you can find it in you to balance language engagement, interpretation, and writing style, I'd say you have yourself a pretty good essay.

Remember not to fall into any of the common traps of the subject, and you'll have put yourself on solid footing to become a true literati.

How Genre Works

We’re not supposed to judge a book based on its cover, but for some reason, we just can’t help it. Sure, we may not be able to tell if we’re going to enjoy the book, nor can we tell what exactly it’s about, but we can tell the tone, set our expectations, and most importantly, guess at the genre. Look at these three book covers and note how they perfectly show their genres - Sci-Fi, Horror and Life Drama, respectively. 

Genre is a way of categorising media. We split books, film and music into genres in order to better talk about them and because humans have a strange desire to sort and categorise things. Within whatever medium, genres display certain structures, characters and tropes that audiences expect from that genre . Audiences like to be able to tell the genre of a text because it’s comfortable. If I go to see a superhero movie I expect wacky costumes, cliche dialogue and a final battle scene that the heroes win - were these expectations not to be met, I would likely be a little bit peeved off. 

But why should you care about genre in VCE Literature? It’s not on the study design?  

Well, not explicitly. In each AoS of the study design, you must engage with ‘the ways the literary forms, features and language of texts affect the making of meaning’ , and/or ‘the ideas of a text and the ways in which they are presented’ . Genres are a feature of texts and are one of the ways that a text will present its ideas. Horror is the most notable example of a genre that uses its tropes to send a message - It Follows is a horror where the monster stands in for sexually transmitted disease, Carrie uses horror to show the horrors of high school, Frankenstein is a criticism of those who would ‘play god’. In the Literature study design, the horror genre is represented by Bram Stoker’s 1897 masterpiece, Dracula.  

For an overview of the Literature study design, check out The Ultimate Guide to VCE Literature . 

Dracula + The Gothic

I invite you to think hard about the horror films you’ve seen and to try to place Dracula into our modern view of horror. It’s hard to put Stoker’s vampire on the same stage as the Babadook , Annabelle or even the ‘70s slasher craze. This gives us an incredible opportunity to consider how audiences engaged and continue to engage with genres. In order to analyse genre, it is essential to recognise what the audience’s expectations were of a genre, and how the author has utilised those expectations for their own ends. Let’s consider Dracula in context .

‍ Dracula is a horror novel. But, we usually don’t think about those uptight Victorians reading texts that were designed expressly to scare. The Victorian era was actually one of the golden ages of horror literature though. But, it is distinctly different from our modern understandings of horror as defined by trailblazers like Stephen King. So, why is it different? It is here we must consider the sub-genre. If you have read anything about Dracula , you’ll note that it is referred to as a ‘gothic horror’ . The gothic genre of literature encapsulates some of the 19th century and certainly the Victorian period’s (1837-1901) best literature. Dracula of course belongs to this group, but it blows up around 1818 with Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein . Edgar Allen Poe, with his short stories and poetry, is widely lauded as the ‘Father of American Gothic’, with ‘The Fall of the House of Usher’ published in 1839. Note the dates here. Stoker published Dracula in 1897, a good 79 years after Frankenstein began haunting readers. Which means he had an established and large genre to work with. So, how did Stoker use the gothic in Dracula?

Tropes of the Gothic

1) the gothic monster.

The vampire myth used by Stoker is turned into the quintessential gothic monster. Dracula existed in the Victorian mind alongside Frankestein’s monster, Mr. Hyde, and Poe’s mixture of humans made monstrous and surreal monsters like that in ‘The Masque of the Red Death’. The defining feature of the gothic monster is its role in the story as a representation of something wrong with society, whether it’s increasingly amoral medicinal science, human greed or perverted desire. 

2) The Creepy Castle

The creepy castle doesn’t have to be a castle. It can be a mansion, a university or the graveyards of London. The important thing is that the setting of the gothic novel should always be - by default - terrifying and evoke a sense of danger. You can never get comfortable in Dracula’s castle, nor in Seward’s asylum, and neither can the characters. 

