Today’s Groups

Please find the table with your name on it: this is the group you will be working in for this session

The importance of seeing Thesis

Statements in Paper Two

Thesis Statements

Thesis statements should start all analytical essays.

Thesis statements are a paragraph which articulates the ‘line’ that a student is taking on an essay question, or what interpretation a student will be arguing.

You might call them introductions.

But thesis statements are different, and better. 1. They’re clearer. 2. They’re more relevant to the

question asked. 3. They’re more persuasive of your

interpretation. 4. They’re a better platform for

your knowledge.

1. They’re more relevant to the question asked.

2. They’re more persuasive of your interpretation.

3. They’re a better platform for your knowledge.

NO Difference

Obviously, a Literature response needs to analyse, compare and contrast literary conventions in two

dramatic texts, while while a Language & Literature response needs to analyse how context shapes

the production and reception of two texts (without the need for comparison). But in ALL instances, you need to create a thesis

statement which is: 1. relevant to the question asked. 2. persuasive of your interpretation.

Isn’t it different for the different courses? Or for SL & HL?

In ALL instances, you need to create a thesis statement which is

Lit. Criterion B: Response to the question (20% of essay grade) How well has the student understood the specific demands of the question? To what extent has the student responded to these demands? How well have the works been compared and contrasted in relation to the demands of the question.

LaL. Criterion B: Response to the question (20% of essay grade) To what extent is an understanding of the expectations of the question shown? How relevant is the response to these expectations, and how far does it show critical analysis?

1. relevant to the question asked. 2. persuasive of your interpretation.

How do examiners spot a good thesis?

1. Most of the information in the thesis should be shaped to the question. 2. The student’s argument in relation to the question should be evident.

See how these match? Clever.

So, if you can’t work out what the question is, it’s probably not a great thesis.

2. They’re more relevant to the question asked.3. They’re more persuasive of your interpretation.

1. They’re more relevant to the question asked.

2. They’re more persuasive of your interpretation.

3. They’re a better platform for your knowledge.

Can you tell what the

question is?

Writers often use setting to emphasize important ideas. Discuss how effectively this has been done in the works of at least two writers you have studied.

Setting, the arrangement of scenery and properties to represent the place where a play is enacted, serves as a crucial means to convey the central ideas of the playwright. Setting dramatises the narration of the play by adding depth to our understanding of the conflict presented to the characters in A Streetcar Named Desire and Top Girls. While the didactic settings which make use of the stage, props and lighting in A Streetcar Named Desire provide us with insights into Blanche’s inner conflict between fantasy and reality, the distinctive location of each act in Top Girls deepens our understanding of the conflict between success and other aspects of life for Marlene and women throughout history at large. However, it seems that the ability of setting to emphasize the central conflicts of the play is stronger in A Streetcar Named Desire than in Top Girls, as Top Girls is a language-oriented play in which the central conflicts are best portrayed through words of the characters, rather than the setting.

Setting, the arrangement of scenery and properties to represent the place where a play is enacted, serves as a crucial means to convey the central ideas of the playwright. Setting dramatises the narration of the play by adding depth to our understanding of the conflict presented to the characters in A Streetcar Named Desire and Top Girls. While the didactic settings which make use of the stage, props and lighting in A Streetcar Named Desire provide us with insights into Blanche’s inner conflict between fantasy and reality, the distinctive location of each act in Top Girls deepens our understanding of the conflict between success and other aspects of life for Marlene and women throughout history at large. However, it seems that the ability of setting to emphasize the central conflicts of the play is stronger in A Streetcar Named Desire than in Top Girls, as Top Girls is a language-oriented play in which the central conflicts are best portrayed through words of the characters, rather than the setting.

Hot or Rot?

In your pack, there are are several thesis statements, either for Language or Literature depending on your course.

Can you work out what the question is for each?

