EAL Studying Texts

72 Pages·1.342 MB·English

by  Melanie Napthin

Studying
Texts
Melanie Napthine
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Copyright © Insight Publications
First published in 2013 by:
Insight Publications Pty Ltd
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National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry:
Napthine, Melanie, author.
EAL studying texts / Melanie Napthine.
ISBN: 9781922243003 (Paperback)
For secondary school age.
English language—Study and teaching (Secondary)—Australia.
428
Acknowledgements
The writers and publishers thank the following people who contributed material to this text: Karen Boyd,
Hugo Britt, Jan Bruder, G.M. Dewis, Patricia Di Risio, Gail Grove, Virginia Lee, Cameron Lowe,
Angus McDonald, Maria Papasotiriou, Emma Pollock, Cara Stewart and Ross Walker.
Special thanks to Michael Daniel for his many valuable contributions, particularly to the exam chapter.
Thanks also to the teachers who gave us feedback and suggestions, including Anne Hotta, Jill Itoh,
Lisa Lander, Anne Peterson, Mary Petsinis, Emma Pollock and Helen Theodoropoulos Savopoulos.
We also thank the following students for permission to publish their essays: Jinah Byun, Jian Chen,
Wayne Cheung, Hyun Joon Kim, Ivy Wu, Yan Zhu Ni.
Disclaimer
Every effort has been made to trace the original source of material used in this book. Where the attempt has been
unsuccessful, the authors, editors and publishers would be pleased to hear from copyright owners in order to rectify
any errors or omissions.
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Contents
1 Getting started 1
Reading/watching the text 1
Metalanguage for novels and short stories 3
Different words for different genres 4
2 Studying texts 5
Characters 5
Narrators 11
Plot 14
Structure 16
Setting 18
Context 19
Themes 21
Values 24
3 Film 27
Interpreting film 28
Sample scene analysis 30
4 Other genres 33
Drama 34
Poetry 36
Non-fiction 38
5 Understanding your text 40
Summary of key text elements 40
Developing an interpretation 43
6 Writing your text response 47
Understanding the question 47
Planning your essay 48
Writing your essay 52
7 The exam 60
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area of study ONE Studying Texts
1
C H A P T E R
Getting started
Your task for Area of Study 1 involves interpreting a text. You will be looking at the different ways
that authors (or directors, poets or playwrights) create meaning in their texts.
Reading/watching the text
It can be difficult to read a novel or watch a film that is not in your first language. Some ways to
make it easier are:
• Get started early. If you know it might take you a while to read your text, it is
better to start on it as soon as you can.
• Read or watch the text in smaller sections – for example, try reading ten pages a
night, or an amount recommended by your teacher.
• Listen to a ‘talking book’ version of the text, if available.
• View the film with subtitles on in your native language the first time you watch it.
• Form a reading/discussion group outside of class.
• If your teacher agrees, you could read sections of the text out loud as a class.
• Do not stop to look up every unfamiliar word. Make a list of these to look up
later, but the first time you read or watch the text, just get a sense of the story.
Taking notes
The second time you read or watch your text, start paying closer attention to the characters,
language and themes. Now is the time to start taking notes. This is excellent preparation for
writing essays, and will help you understand the text well.
Chapter 1: Getting started  1 
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Insight EAL: Studying Texts
Tips for note-taking
• Highlight or underline key quotations.
• Draw up a table in your journal like this:
Characters Plot Setting Themes and values Key
quotations
Example: Elaine Risley The present day: Toronto: Memory and time: The ‘You don’t
Cordelia Elaine, a painter, particularly time in which things look back
Cat’s comes to Toronto for a the Leaside happened to Elaine is along time, but
Grace
Eye by retrospective of her work. neighbourhood less important than their down through
Smeath
Margaret Elaine’s childhood: for Elaine’s emotional effect. it, like water.
