ATAR Notes: Forum
VCE Stuff => VCE English Studies => VCE Subjects + Help => VCE English & EAL => Topic started by: Deleted User on September 08, 2012, 08:19:45 pm
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This year I studied a book and a film. Obliviously it's easier to write about a book than a film (because you don't have to include techniques, etc etc etc, etc) so would I get marked harder if I write an essay on a book?
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1) It's not easier to write on a book as opposed to a film. And umm, you do discuss techniques when you write about a book - literary techniques?
2) Not really, you'll probably be marked the same
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Films and books both have techniques. Just saying.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
I'm pretty sure, to write a good essay you need to write about the techniques as well e.g. objects and actions that symbolize ideas matching the prompt. Just using quote would result into a quite weak essay.
Books are at least as hard as films.
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According to VCAA, a top level student demonstrates "complex discussion and critical analysis of the ways in which the author constructs meaning and expresses or implies a point of view and values" in the text response so techniques or devices used are definitely part of the task no matter what the type of text is.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
Depends what you mean by "techniques". But the tone the author has used to portray a particular character of part is of importance sometimes.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
No. Well, not in a high-scoring response anyway. Tone of voice, style, authorial presence and syntax are all key features of an author's choice of literary techniques. There's not enough time spent in English appreciating exactly how an author crafts a sentence.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
Well that's because you make a choice not to analyse techniques, you could easily make a choice to avoid analysing techniques in films as well, but that will hurt your marks.
So if you have this sort of mentality when approaching the analysis of a text, you won't score highly, like what charmanderp has said, there are many literary techniques should be analysed. In fact, there are certain essay prompts which actually force you to analyse techniques as well. For example:
Discuss how Louis Nowra uses the opera Cosė Fan Tutte within his play. (A prompt on Cosi on the VCAA 2011 paper) - you won't be able to discuss this fully without incorporating literary techniques into your discussion.
Anyway, I would also like to mention that your attitude and the way you respond and talk to other members on this forum is quite rude. I've read through your other posts and in all honesty, you should be giving more respect to others who have taken their time to help you, rather than responding in a way that is provocative and disrespectful. Personally, I don't really care, but some might take offence.
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You dont use techniques from a book as evidence. You just use quotes. You have to discuss themes or characters in a text response, not analyse their techniques.
I'm pretty sure, to write a good essay you need to write about the techniques as well e.g. objects and actions that symbolize ideas matching the prompt. Just using quote would result into a quite weak essay.
Books are at least as hard as films.
FlorianK hit the nail on the head. If you utilise the literary techniques and incorporate them into your writing, you are bound to do much better than if you neglect them. In fact I'd imagine it'd be a real challenge to score full marks on a piece without doing so.
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Some books also do actually use some interesting literary techniques which do stand out. For example, Things We Didn't See Coming is quite distinct in that each "chapter" (short story, vignette, whatever term you want to use - which is interesting in itself since it the US it's marketed as a short story collection, while in Australia it's marketed as a novel - "discontinuous narrative" is the phrase that I settled on using for my essays, I saw that said in an interview with the author that I read once) does jump quite a few years every time.
Considering that the book is also first person, the fact that the narrator is a kid at the start of the book and a middle-aged man only a couple of hundred pages later, naturally has quite an affect on how the story is told and what goes through the narrator's head. In addition, the book doesn't even spend a great deal of time describing the various changes the world goes through in depth, which makes a fair bit of sense if you spend a bit of time thinking about it. It's a first person account and if you were in the narrator's situation you wouldn't waste your time describing what the world is like when your life is at risk. Anyway, I'm starting to ramble and get into the themes of the book, which is completely irrelevant to what I was going to say.
IMO, thinking about why the book was written the way it was, especially if it's bleedingly obvious like in the case of Things We Didn't See Coming, lends itself pretty naturally to being material for an essay - and that's not even really reading into the book that much.
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so There's no difference?
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so There's no difference?
Examiners don't sit in a circle around a large bonfire the day before the exam and say: "Lets mark text A, B and C" harder this year [evil laugh]". All texts are marked fairly equal. What's important is your analysis, structure and originality.
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so There's no difference?
Examiners don't sit in a circle around a large bonfire the day before the exam and say: "Lets mark test A, B and C" harder this year [evil laugh]". All texts are marked fairly equal. What's important is your analysis, structure and originality.
Oh nonsense, we all know that's exactly what they do :P
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PROOF:
(http://i.imgur.com/lxYpr.png)
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^That needs to go on VCE Memes haha.
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^That needs to go on VCE Memes haha.
Just fix the typo (which admittedly was my fault as it was present in my post) of test -> text :)
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^That needs to go on VCE Memes haha.
Just fix the typo (which admittedly was my fault as it was present in my post) of test -> text :)
Wow I didn't even realise that's what it meant haha, I assumed Test A, B and C were just Section A, B and C on the English exam #thisiswhathappenswhenyoudontreadthepreviousposts
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Deleted User, if you're going to down vote posts with no good reason apart from the fact that you don't like them, you're going to have a hard time earning respect, it's just immature and douchebaggy, if you have a problem, by all means down vote, but don't have a go at someone (myself) who was trying to offer you constructive criticism.
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Depends on personal preference. Personally I would rather write on a text because I am more familiar with novels because there is evidence right in front of me if I need it through my study. However, saying that, I wouldn't mind writing a piece based on 'On The Waterfront', I think it has some great concepts and shouldn't be a problem when generating ideas.
Films and Literary Texts aren't all that different. They are both essentially 'scripts' and still have underlying messages (of course explanation in a film is created through on-screen direction, and a text is via written explanation), it is just simply the medium of presenting the ideas that is different. If you aren't that familiar with filmic techniques, it doesn't necessarily mean you cannot produce a piece of work based on a film. The ideas presented in the film are enough to produce a TR.
For a high scoring essay though you would probably be required to mention Filmic Techniques or Literary Techniques.
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Filmic techniques aren't difficult to study and apply, just have a think about the way the director has constructed the film and look at the motifs and symbols which they have used. There are plenty of study guides out there that go into filmic techniques if you're still uncertain.
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They're not hard but it's difficult to fit all the discussion of techniques, quotes, symbols, characters/themes, historical context all in the one paragraph. That's why each one of my paragraph tends to exceed 500 words.
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Filmic techniques aren't difficult to study and apply, just have a think about the way the director has constructed the film and look at the motifs and symbols which they have used. There are plenty of study guides out there that go into filmic techniques if you're still uncertain.
I always feel like they're harder to recollect when you're writing an essay though.
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They're not hard but it's difficult to fit all the discussion of techniques, quotes, symbols, characters/themes, historical context all in the one paragraph. That's why each one of my paragraph tends to exceed 500 words.
Don't discuss them separately. Incorporate all of those things into your sentences. Poorly formed essays are those that are quite blatantly obvious that you're simply regurgitating unnecessary information. Use your knowledge to strengthen your argument. You can write a paragraph that does not exceed 500 words that outlines all of those things.