Reading Non-Fiction: Comparing 19th and 21st Century

Agreeing on everything, and still disagreeing

This paper gives you two non-fiction extracts and asks you four different things about them. What the writers say. How they write it. How their views compare. And how convincing you find them. ⚠️ THE THIRD OF THOSE IS WHERE MOST MARKS ARE LOST, AND ALWAYS IN THE SAME WAY. Asked to compare the writers' perspectives, students compare what the texts are about. "Both writers describe children playing outside. Text A says they were in the street all day, and Text B says the streets are empty now." It is accurate, it uses both texts, and it is answering the wrong question. ⭐ THAT IS A COMPARISON OF CONTENT. THE QUESTION ASKED FOR A COMPARISON OF PERSPECTIVE. Here is the distinction, and it is worth more than any other single idea on this paper. A fact is what happened. A perspective is how the writer stands towards it. ⚠️ TWO WRITERS CAN AGREE ON EVERY SINGLE FACT AND STILL DISAGREE COMPLETELY, because agreeing about what happened tells you nothing about whether they think it was good. Imagine two people describing the same street a century apart. Both say children used to play there unsupervised from morning until dark. Both are describing exactly the same thing. ⭐ AND ONE OF THEM MAY THINK IT WAS A SCANDAL WHILE THE OTHER THINKS IT WAS A FREEDOM WE HAVE THROWN AWAY. Nothing about the facts tells you which is which. The attitude is carried somewhere else entirely: in the words each writer chooses, in what each one bothers to mention, and in what they ask the reader to feel about it. ⚠️ AND THAT IS WHY THIS PAPER SETS TEXTS FROM DIFFERENT CENTURIES. Facts about ordinary life change slowly. Attitudes to them change a great deal, so a pair of extracts a hundred years apart is close to a guarantee that a real difference of view is sitting there waiting to be found.

The two extracts

Two practice extracts written for this module. Read them both, and notice how much they agree about.

Tap what both writers agree happened

Tap the TWO statements that BOTH extracts state as fact, whatever each writer thinks of it.

• Children were outside from breakfast until after dark
• No adult was supervising them while they were out
• The arrangement was a good thing for the children involved
• The arrangement showed that the district had given something up

The same street, two verdicts

Both writers describe children outside unsupervised all day. A student concludes that the two writers broadly agree. What has gone wrong?

• They agree about what happened but not at all about what it means: one presents it as a failure of care, the other as a freedom worth mourning
• The two writers do not really agree on the facts at all
• The older text cannot be compared with a modern one because the language is too different
• Only the modern writer is giving an opinion; the older one is reporting

Five words this paper marks against

Five terms, each defined by what it is. Neither extract is quoted here.

Match each phrase to the attitude it reveals

Two that follow from the distinction

Select the TWO statements that follow from the difference between content and perspective.

• A claim about a writer's attitude has to be supported by their language, because the attitude is not stated anywhere directly
• Two writers agreeing about the facts tells you nothing about whether their views match
• Quoting a longer stretch of each text makes a comparison point stronger
• The 19th-century writer is simply reporting, so only the modern text has a perspective

Proving an attitude you cannot quote

A perspective is never written down in a text. Nobody puts "my attitude to this is disapproval" in the second paragraph. ⚠️ SO A CLAIM ABOUT A WRITER'S VIEW ALWAYS HAS TO BE PROVED FROM THE WORDS, and that is where your analysis skill earns its living on this paper. You already know how to build an analysis point: a short quotation, the technique named precisely, and the effect explained. ⭐ A COMPARISON POINT IS THAT SAME THREE-PART MOVE, DONE TWICE AND JOINED. State the difference in attitude. Prove it from Text A. Prove it from Text B. In one sentence if you can. ⚠️ AND HERE IS THE TEST THAT TELLS YOU WHETHER YOU HAVE ACTUALLY DONE IT. Take your sentence and delete the writer's attitude from it. If what remains is still a true statement about the texts, you have written about content and called it perspective. Three habits that keep the marks. ⚠️ KEEP QUOTATIONS SHORT ENOUGH TO ANALYSE. A few words that carry the attitude beat a whole sentence that merely contains it, and a long quotation spends the time the evaluation question needs. ⚠️ USE A COMPARING WORD IN EVERY POINT: WHEREAS, BY CONTRAST, BOTH, UNLIKE. Without one, an examiner is reading two separate observations and doing the joining for you. ⭐ AND DO NOT MISTAKE OLD-FASHIONED LANGUAGE FOR NEUTRALITY. A writer from the nineteenth century can be every bit as opinionated as one writing now; the opinion is just carried in an older register. Students routinely treat the older text as "just reporting" and lose half the comparison that way.