3) Damsel/s in Distress

For sure an outdated trope, but a constant in the gothic. It’s a quick and simple way to show that the innocence of young women is threatened by a malignant force. In Dracula , look to Mina, Lucy and Mrs. Westenra. But what happens when the damsel saves herself?

4) Omens, Portents, Visions

Visions in dreams? Random wild animals escaping from ships? Ships docking with a completely dead crew? Random changes in the weather? You might be dealing with a gothic villain, or going mad. In either case, Renfield, Dracula, Mina and Jonothan all deal with portents and visions. 

And This Is Important Because…

Stoker has followed the predominant tropes of the gothic horror genre. Why is this important for our analysis of Dracula ? The ways in which authors use genre and other stylistic elements like form, voice or plot relate directly to their intentions. If we investigate the particular aspects of Stoker’s use of the gothic, we may better understand the views and values that he is promoting. For instance, let’s take Dracula as the gothic monster. Since the gothic monster is always a way to reflect society back onto itself, how is Stoker doing that? A feminist analysis might take Dracula as a reflection of sexual deviancy, which then ties into his constant threat towards women. A post-colonial analysis might question the foreignness of Dracula, and view him as a part of the intrusiveness of foreigners in English society. Either way, you’re touching on a view or value presented by Stoker, and tying it to an aspect of the gothic genre in a way that conveniently also touches on characterisation. 

Let’s complicate things a little more. The ‘Damsel in Distress’ trope is clearly evident in Dracula , but what view or value is Stoker commenting on by its inclusion? The simplest answer is that, by showing that women cannot save themselves, Stoker is saying that women are inherently weak and need to be saved by men. But this answer isn’t sufficient for a number of reasons. Firstly, what are the women weak to? Is it a physical mismatch between the women and Dracula, keeping in mind that Dracula is also stronger than the novel’s men? Or is it a symbolic weakness to some aspect of Dracula’s character, be it sexuality or magic? Secondly, and more importantly, are all the women victimised by Dracula the same? Well, obviously not. 

It could very well be argued that Stoker is subverting the ‘Damsel in Distress’ trope by actually giving us a woman who is able to be her own saviour (which is actually becoming a trope in itself nowadays!). The dichotomy between Lucy and Mina is a crucial aspect of the text, and the way that Mina’s character doesn’t quite fit into the ‘Damsel in Distress’ archetype is a major interpretative dilemma. By considering the genre tropes, Lucy is clearly a ‘Damsel in Distress’ who cannot save herself and is unduly victimised by Dracula. It can be argued that her implicit promiscuousness is punished through her murder, but in whatever case, she is distressed and must be saved. Mina, however, has an entirely different view of her distresses. Not only does Mina take on a caring role towards Jonothan - in which Jonothan becomes a ‘Master in Distress’ - she actively supports the attempts to save her and kill Dracula. By compiling the journals, letters and newspaper clippings into the epistolary that we the audience are reading, and using herself as a window into Dracula’s mind through their psychic connection, Mina proves to be a means by which to save herself from her distress. So, the question of what Stoker actually thinks about women is still quite open: Lucy is seemingly punished for her character flaws, which indicates a misogynist view of women’s sexuality, but Mina is praised for her use of masculine qualities like leadership and stoicism. Is Stoker saying women should be more masculine? Less masculine and more traditionally feminine? This entire discussion revolves around how and why the ‘Damsel in Distress’ trope is being followed or subverted. 

Using Genre in VCE

Whilst a genre-based analysis (or a structural analysis) can be a fantastic way to open up discussion and leads to important questions about views and values , the way I have presented it may appear to be another useless and long-winded thing you have to try to shove into an essay when you already have to balance so much in Literature! Fear not, because there are a couple of really easy ways to fit genre into essays without taking up loads of space.

Option one is to use a genre trope as the basis of a paragraph. If your essay contention is that…

‍ ‘Stoker presents the dangers of foreign immigration to England at the height of its colonial empire’

…then you can easily write a paragraph discussing that…

‍ ‘Stoker employs the gothic trope of a supernatural monster in Dracula, using this vampire as a stand-in for foreigners in England’.