Atwood Carol Elaine remembers her childhood and Gender roles and Sometimes
Campbell childhood, in particular also the present expectations: Elaine’s this comes to
Mrs Smeath her relationship with day, during experiences are deeply the surface,
(Grace’s Cordelia and the other her visit from influenced by her gender sometimes that,
mother) girls who bullied her, and Vancouver and the pressures and sometimes
Stephen her eventual breaking Vancouver: expectations unique to nothing. Nothing
Risley away from that group. after Elaine’s being a young girl. goes away.’
(p.3)
(Elaine’s Elaine’s adolescence: divorce Belonging and
brother) Elaine does not clearly The identity: Elaine’s need ‘I am not normal,
Jon remember the bullying countryside for belonging, while not I am not like
(Elaine’s first she endured as a young of northern negative in itself, makes other girls.’
husband) girl, but is haunted by it. Ontario: north her vulnerable to various (p.140)
She attends university, of Toronto, people throughout her ‘I am not afraid
Mr and
finds her start in the Elaine’s early life, and makes it difficult of seeing
Mrs Risley
art world, has her first childhood for her to forge an Cordelia. I am
(Elaine’s
sexual experience and identity for herself. afraid of being
parents)
meets her first husband. Change and ageing: Cordelia.’
Josef Hrbik Elaine’s early Elaine’s experiences (p.267)
adult years: Elaine highlight the tension ‘Forgiving men is
experiences marital between expectations so much easier
problems, a divorce, a and reality – the than forgiving
cross-country move, difference between what women.’ (p.314)
a second marriage, and people hope will happen
raises two daughters. as they get older and how
She experiences the things actually turn out.
deaths of her brother Perceptions, secrets
and both of her and knowledge:
parents, and eventually Characters demonstrate
remembers all that how people often perceive
happened to her as a situations to be different
child, circling back to the from reality because of
present day, where she their personal experiences
is middle-aged. or prejudices.
Your
text:
2  Chapter 1: Getting started
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Insight EAL: Studying Texts
Record quotations or evidence as you come to it in the appropriate column.
• Make a list of key quotations for each main character and each main idea or theme.
• Use post-it notes to mark pages where important events, dialogue or quotations occur.
Metalanguage for novels and short stories
Metalanguage is the special vocabulary we use to discuss texts. Using the correct words will help
you be precise when talking about texts. The following table shows some of the most useful words
for talking and writing about texts.
WORD EXAMPLE
Author: The person who creates a text such as a The author of Cat’s Eye is Margaret Atwood.
novel or short story.
Context: The historical, social and cultural In the Country of Men is set in the context of Libya in
environment the story is set in. For example, context 1979, when the country was under the oppressive rule
can refer to whether the story is set during a war, or of dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
among the working class or the upper class.
Fiction: Any piece of writing that isn’t intended to be a Cloudstreet is fiction.
factual account of real-life people or events.
Genre: The category a text belongs to. All genres have Wuthering Heights belongs to the novel genre.
certain ‘rules’ or guidelines for their form or structure.
For example, a novel is longer than a short story, and
a biography is a factual account of a real person’s life.
Main character: Who the story is mostly about. This The main character in Brooklyn is Eilis Lacey.
character usually has a realistic and complicated
personality, just like a real person.
Minor character: Other characters in the text who Mrs Smeath is a minor character in Cat’s Eye.
don’t play as big a role as the main character. Often
their personalities are not as complicated as the main
character’s.
Narrative: A story which may be true or fictitious. This Boy’s Life is a narrative about author Tobias
Wolff’s teen years, spent wandering the United States
with his mother.
First-person narrative: A narrative told from one The novel Cat’s Eye is a first-person narrative.
character’s point of view. That character uses the
words ‘I’ and ‘me’ to refer to themself.
Third-person narrative: A narrative told from the Cloudstreet is a third-person narrative.
point of view of someone who is not one of the
characters in the text. All characters are referred to as
‘he’, ‘she’ and ‘they’.
Narrator: The person or ‘voice’ who tells the story. The narrator of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s short
story ‘Jumping Monkey Hill’ is a young Nigerian writer.
Non-fiction: A story that is based on real-life events or Stasiland is a non-fiction text.
people.