One difference, proved from both texts

Take the difference in how the two writers regard the children themselves, and build it into an answer properly. Start with the weak version, because it is what a first attempt looks like. "Text A does not like the children being out. Text B thinks it was better in the past." ⚠️ BOTH HALVES ARE TRUE AND NEITHER IS PROVED. An examiner has been told your conclusion and shown none of the working. Now name the difference precisely first. "The two writers differ in whether they see the children as a problem or as capable." ⭐ THAT SENTENCE IS ABOUT ATTITUDE, AND IT IS TRUE OF NEITHER TEXT ON ITS OWN, which is how you know it is a comparison rather than two observations. Then prove it from Text A, with the technique named. The older writer says the streets are "given over" to children. That is the language of territory being surrendered, as though the street were properly adult ground that has fallen into the wrong hands. ⚠️ THE PHRASE DOES THE WORK THAT THE WRITER NEVER DOES DIRECTLY: it positions the children as occupiers rather than residents. Then prove it from Text B. The modern writer says they were "settling their own arguments". ⭐ THAT IS A PHRASE ABOUT COMPETENCE. Settling an argument is something you credit an adult with doing; applying it to unsupervised children treats them as capable of running their own affairs, which is exactly what the first writer objects to. ⚠️ NOW LOOK AT WHAT THE TWO QUOTATIONS HAVE IN COMMON AS CONTENT. BOTH DESCRIBE CHILDREN MANAGING WITHOUT ADULTS. ⭐ THE FACTS ARE THE SAME. THE VERDICT IS OPPOSITE, AND THE EVIDENCE FOR THE VERDICT IS FOUR WORDS FROM EACH TEXT. That is the whole move, and it works on any pair this paper gives you.

Assemble a comparison of perspectives

Build a sentence comparing how the two writers regard the absence of adult supervision.

Order the way to build a comparison point

Put the steps in order, from reading the extracts to having a point on the page.

• Read both extracts and work out what they agree happened
• Ask what each writer appears to think about it, which is not stated anywhere
• Name the difference in attitude as a single statement true of neither text alone
• Find a few words in each text that carry that attitude
• Write the difference, then the evidence from each, joined with a comparing word

The perspectives run

Five questions on comparing what writers think rather than what they describe. Three lives.

Complete the comparison facts

The attitude a writer takes towards their subject is their _____. Combining material from more than one text into a single statement covering both is _____. The impression a piece of writing gives of the writer's feeling, carried by word choice rather than stated, is its _____. Something shown by a text without being stated directly is _____.

Three comparisons to repair

Three attempts at the comparison question. In each case the mark is in the reasoning, not the verdict.

• An answer reads: "Both writers say children used to play outside all day without adults watching them." It is accurate and uses both texts. Why does it score poorly on a perspectives question?
• A student says the older text cannot be compared for perspective because the writer is only reporting what they saw. How would you answer?
• An answer claims the modern writer admires the children, but offers no quotation. The claim happens to be right. What is missing?

Compare how the two writers regard the same street

Compare the perspectives of the two writers in the extracts in this module, supporting every point from both texts.

• State what the two writers agree happened, briefly, so the comparison has a starting point
• Name the main difference in their attitudes as a statement that is true of neither text on its own
• Prove that difference from Text A, quoting a few words and explaining what the choice does
• Prove it from Text B in the same way, joining the two with a comparing word
• Make a second comparison point about how each writer positions the reader, again supported from both texts
• Finish by explaining why the difference in their views cannot be read off the facts they both report