This paragraph would discuss Dracula’s characterisation, and the settings of Transylvania and London, whilst investigating Stoker’s views on England’s colonialism and race. In a Developing Interpretations or Close Analysis essay, you’ve just touched on several key criteria, including the author’s views and values , your own credible interpretation of the text and how the text presents its messaging (through characterisation and setting). You can do all these things without mentioning genre, but by explicitly using the language of genre analysis you are likely separating yourself from the student next to you - who had a similar idea but described it in a less interesting way. This is the utility of understanding genre, it gives you the words and concepts necessary to improve your writing and interpretation. The ‘Gothic monster’ is an easy way to describe an otherwise GIANT concept.

Another way is to add it to other analyses in passing. Instead of saying “ Dracula presents Lucy and Mina as foils to demonstrate the ways in which modern women’s promiscuity is ultimately harmful”, you can say “the presentation of Lucy and Mina as two ‘damsels in distress’ in dichotomy with each other demonstrates the differing ways in which Victorian women could doom or save themselves” . The latter sentence has not significantly changed the content of the first, still referring to the women’s opposition to each other, but by phrasing it with ‘damsels in distress’ I leave open the possibility of discussing not just Lucy’s promiscuity, but also Mina’s conservative womanhood. 

Finally, you need not even mention genre or its tropes in the essay, just use it as a thinking tool. If you go back through the previous section of this blog, you’ll see just how many questions I am asking about the tropes and ideas I am discussing. By using the trope as a jumping-off point for a series of questions, I can develop a nuanced understanding of multiple views and values and the ways in which they interconnect. Take a trope like the ‘creepy castle’ and ask:

“Why would Stoker put Dracula manor in the text?”

“Because it sets up the ‘otherness’ of Dracula.”

“Why do we need to know that Dracula is the other?” 

“Because he represents a supernatural foreignness that we need to be scared of.”

“Okay, but why is it right at the start, why is it from Jonothan’s perspective?” 

All of these questions offer ways of breaking down the text and they will naturally lead to questions about structure, characterisation and views and values. In doing this, you can start to come up with ways to turn those questions, or the order of those questions into an essay structure. Moreso, this type of questioning is what your teacher, tutors and top-tier Literature students are doing. It is a constant process of asking, answering, reconsidering, reasking and synthesising. And genre is an easy way to start the process. 

Updated 23/09/2020.

‍ One of the most prominent questions I receive from students  is this: “do I need to write an introduction?”. This is usually followed with “how do I write an introduction?”.

Firstly, yes,  I believe all students should be writing introductions  as they are an excellent way to showcase your ability to provide an insight into your personal “reading” of the text, interpret the passages and allow you an avenue through which to begin your discussion of the material. In this guide, I will be explaining two of the key elements to be utilised to create a strong introduction.

When constructing introductions, it is important to note that the VCAA Literature Exam Criteria is as follows:

• understanding of the text demonstrated in a relevant and plausible interpretation
• ability to write expressively and coherently to present an interpretation
• understanding of how views and values may be suggested in the text
• analysis of how key passages and/or moments in the text contribute to an interpretation
• analysis of the features of a text and how they contribute to an interpretation
• analysis and close reading of textual details to support a coherent and detailed interpretation of the text

What you need to include in your Close Analysis introduction

Considering these points, your introduction should feature these 2 elements:  your personal reading  of the text and  your interpretation  of the passages.

Your personal reading  is simply your perception of the text. Though the key facets of the text such as the plot and the characters are generally viewed by the majority in a similar fashion, each student will have their own opinions of the text. This can range from resonating with particular scenes or placing a greater emphasis on a certain concept or relationship.

Your interpretation of the passages  is the way in which you view the excerpts given to you. Akin to your personal reading, the core aspects of the passages will likely be viewed similarly by most students, however your point of difference will come from how you perceive  the passages suggest views and values  and  how features and moments contribute to an interpretation  (factors coming from the criteria).

In terms of structure, try to begin with a sentence or two explaining  your personal reading of the text.  The key to doing so in a manner befitting Close Analysis however, is to utilise  quotes from the passages  to supplement your assertion.