Plot: The arrangement of events in the text. It can also The plot of Cat’s Eye begins with Elaine talking to her
refer to the main storyline. brother about the nature of time and ends with Elaine
visiting the ravine that she fell into when she was
younger.
Chapter 1: Getting started  3 
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Insight EAL: Studying Texts
Subplot: A minor storyline within the main story. A subplot of Cat’s Eye concerns the world of art for
female artists.
Setting: The place and time the events in the text The setting of A Christmas Carol is England in the
happen. mid-nineteenth century.
Structure: The way the elements or ‘bits’ of the text The structure of Stasiland is based around Funder’s
are arranged. For example, the text might have events attempts to understand Miriam’s story. The text begins
happening chronologically, i.e. from earliest to most and ends with Anna’s meetings with Miriam and other
recent, as in real life. Or it might use flashbacks, have characters are introduced when Anna realises that to
one or two subplots running alongside the major plot, write Miriam’s story she ‘needed to explain other things
or be divided into sections. around it’.
Theme: A major idea running through the text. The importance of family is a major theme in
Examples are growing up, identity and the future. A Christmas Carol.
Values: Qualities that are thought to be important to Loyalty is an important value endorsed by In the
live a good life. Examples are honesty and loyalty. Country of Men.
Different words for different genres
Novel
Short story
Biography Film Play Poetry
Autobiography
Memoir
Creator Author Director Playwright Poet
Person who tells Narrator Narrator/Voice-over Narrator (not Speaker/Persona
the story normally used)
Special features • Language • Camera shots • Acts • Language
• Chapters • Actors • Scenes • Metaphor
• Point of view • Sound effects • Sound effects • Simile
(first-person or and music and music • Imagery
third-person) • Lighting • Lighting
• Sets • Sets
• Props • Props
Referring to texts
No matter what tense your text is written in, always use the present tense when referring to texts
in your essays.
WRONG: In The Complete Maus, Art Spiegelman drew on his father’s experiences during
the Holocaust and used both images and text to explore ideas about memory and guilt.
RIGHT: In The Complete Maus, Art Spiegelman draws on his father’s experiences during
the Holocaust and uses both images and text to explore ideas about memory and guilt.
4  Chapter 1: Getting started
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2
C H A P T E R
Studying texts
Characters
Characters are who the story is about. Main characters, also called protagonists, are the people
who are the main focus of the text. They are usually shown in a realistic way, with both good and
bad qualities, just like people in real life. Minor characters are often shown in less detail than major
characters.
How to study characters
We learn about characters in a text in a number of ways:
• by how they are described
• by what they do
• by what they say
• by what other characters say about them.
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Insight EAL: Studying Texts
Activity 2.1
Fill in the table below with evidence about the main character from your own text.
An example has been done for you.
Sample text: In the Country of Men
Main How they are What they do What they say What other
character described characters say
about them
Suleiman ‘... doubtful of the Takes care of his (To himself) ‘You ‘you are the man of
world and my place mother during her have always been the house now …’
in it ...’ (p.21) times of ‘illness’ bad. Just waiting for (Bu Suleiman, p.5)
your true nature to
‘light of my eyes’ Throws rocks at the ‘You are my
rise.’ (p.112)
(Um Suleiman, beggar Bahloul prince. One day
p.73) ‘I am not a child’ you’ll be a man
Betrays his
(p.107 and p.200) and take me
‘Stray Dog’ (p.236) childhood friend
away on your
Kareem ‘We drift through
white horse.’ (Um
allegiances, those
Is prepared to Suleiman, p.12)
we are born into
betray his father to
and those we ‘you have no
the Revolutionary
are claimed by, word, you are not
Committee
always estranging a man because
ourselves.’ (p.165) you have no word’
(Kareem, p.110)
‘I suffer an absence,
an ever-present ‘But you have had
absence’ (p.231) many chances since
to return.’ (Uncle
Khaled, p.243)
Your text:
Main How they are What they do What they say What other
character described characters say
about them
6  Chapter 2: Studying texts
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