Questions for Sections B and C

From the 2008 booklet:

SECTION B – Response to literature and language
Write a coherent and engaging essay in response to ONE of the following topics 1–16. Use the topic as the focus for an in-depth discussion of a relevant text or texts. Your discussion should reflect independent thinking and be substantiated by frequent, appropriate and integrated references or quotations.

DO NOT REPEAT CONTENT OR REFERENCES IN SECTIONS B AND C.
Either:
1. Many of Shakespeare’s plays focus on the ways in which complex characters respond to an environment infected by evil.
Discuss this statement with detailed reference to a Shakespearean play you have studied.

2. Discuss Shakespeare’s exploration of the relationship between power and gender in a Shakespearean play you have studied.

3. Discuss the view that there is little pleasure to be had from novels in which good finally triumphs, all problems are resolved, and love prevails.

4. “The greatest mystery of all is the human heart, and that is the mystery with which all good novelists are concerned.” (PD James)
Discuss how this concern is explored in a novel or novels you have studied.

5. Discuss what is lost and what is gained in a film adaptation of a text you have studied.

6. Discuss, with reference to at least one film you have studied, the ways in which images from today’s cinema allow people to recognise themselves and their culture.

7. According to Anthony Burgess, the danger of television, especially when its standards are established by commercial interests, is that it is an agent of social degradation.
Discuss the extent to which this statement reflects the state of New Zealand television in 2005. Support your views with detailed reference to one or more television programme(s) you have studied.

8. Thomas Hardy considered that a poet should express the emotion of all the ages and the thought of his own.
Discuss this statement with reference to poems you have studied.

9. Discuss how poetic language and form allow the poet to explore strong emotions in poems you have studied.

10. In live theatre, every technique learned by the actor, every curtain, every flat on the stage, every decision made by the director is made to enrich the appreciation of the audience.
Discuss this statement with reference to theatrical productions you have studied.

11. In the eighteenth century, Samuel Johnson wrote, “advertisements are now so numerous that they are very negligently perused, and it is therefore become necessary to gain attention by magnificence of promises, and by eloquences sometimes sublime and sometimes pathetic”.
Discuss the relevance of his statement to your studies of the language of advertising.

12. Short stories often focus on the experience of isolated individuals.
Discuss this statement with reference to short stories you have studied.

13. For generations, the short story form has been used by writers to explore significant aspects of cultural and / or societal values.
Discuss this statement with reference to short stories you have studied.

14. Discuss the qualities of a text you have studied that could be described as literary journalism.

15. Discuss the literary qualities of a non-fiction text you have studied.

16. Information technology is owned by us all. It has turned audiences into participants.
Discuss, with reference to on-line text(s) you have studied, the ways that on-line writing has altered the traditional relationship between writer and reader.

SECTION C – Exploring issues in literature and language
Write an essay in response to ONE of the following topics 17–28. Your essay should take the form of a coherent, engaging argument substantiated by relevant ideas and textual references. Your discussion should reflect independent thinking and show extensive knowledge of a range of texts, their purposes and the methods used in crafting them.
DO NOT REPEAT CONTENT OR REFERENCES IN SECTIONS B AND C.

17. “The best texts go to the edge and risk falling over it.”
Discuss the extent to which a range of texts you have studied has been enriched by the risks they take.

18. “Serious literature is like the decayed heart of a grand old city whose prosperous outer suburbs correspond to the popular genres, such as romance and crime fiction.”
With reference to a range of texts you have studied, discuss the extent to which pulp fiction has superseded more serious literature in today’s world.

19. Author Julian Barnes asks, “Why does the writing make us chase the writer?” Is it voyeurism or does knowledge of the writer give us insight into the writing?
Discuss with reference to a range of texts you have studied.

20. With reference to a range of texts you have studied, discuss the extent to which literature loses or retains its value over time.

21. Andy Serkis, who ‘plays’ the character Gollum in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, said of him: “I wanted the audience to feel that they had some connection to this character, that he wasn’t just a black and white villain, an absolute villain, because you’d get bored with him after two minutes.”
With reference to the villains in a range of texts you have studied, discuss the extent to which their portrayal makes them engaging.