Here is a sample written about George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion”:

George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” contrasts the absence of morality in the titled upper class of 19th century England who dehumanise common citizens as “pebbles on the beach” and the under privileged but morally conscious lower class, “intimidated” by the socio-economic chasm, but living with “middle class morality”.

This  highlights my personal reading  of Pygmalion as a whole, supported by quotes from the passages I was provided.

To build on this, proceed by writing a sentence or two that demonstrates  your interpretation of the passages  and how they discuss views and values and create meaning.

Though Shaw implies that one can ascend the ranks through Doolittle’s “lecturing them blue in the face” and Eliza’s gradual self-actualisation, ultimately Shaw quashes any prospect of one permanently invading the upper class by deploying the repetitive “I will” catchphrase throughout Eliza’s ventures. The indefatigable delivery ironically conveys the notion that in spite of Eliza’s effort, she “won’t” achieve.

In these sentences I have commented briefly on the events within the passages and utilised them to exemplify how they are utilised to delve into views and values and create meaning in the overall context of the text. These factors encompass  my interpretation of the passages .

Introductions which contain these two key features will score well as they  directly target numerous parts of the assessment criteria . This allows students to explicitly outline their overall reading of the text in a style which will efficiently show off your writing skills. Here's the introduction altogether:

Sample A+ Introduction

George Bernard Shaw’s “Pygmalion” contrasts the absence of morality in the titled upper class of 19th century England who dehumanise common citizens as “pebbles on the beach” and the under privileged but morally conscious lower class, “intimidated” by the socio-economic chasm, but living with “middle class morality”. Though Shaw implies that one can ascend the ranks through Doolittle’s “lecturing them blue in the face” and Eliza’s gradual self-actualisation, ultimately Shaw quashes any prospect of one permanently invading the upper class by deploying the repetitive “I will” catchphrase throughout Eliza’s ventures. The indefatigable delivery ironically conveys the notion that in spite of Eliza’s effort, she “won’t” achieve.

Let's all be honest here, Year 12 is endlessly tiring. Literature, for all its greatness, can also be endlessly tiring. Along with 3-4 other subjects, sometimes the idea of writing a practice piece, deeply analyzing the language of your text, or doing research into the context, views and values of the author are things you really, really don’t feel like doing.

Although these things are necessary and important, they’re also often difficult, taxing, and possibly not that interesting. Not too long before the Literature exam, my friend and I were texting, both feeling immense stress and guilt because we felt we hadn’t studied enough for the exam, but equally tired and unable to write any practice pieces. I’m sure many of you are very familiar with the paradox of not spending time studying because you are instead spending that time worrying about not studying.

However, there’s really no need to suddenly feel full of stress and anxiety when you have no motivation to do such work for Literature, that’s just wasted energy! Instead, accept that you’re going to have a little break from the serious stuff, and use that energy instead to improve your understanding and knowledge of your text (part of the exam criteria!!).

My friend and I decided we’d meet for coffee, and try and just discuss our exam texts together (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf and Dark Roots).

‘Bring paper and the books’ she texted me ‘I’ve got an idea’. And that idea was...

VCE Literature Charades

How to play:1. Find a friend2. Think a concept, character, quote, theme, literary device or anything really from one of your texts3. Forget about your dignity4. Act it out until your friend guesses5. Swap and repeat.And once people started to stare as we theatrically mimed things like ‘metaphor’ and ‘the albatross’ we decided to tone it down a little bit, leading to the invention of...

VCE Literature Pictionary

How to play:1. Find a friend2. Think of a concept, character, quote, theme, literary device (you get the idea)3. Keep your dignity intact!4. Start drawing the idea until your friend eventually guesses (warning: could lead to many failed attempts at drawing ‘foreshadowing’)5. Swap and repeat.

So I know this seems ridiculous but I swear, without even realizing it you’re getting to know your text so much better. There’ll be that moment in the exam room when all you’re thinking is ‘what on earth is that quote’, and suddenly you’ll remember how you’re friend fell off her chair trying to mime it. Either way, it’s a much more valuable use of time than worrying about not studying, especially because you’ll spend most of the time laughing.

