Summary

A Level English Language and Literature explores a wide variety of texts from different places, periods and genres, written for different audiences and purposes. These will include novels, newspapers, journals, advertisements, blogs, plays, speeches, poems, short stories and diaries, which will be explored though a range of literary and linguistic approaches. As part of the course, you will be encouraged to think about the nature of language, to consider how writers and speakers are affected by the context in which they live and how they have chosen to communicate.

Alongside this, you will consider how writers and speakers represent people and places, and explore the nature of storytelling. You will also look at dialogue and narrative voices in literature and compare them with the spontaneous speech of everyday life.

The study of revered writers and poets from the literary canon will also be required during this course. These include works from Margaret Atwood, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert Browning and Tennessee Williams.

To succeed on the course, you will need to enjoy reading and writing and have an interest in exploring how the English language can be used to create specific effects and evoke responses. You will also need to be someone who enjoys discussing ideas and looking beyond the surface meaning of words.

English Language and Literature can be taken with any other subjects, but students often choose to combine it with Drama and Theatre Studies, Media Studies or Film Studies.