Literature Table Fruit Machine

The Literary LegendsThe Litterati

Compare and contrast the presentation of any three or four characters in the plays you have

studied. Discuss how characters, and how effectively, are used to further the dramatic

force of the play. Put simply, dramatic force is effect of the drama upon the audience: it’s ‘force’ upon them. Within both Death of a Salesman and A Streetcar Named Desire are characters that elicit a strong response from the audience. Both plays present protagonists, in Willie Loman and Blanche Dubois respectively, whose characteristics of arrogance and superciliousness initially prick the audience’s antipathy, but in the unfolding of the tragedy we find more reasons to sympathise with their peripeteia and tragic demise. The role of minor characters is also to support the presentation of the key characters and further the dramatic force that they possess though highlighting and enhancing their flaws and vulnerabilities. Through complex characteristion, the audience is left with a resounding feeling of loss and grief at the demise of these flawed but very ‘human’ characters.

Language Table Fruit Machine

La LegendsLa LitteratiLa LeopardsLa OrwellsLa Satrapis

Context - historical, cultural, or social – can have an influence on the way literary works are written or

received. Discuss with reference to at least two of the works you have studied.

In the 1950s, in the aftermath of WWII, the emerging Cold War fostered paranoia for ‘Anti-American’ non-conformism. Society promoted a ‘traditional’ family structure, involving adherence to so-called traditional gender roles, and a suppression of individualism. In this regard, mental illness was a form of non-conformism, stigmatized by society, and treated by new medical and technological developments. Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar and Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest are both situated in this time and place. The former is a semi-autobiographical novel, narrated from the perspective of the protagonist, Esther Greenwood, who struggles with depression as she seeks to express her ‘authentic’ identity. The latter is a novel, narrated by Chief Bromden, about a ward in a mental institution in Oregon, controlled by the tyrannical Nurse Ratchet whose control is challenged by the arrival of Randle P. McMurphy. Both literary texts are influenced by the socio-cultural context in which they are set – 1950s America – and may be regarded as the authors’ personal response to the circumstances of their context, revealing an understanding of gender roles and mental illness in particular.

Literature Table Fruit Machine

The Literary LegendsThe Litterati

In what ways and for what purpose do playwrights indicate time? Discuss with reference to works by at

least two playwrights you have studied. In terms of time, both playwrights comment on the world around them: Williams’ situates Streetcar contemporarily in the 1940s, a backdrop for larger themes such as the transformation of the old to new America, while Churchill plays with time, setting history and fiction against a modern British 1980s setting of Top Girls to hold a mirror up to the failure of feminism in the present day. However, in terms of the timeframe of the play, Williams and Churchill almost use time for specific and opposite effects on the audience. Events in Streetcar follow the trajectory of a tragic play, and the purpose of this chronology may be to incite emotional involvement, as Blanche’s downfall evokes our pity. In Top Girls, time is used for the opposite effect – to exclude emotional involvement, as Scene 1 happens in an unrealistic time period, and the three acts in the play are non-linear. Churchill may purposely use fragmented time periods for the alienation effect, which is to avoid connection between the audience and characters, and to question the success of these characters as a whole.

Language Table Fruit Machine

La LegendsLa LitteratiLa LeopardsLa OrwellsLa Satrapis

Conflict is a broad term and can refer to international war, or a simmering fight between siblings, and this theme in its many forms is, to a large extent, the meat of literature. In Ibsen’s late 19th Century drama, A Doll’s House, the private conflict which unfolds between Nora and Torvald was interpreted with alarm by some contemporary audiences: despite Ibsen’s message, the perception of a woman’s ‘sacred duty’ being to her children as opposed to herself as a human necessitated Ibsen changing the last act of the play entirely. However, modern day audiences in the West, particularly, tend to applaud Nora’s shrugging off of the childish and submissive persona she adopts. Similarly, the family conflict in Arundhati Roy’s brilliant 1990’s novel, The God of Small Things, is also symbolic of wider issues in Indian culture: the racism of the caste system is key, and while the novel gained critical applause abroad, the difficult reception in India shows the impact that literature about truth, and about conflict, can still have.

Show how conflict is represented in the two literary works you have studied, and discuss how this aspect

might be interpreted or understood in different historical, cultural or social contexts.

What makes a good thesis statement?

