How to find language articles and write a language analysis?

These days many colleges and universities expect students of languages to have the ability to write a successful language analysis. Unfortunately for students there aren’t many language articles that demonstrate how to write an analysis. The ones that are online are, on the whole, not very useful. There are fewer sites that offer examples of good, bad, and mediocre language analysis essays.

There are several reasons for doing a language analysis:

• a detailed language analysis provides insights into how and why the author chose to write in the way he or she does.
• The analysis should be done meticulously in order to identify the writer’s main assertion, or point.
• The tone of all language articles has to be identified. Not all are serious academic articles, some might be humourous and intended to amuse. If erroneous assumptions are made about the purpose of a text, the analysis will not score high marks.
• It is necessary to uncover the arguments in the text that support the main argument contained in the text.
• Doing an analysis of a text helps students to find out what literary devices the author uses to make his or her point. These can be emulated by the student in his or her own writing. So the main purpose for doing and analysis is for a student’s own writing to improve. This happens because of the close attention students have to pay to an author’s choice of words and use of English.

Reading articles about language helps students understand how language works. When this is understood, a student’s English and awareness of the language his or her learning will be enhanced. In fact, doing a language analysis benefits the student immensely.

Students need to be able to identify common literary devices and illustrate why they have been used in a text. Basically, these devices are used to make the text interesting for the reader.

Basic literary devices are:

• metaphors
• similes
• allusion
• inference
• imagery
• personification
• alliteration
• hyperbole
• litotes
• oxymoron
• tautology and
• onomatopoeia

Metaphors and similes are almost the same, but whereas similes are obvious comparisons of two or more things, where ‘as,’ or ‘like’ is used, metaphors are comparisons without the words ‘as’ or ‘like’. For example, ‘Her hair is like sunlight.’ I a simile, while ‘She has sunlight hair’ is a metaphor.

Allusion is a short, indirect references to a person, place, thing idea and so on. Allusions can be made to famous people either historical figures or modern ones. They can also be made to places, and to famous events, either modern or historical. For example, ‘I really dislike people who act like Scrooge.’ Scrooge, of course, is the fictional miser created by Charles Dickens in his book, ‘A Christmas Carol’.

Inference is a conclusion that is arrived at by studying evidence and logical reasoning. For example, ‘She pays a lot of attention to her appearance and the cleanliness and tidiness of her home.’ From that we can infer that the woman likes orderliness and would probably be particular about hygiene.

Imagery is found in poetry, but it can also be used in descriptions in prose. Imagery helps readers to picture a scene and uses figurative language. For example, ‘She bit into the fresh juicy peach and the juice ran down her chin.’ This appeals to the senses of taste and smell. Readers can actually imagine both the taste and the smell of that fresh peach.

Personification is used when a thing, perhaps an animal or even an idea is given human characteristics. Personification should not be confused with anthropomorphism though. The difference is that personification the animal just appears to be like a human, but anthropomorphism is used when the animal is actually doing something that people do. This often happens in children’s books. Think of the famous book “Watership Down,’ or the tales of Beatrix Potter.

Alliteration is the repetition of letters and sounds, usually at the beginning of words. For example, ‘The shining shingle shimmered in the sun.’ In this example the alliteration is of the ‘sh’ sound. However, the sounds can also be in the middle of words.

Hyperbole is an exaggeration of an idea which gives added emphasis to what is said or has been written. We often use it when speaking informally. For example, ‘I haven’t seen you for ages.’ This usually simply means ‘for a long time’ not that we haven’t seen someone for centuries.

Litotes is an understatement which often employs the use of a double negative, something that is unusual in English. For instance, ‘That’s not (half) bad’ actually means that something is very good.

An oxymoron is the juxtaposition of words that mean the opposite of one another. John Milton used this famous oxymoron, ‘darkness visible’ in “Paradise Lost’. The famous film directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise, ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ has an oxymoron in the title (‘wide shut’).

Tautology occurs when words with the same or very similar meanings are expressed more than once. In other words, the repetitive words are redundant, but used to add emphasis.

Onomatopoeia is the deliberate use of words that describe sounds and sound like the sound they describe. For example, ‘Bees and flies buzz.’ Buzz sounds like the noise bees and flies make.

This list is not exhaustive, but it illustrates some common literary devices that are found in literature.

Not all examination boards ask students to write a language analysis, so if you feel that you really can’t write a good one, have a look at other courses. At the moment, the main exam board that has a language analysis component is the Australian Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority (VCAA) VCE course. Unfortunately for some, the language analysis accounts for a third of the paper, and so, naturally do the marks.

The Cambridge and Michigan exam boards do not require students to do language analysis, at least at the moment, although this might change.

Some British universities require students whose mother tongue is not English to have experience of text analysis. Students are taught how to identify the purpose of texts and to identify different writing styles, for example, those in newspapers, journals, text books and so on.

You don’t get any marks for an introduction to an analysis of a text, but one is useful so that you can organise your thoughts and work out what you need to include in the main body of the analysis.

If you do write an introduction be sure to give a brief outline of what the author’s intentions are. State what the main contention or argument is. Keep the introduction sharp and to the point. Don’t waffle or pad it out. If you do, then it will create a bad impression on the examiner, and that’s the last thing you want.

Always read what you need to do carefully, don’t analyse everything, as that will almost never be necessary. You may, for example, be asked to explain how the text tries to persuade readers to adopt, or accept, a particular point of view. That means that you don’t have to discuss, or list, all the literary devices that are used in the text. What you do have to do is concentrate on what devices and techniques are used to persuade readers.

You will need to state how the author’s techniques are designed to sway the readership. You will also need to discuss the author’s main argument or contention. Write about the tone of the text (which may change in the text), and any connections you can find between the text and any visuals presented. Pay attention to the connotations of the language used and describe your findings.

You will need to write a conclusion to wrap up your analysis. You need this to be impressive as it is the last thing an examiner will read. Comment on how language has been used throughout the text(s) and make a comment or two on how the author’s technique and state how he or she intends the readers to react.

When you believe you have completed the task, read it through carefully and check that you have covered all the points. Take a look at the suggested checklist below:

1. Have you mentioned the visuals as well as the material in the text?
2. Have you stated how the visuals complement the text?
3. Have you used appropriate topic sentences in each paragraph to signal what it is about?
4. Have you used quotations? If you have, then make sure that they are in the appropriate places in your text.
5. Are there appropriate cohesive devices that successfully link your paragraphs and ideas.
6. Does your writing flow easily?
7. Make sure you check grammar and spelling. Also check that you have organised your analysis into paragraphs.
8. Have you followed the rubric?
9. Have you started your detailed analysis of the text too soon?
10. Make certain that your sentences are not too long and rambling.
11. Have you been concise, or have you fallen into the trap of using hyperbole?