22. Eighteenth-century satirist Jonathan Swift noted that, “satire is a sort of mirror, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own”.
With reference to a range of texts you have studied, discuss how satire is used to comment on society.

23. “The real art is not to come up with extraordinary clever words but to make ordinary simple words do extraordinary things.”
Discuss this statement with reference to a range of texts you have studied.

24. “Reading or viewing texts of quality enables us to explore different ways of seeing things, without feeling obliged to take a particular point of view.”
Discuss this statement with reference to a range of texts you have studied.

25. James Joyce described the writer as an artist who, “like the God of the creation, remains within or behind or beyond or above his handiwork, invisible, refined out of existence, indifferent, paring his fingernails”.
Discuss the significance of the writer’s invisibility (or presence) in a range of texts you have
studied.

26. Dr Seuss described fantasy as a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope.
With reference to a range of texts you have studied, discuss the extent to which fantasy connects with real life.

27. Discuss the extent to which a range of texts you have studied succeeds in combining social
commentary and artistic excellence.

28. Discuss the ideas about culture that are promoted by a range of text types you have studied.

In the next post I'll list the genres generally asked about.

Performance Standard for 2009

English Scholarship students will be expected to

• respond critically

• Demonstrate extensive knowledge of texts - refer to a range of different books, poems, plays, films and other written mediums and "know methods used in crafting them".
  
• Sustained critical response with "mature ideas and independent reflection" - be original and insightful with your main points and ideas.
  
• Ability to synthesise knowledge, understanding and argument - come up with your own opinion and argue it using collaborated evidence from texts you write about.

Key terms that need defining:

• critically: to "judge the truth/merit of a subject, careful evaluation and judgement of material used".
• synthesise: To form a truth or statement from collaborating information from other sources.

This is needed for performance descriptor 1: achieved with outstanding. Descriptor 2 is achieving scholarship. Descriptors 3 and 4 are fails.

According to the official "Scholarship Performance Standard" document from NZQA:

1 This standard is derived from English in the New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 1994) up to and including level 8.

2 The method of evidence collection is reading and writing by means of three essays. The student’s responses will derive from their understanding and experience across the written, oral and visual strands of the English curriculum.

3 Text is spoken, written and visual means of communication. (EINZC)

4 Demanding text and questions provide scope for the student to apply a high level of critical thinking. It is not necessarily the complexity of the text but how students respond that makes it demanding.

5 Respond critically is under-pinned by the essential metacognitive skills of interpretation, analysis and evaluation in EINZC, up to and including level 8. At Scholarship these skills are applied in contexts that require mature appreciation of more demanding text and questions. For example, a student may show the ability to: initiate an alternative reading or application of theory; take a fresh approach to accepted interpretations; challenge the reader’s understandings; apply or deconstruct theoretical models.

Knowledge of methods used in crafting will be demonstrated through critical thinking about common and specific conventions used in written, visual and oral texts, such as structure, style, layout, delivery techniques, figurative language, editing, method of narration, rhetorical devices, sound effects, dramatic techniques, characterisation, costume and scripting.

So what is involved in an English Scholarship Exam?

First of all there will be three papers or sections:
Section A: Close Reading of Unfamiliar Texts. A compare/contrast essay, most likely a piece of poetry vs a piece of prose.

Section B: Response to Language and Literature. Pick a genre to study, eg Shakespearean plays, New Zealand literature, short texts (though with this you must show a range of texts studied), film (but you may want to narrow to one or two genres within this), pre-twentieth century plays or post-colonial literature etc etc.

Section C: Response to Issues in Language and Literature. This is related to ideas that surround literature that we read. Culture, theoretical readings of texts, effect of the author, political and challenging etc. Ideas vs genres. Make sure you learn the difference between the two.

Marking System
Each essay is marked out of 8 points with a total of 24 points. Obviously the better your essay is, the higher your marks are, and the better your overall mark will be.
This means referring to a range of different ideas and materials. Exam questions will hopefully will be the next post.