• Address the terms of the question• Name the texts that you will be writing about. • Set up a persuasive argument and therefore … • Provide a point from which the rest of the

essay can be developed• Use convincing, assured language which

demonstrates a confidence in your argument

Smaller Groups

Now, your table groups should split into two further groups of 3 or 4: • Literature – work with students from your

class• HL LaL – work with students from your class• SL LaL – work with whomever is sitting closest

since your table have all studied the same texts.

Your TurnRemember: • Address the terms of the

question• Name the texts that you will

be writing about. • Set up a persuasive argument

and therefore … • Provide a point from which

the rest of the essay can be developed

• Use convincing, assured language which demonstrates a confidence in your argument

In your groups, answer the question you have at the back at your pack.

Myself, and your English teachers will be judging and typing up the best responses.

IT’S A COMPETITION!

Remember

• Address the terms (keywords) of the question• Name the texts that you will be writing about. • Set up a persuasive argument and therefore … • Provide a point from which the rest of the essay can be

developed• Use convincing, assured language which demonstrates

a confidence in your argument

And … please indicate titles with ‘inverted commas’ or a straight underline.

Honorable Mentions(22 Groups) In no particular order

• Melinda, Brooke, Joseph, Thomas (LaL)• Charles, Kelsey, Rin, Rebecca, Jumi, Jeremy, Kevin

(LaL)• Anni, Lisa, Bjorn, Jackie (LaL)• Alex, Nick, Jason (Lit)

LAL

NEARLY WINNERS

Explain how the authors of two literary works have portrayed a social group in a particular way. How might the contexts of the authors have influenced their portrayal of these social groups?

A social group is a number of individuals who share the same beliefs and interests. George Orwell’s ‘1984’ and Marjane Satrapi’s ‘Persepolis’ portray authoritative social groups in an oppressive society. Such portrayal was influenced by the contexts of the authors. ‘1984’ was written after WWII. Having witnessed the uprisings of Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler, Orwell warns the dangers of totalitarianism through presenting a bleak society where the ruling class imposes absolute power against its people. ‘Persepolis’ is a memoir of Satrapi’s life during the Islamic Revolution. In this graphic novel, society is controlled by the government of religious extremists that limit the freedom of people. As Satrapi directly experienced such an oppressive environment, this influenced her portrayal of the religious ruling class.

Well done JinJu, HaKyoung, Sarah, Se In

LAL

WINNERS

Explain how the authors of two literary works have portrayed a social group in a particular way. How might the contexts of the authors have influenced their portrayal of these social groups?

The portrayal of women in Wilde’s ‘The Importance of being Earnest’ and Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’ are significantly influenced by the context of their authors. Ibsen, having lived in 19C Norway where women were not entitled to vote, reflected the expectation for women to be subservient and oppressed. On the other hand, Wilde developed a different approach to challenging society’s expectations of women by portraying them to be powerful and self reliant. The emerging ‘New Woman’ feminist ideal was a key influence that shaped Wilde’s representation of women in his play. Both literary texts are similar in terms of how the author’s viewpoints on feminist ideas shape the representation of women, however they differ in terms of how they present women’s role in society.

WELL DONE Megan, Alivia, Jason, Michelle

LIT

WINNERS

All plays pose questions about the world, yet some questions are easier to ignore than others. In the light of this statement,

evaluate the questions raised in your texts and show how and to what degree these issues are explored.

Traditionally, tragedies were used to question moral issues in society. In modern tragedies such as ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ (Streetcar) and ‘Death of A Salesman’ (Salesman), questions about the world continue to be posed. Most notably, these plays explore the validity of dreams and aspirations and question the importance of truth and the protagonists’ refusal to accept reality. Additionally, the conflict between different worlds is explored through the juxtaposition of th urbal working class world and the old Southern culture in Streetcar and through the contrast of the urban world and pastoral setting in ‘Salesman’. These questions are developed through the characterisation of Willy Loman and Blanche du Bois, the claustrophobic setting of both plays, and the use of lighting and sound effects.

WELL DONE Jasmin, Dana and Chris