AQA A-Level English Language
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Explore your topics
3 topics
Language, the individual and society1 topic
Language diversity and change1 topic
Language in action1 topic
Assessment and exam guidance
Assessment Objectives
Apply appropriate methods of language analysis, using associated terminology and coherent written expression.
Demonstrate critical understanding of concepts and issues relevant to language use.
Analyse and evaluate how contextual factors and language features are associated with the construction of meaning.
Explore connections across texts, informed by linguistic concepts and methods.
Demonstrate expertise and creativity in the use of English to communicate in different ways.
Exam Structure
Non-exam assessment: Language in Action
Not stated
Duration
100
Marks
20%
Weighting
Paper 1: Language, the Individual and Society
2h 30m
Duration
100
Marks
40%
Weighting
Paper 2: Language Diversity and Change
2h 30m
Duration
100
Marks
40%
Weighting
Tips and common mistakes
Common Exam Mistakes
Pitfalls to avoid in your exams
- •Treating the list as a checklist of separate items and collecting texts that vary in only one dimension. Correction: choose texts that differ across several dimensions at once, for example a regional spoken interview and a global electronic advertisement.
- •Assuming only literary texts count. Correction: the range covers any texts, including everyday, occupational and digital ones.
- •Ignoring mode or place and gathering only written national texts. Correction: deliberately include spoken and electronic texts and material from outside your own region and country.
- •Listing language features without explaining how they are shaped by audience, purpose, genre or mode; correction: attach each feature to a shaping factor and an interpretive point.
- •Treating representation as mere description; correction: analyse the linguistic choices that construct a particular view of the subject.
- •Assuming a single fixed effect on all readers; correction: discuss likely or possible effects, hedged and supported by contextual evidence.
- •Listing linguistic features without explaining their effects or linking them to identity, audience, function, structure or representation. Correction: always pair a feature with an analytical point about its function or effect.
- •Treating representation as simply what a text is about rather than how language constructs a particular version of events or groups. Correction: focus on the linguistic choices that produce the representation.
Top Examiner Tips
Expert advice for exam success
- •Keep a reading log with columns for subject, producer, audience, purpose, genre, mode, time and place so coverage is visible and easy to audit.
- •For each text, write two or three sentences on how context shapes language choices; this builds analytical habits you will use later.
- •Regularly swap texts with peers so your range grows beyond your own interests and usual sources.
- •Use a four-move analytical sentence: feature, shaping factor, representation or relationship, contextual link.
- •Anchor relationship claims in address forms, modality, pronouns or turn-taking rather than general assertions about tone.
- •Keep quotations short and integrate them into your sentence so analysis, not retelling, dominates.
- •Use the statement's dimensions as a checklist when planning: methods, identity, audience, function, structure, representation.
- •Select a small number of well-chosen examples and analyse them in depth rather than covering many features superficially.
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