If you’re alone, and you really don’t feel like studying for literature, but you still kind of have to study for literature… don’t despair! Find a place in your house where you wont be disturbed (or disturb anyone) and pretend you’re running an information session on your text. I used to record endless minutes of myself rambling about all different facets of my text, with no comprehensible structure, just trying to say and explain everything I knew about it. I would delete them almost straight away, but trust me, taking on the role of a teacher can be very fun, and when no ones watching, you can really just go for it. Things are much more likely to stay in your memory when you’ve explained them aloud, so you’ll be super prepared for your SACS!

Of course, it is beyond important to make sure you write as many practice pieces as you think you need to, and to work on tasks that may at times be ‘boring’, but if you want to avoid burning out try making studying a little fun!

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English Works

Writing essays for VCE

Text responses essays.

You must make sure that each of your topic sentences deals with (and directly answers) an aspect in the prompt.

An easy way to plan:

• Think about the most obvious answer or the best piece of evidence for an aspect of the question. Flesh it out; elaborate.
• Think of another character or section in the book, and write a sentence that covers a slightly different part/aspect of the topic.
• Think of a problem or some evidence/character that defies (goes against) the question.

Remember: often the most direct answer and the simplest statement is the hardest.  The late Steve Jobs understood the issue of simplicity: “Simple can be harder than complex: you have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple.”

The “simple” comes with a great deal of practice.

Writing thematic-style essays;

Creating and presenting (Section B)

In “Section B: creating and presenting” you will encounter various themes and relate them to a variety of texts. Inspired discussions may revolve around conflict, identity, landscapes and whose reality. Typical prompts that you will encounter are: “Conflict brings out the best or worst in people. “We grow through change”. “People’s true spirit is revealed in difficult times.” “There’s two ways of seeing our world – a right way and a wrong way.”

An expository essay with an interesting beginning; 3 clear angles/points with parallel examples); show a problem with the topic.

See Sample Plan/Format for expository/ hybrid/ persona-style : Hybrid essay

When writing expository essays relating to these themes you may wish to write a feature article or adopt “hybrid” format. A feature article can be compared with an expository essay with narrative and creative components. Feature writers often take a narrative approach and draw on dialogue, descriptive scenes and varying tones of voice to tell stories. Anecdotes and “people” stories are common and help to bring the theme alive.

Think about an interesting persona: hybrid/feature texts

• Choose an authentic but fresh context/persona. It should be simple and straightforward, but have the potential to include sophisticated examples and quotes. For example, Jason Smith, Youth Leader at the Kyneton Youth Voices Program. Use the “I” as a linking device and one who signposts the key ideas. Exploit the personal dimension. Once you get confident, inject a dash of personality into your persona.
• Make sure you show a progression of ideas. Divide your article into three sections with a beginning, middle (development) and end (food for thought; a complex or ambivalent, contradictory idea.) (Or think about a compare and contrast style: start with some similar examples and then show a difference/a contrast.)
• Once you choose a context/persona that you are comfortable with think about how you can link to the set text. This can often be done through a speaker, lecturer, presenter etc.
• Write out your key ideas/points/ paragraphs from the set text that you tend to use for a variety of prompts.
• Then think about some parallel examples that suit your persona and the text. Make sure you have a variety of quotes, real-life examples and sources (poems/people) etc.
• Finally, create an interesting beginning that also suits the persona and foreshadows the text.

The author: feature writers may be newspaper staff writers who have investigated an issue, or they may be freelance writers with particular expertise and seek to contribute to a debate. Personal journalism, or the use of the first-person pronoun, is common. This means that writers, drawing upon their personal or professional observations, often include personal references and their own feelings and attitudes to the subject — sometimes with a “before” and “after” perspective.

The audience: feature articles should appeal to the target audience. For example if a magazine targets middle-aged women, then the articles, advertisements and pictures would reflect the women’s interest in lifestyle, career, money, health and relationships.

The facts: Writers must research their facts and present them in a compelling and interesting manner, including quotes to give a sense of immediacy. They must choose a range of sources to give a balanced perspective. Use a combination of evidence.

