How to Write a High-Scoring Text Analysis for Year 12 English

To succeed in Year 12 English, you must show strong skills in text analysis and evaluation. You need to be able to break down texts and evaluate their meaning, value, and significance. This means looking closely at how a text is structured, the techniques the author uses, and the ideas they are trying to communicate. These skills help you think critically, write strong essays, and communicate effectively.

For a full list of key literary techniques, check out our English Literary Techniques Toolkit.

Table of contents

• What is text analysis?
• Why is text analysis important?
• Key aspects of text Analysis
  • Audience, context, purpose, and meaning
  • Representation and style
  • Form & genre
  • Narrative technique
  • Structure
  • Narrative structure
  • Intertextuality
  • Language features
  • Figurative, rhetorical, and poetic language

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What is text analysis?

Text analysis is about breaking down a text into its key parts—form, structure, and language features—to understand how the composer communicates meaning. By interpreting these elements, you can see how different techniques influence the reader and shape the message of the text.

Why is text analysis important?

1. Meeting curriculum requirements

• Victoria Curriculum (VCE English and Literature): You must analyse how authors construct meaning through language, structure, and stylistic choices. You’ll need these skills for tasks like analytical text responses and comparative essays.
• NSW Stage 6 English (HSC English Standard, Advanced, and Extension): In modules such as Texts and Human Experiences, Critical Study of Literature, and The Craft of Writing, you’ll need to analyse and evaluate texts with evidence from literary works.

2. Preparing for exams and assessments

In VCE and HSC exams, you must:

• Respond to unseen texts quickly and accurately
• Write comparative essays that evaluate two texts
• Construct strong arguments using textual evidence

The key to achieving high marks is by having a sophisticated analysis of language and structure.

3. Developing critical thinking skills

By studying literary techniques like symbolism, irony, and imagery, you learn to read between the lines and interpret deeper meanings. Identifying how authors shape perspectives helps you evaluate themes, context, and purpose more effectively.

4. Writing essays and effective communication

Mastering analytical writing strengthens your evaluative essays and extended responses. When you can identify and explain techniques like tone, point of view, and diction, you build better arguments,  write with confidence, and score higher marks.

5. Life skills

Text analysis isn’t just for English exams! It’s useful in university courses like law, media, and science, and even in everyday life when evaluating news, social media, or persuasive writing.

Key Aspects of Text Analysis and Literary Techniques

Before writing your text analysis, it will help you to follow these steps and the key questions within them about the text that allow you to understand its situation or position, expression, and meaning.

Step 1. Understand audience, context, purpose, and meaning

Crucial to analysing the text is understanding and knowing its composer, audience, purpose, and context.

• Audience: Who are the intended readers, listeners, or viewers? How might different audiences interpret the text based on their perspectives?
• Author (or Composer): Who created the text (e.g., novelist, filmmaker, poet, playwright, speechwriter)?
• Context: What cultural, social, or historical circumstances influenced the text?
• Theme: What is the text about, and what is the composer’s perspective?
• Purpose: What does the composer want the audience to understand?
• Meaning: What message does the audience receive, whether intended or not?
• Value: How does the audience judge the text’s worth?
• Significance: How might the text’s meaning shift depending on the audience or context?

Step 2. Identify representation and style

Step 3. Pinpoint form and genre

Analyse how the composer creates the text:

• Form: How is the text formed? (e.g., poem, drama, novel, speech) What is its “language“?
• Genre: What category does the text belong to? What codes and conventions are used? For instance, a film may be a documentary, drama or a hybrid docudrama.
• Medium: What tools or materials did the composer use (e.g., digital, written, audiovisual)?
• Mode: How is meaning communicated—through listening, speaking, reading, writing, or viewing?
• Types of Texts: Is it imaginative (e.g., typical of fiction texts like novels, plays), informative (e.g., news), or persuasive (e.g., ads)?

Step 4. Identify narrative technique

Explain how the narrative point of view, voice, and word choice reveal the subjectivity of the narrator or another character:

• Narration: From whose perspective is the story told? How does this perspective shape understanding of events?
• Diction: How are words chosen to create specific associations?
• Narrative Point of View: Is the narrator a participant in the story (first-person), or are they outside of it (third-person, omniscient)? If the narrator is first-person, they are an unreliable narrator: to what extent are they reliable or biased?
• Voice: Who is speaking (composer, narrator, or character) in the text? Are there moments when more than one voice is speaking?
• Discourse: How the narration and dialogue reveal details about a character?
• Register: Is the language formal or casual? Is the language indicative of the text’s genre? (E.g., legalese, Shakespearean)

Step 5. Break down the structure

Analysing how a text is organised and how one part of the text relates to another:

• Text Structure: How is the text organised? For a written text, is the text organised into chapters, or for a play, is the text organised into dialogue and stage directions? For persuasive texts, does its central argument or conclusion follow from its premises?
• Motif: What ideas, phrases, or images repeat, and what do they signify?
• Contrast: How do opposing ideas or phrases highlight differences?
• Juxtaposition: How does contrasting two ideas enhance similarities or differences?
• Irony: How does the text reveal gaps between what is said and understood?

Step 6: Examine narrative structure

Analyse how the plot and characters develop over the text:

• Plot: How is the plot structured? Does it use flashbacks or fragmented sequences?
• Characterisation: How are characters developed? What are their central conflicts?

Step 7. Analyse intertextuality

Recognise the presence of other text and analyse how this shapes meaning:

• Adaptation: Is the text adapted from another work? How closely does it follow the original?
• Allusion: Does the text indirectly reference other works, historical events, or cultural beliefs?
• Reference: Are there direct or indirect mentions of other works?

Step 8. Explore language features

Analyse how the composer chooses language to shape our response:

• Imagery: How is figurative language used to create mental images?
• Tone: What attitude does the composer show toward the subject or audience?
• Mood: How does the composer want the audience to feel?
• Atmosphere: What is the overall effect on the audience?
• Aesthetic: What recurring stylistic features relate to expressive arts?
• Connotation: What implied meanings go beyond literal definitions?

Step 9. Recognise figurative, rhetorical and poetic language

Analyse how the composer uses language to express ideas creatively:

• Metaphor: How does the composer relate one concept or object to another? What is the effect of this comparison?
• Symbol: How are images or objects used to represent more abstract concepts? What cultural associations does the symbol have, and how do we draw on these associations to interpret its meaning (e.g. fire and light symbolise knowledge)?
• Foreshadowing: How does the composer hint at events later in the plot?
• Hyperbole: How is an exaggeration used for emphasis?
• Paradox: How does an apparent contradiction reveal deeper truths?
• Anaphora: How does the repetition of a phrase at the beginning of a sentence or lines enhance meaning?

Improve your text analysis today

Text analysis requires understanding how composers use form, structure, and language to communicate meaning. By developing strong analytical skills, students can succeed in English assessments, deepen their critical thinking abilities, and enhance their communication skills for life beyond school.

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