Who are you? You must choose a “persona”, that is you may be an expert or professional in the field, or represent an organisation. Or you may be a staff writer; you may be a youth leader or a student leader at a school/university.  Your persona is critical to your message. It is also critical to your writing style. If you wish to include a personal slant, establish the “I” persona near the beginning of your article.

Making a start: a template for your first “hybrid” (feature) article Follow the guidelines below to write a “hybrid” article. As you gain confidence, you can vary your persona, become more sophisticated or model your style on your favourite newspaper writer. (For example, refer to Martin Flanagan, Saturday Reflection, The Age (Insight).

Also see Writing in Context. Joey Bloomsfield, Community Reporter, Meredith News

Take on the role of a community reporter at a local magazine and report on the Shire’s Cultural Week. Include some stories about people in the (local) community and refer to your novel or film.

Write down your key points/arguments, starting with the most obvious point. Think about your most compelling evidence for each point. Be sure to establish an emotional and/or a logical context. You must show a progression of ideas: include a problem or a different angle to show the issue’s complexity.

Here we go.

Start with an interesting beginning: a short anecdote or a quote.

Set the scene. Explain your purpose: to cover Meredith Shire’s Cultural Week.

• Show a link to the prompt.
• Refer to a speaker/discussion at the Meredith Library. This is an opportunity for you to discuss aspects of your chosen text and similar examples that shed light on the prompt. For example, you may focus on a discussion by Mr Donavan regarding a relevant theme in your novel.
• Make a comment. Ask a question. Perhaps include a relevant comment from a member of the audience.
• If you wish to refer to a film or a play, include a reference to the Meredith Theatre Company or the Meredith Film Society.
• Ask a question to prompt reflection.
• You may conclude with a reference to a local “people” story, or a reference to your favourite poem that provides another interesting angle on the prompt.
• Round off your discussion.
• Conclude with a final example or refer back to the opening anecdote or quote. Encourage readers to reflect on a problem.

See a sample of Joey’s essay.

See Better Essays and Persuasive Techniques  : See Chapter 4: Persuasive text types pp 90-91.

For sample “hybrid” essays and a variety of styles and contexts, see:

“Different versions of reality” (Whose Reality) (Student Magazine)

Our place in the world and us: Reflection in The Meredith Gazette (“Death of a Salesman”, Two essays on Whose Reality from different persona/context)

How we live in a world created by others, Student Representative (Whose Reality: Wag The Dog)

Trapped in our subjective world: A prison with no bars (Literary reviewer, Spies)

Looking back can alter our reality: Spencers Film Festival by reviewer Hayden Crong

Speech: Sally Dalton, new age health consultant; How much reality is healthy?

(Speech to Spencer Grammar School, The Lot, Death of a Salesman)

Also a Speech by the Author of “Getting a Grip” (Jeremy Springer, who addresses a group of wannabes: Death of a Salesman)

Remembering and forgetting: life-style counsellor and health guide (Death of a Salesman)

See “A Series of Open Letters” (Based on the The Lot/ Whose Reality)

Illusions and dealing with loss: psychologist, Jimmy Swanson (Death of a Salesman)

Spencer News Reflection: what determines our realities? : Column Reflection

Misrepresenting Reality: an insurance evaluator takes stock: Willy Loman

See Evading Reality, a personal reflection (Death of a Salesman)

To get involved or not: Weekly Reflection Column by Student Representative (Conflict)

See Relationships with Place and Community By Jason Smith Youth Leader (The Mind of a Thief)

Dilemmas and choices: a reflection of ourselves (Conflict) (Spencer News)

See “Doing the Right Thing”, by Janie Fitzpatrick, Youth Global Voices Group (Melbourne) and Galileo

See A Clash of views and values and conflict , by Kristy Mendelson (Student representative Hampton Park University)

“The world in which we live shapes us” History Lecturer at Southern Cross University (Imaginary Landscapes)

See Identity as a Story (Mind of a Thief)

Be sure to perfect your Language Analysis Skills if you want a good mark the Year 12 English Exam.

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