WJEC GCSE English Language and Literature

Every word belongs to a class according to the job it does in a sentence. Naming the class is only the first step in analysis; the point is to say what the choice does to the reader. A writer who picks a stative verb over a dynamic one, or a modal over a flat statement, is shaping pace, certainty and tone, and the same holds for a poet or a speechwriter as much as for a novelist.

Nouns

A noun names a person, place, thing or idea. The types worth telling apart are these.

A text full of abstract nouns (justice, dignity, equality) tends to sound serious and principled, which is why speeches about rights lean on them. A text full of concrete nouns tends to sound immediate and sensory, which suits description and personal accounts.

Verbs

A verb expresses an action, state or occurrence.

A dynamic verb describes an action or process (sprint, slam, tear) and gives pace and energy. A stative verb describes a state, feeling or condition (be, seem, feel, remain) and slows the pace, often suggesting a settled state of mind. A paragraph of dynamic verbs feels active; a run of stative ones feels still, reflective or trapped.

An imperative verb gives an order or instruction (take, stop, imagine). It creates a direct, commanding tone, which is why instructional guides, adverts and persuasive leaflets use it so heavily.

Auxiliary verbs (be, have, do) help a main verb show tense, mood or voice, as in "she has gone" or "they were told". Modal verbs (can, could, must, should, might, will, would) show how certain, possible or necessary something is. A writer's choice of modal can reveal a character's stance: must suggests duty or compulsion, might suggests doubt, and will suggests firm determination. In persuasive writing, "we must act" is much more forceful than "we could act".

A gerund is an -ing verb form used as a noun, as in "Walking is good for you".

Adjectives and adverbs

An adjective describes a noun. A carefully chosen adjective builds a precise picture or mood around the noun, so that "a hollow, rattling room" says far more than "an empty room". An adverb describes a verb, an adjective or another adverb. An adverb of manner shows exactly how an action is done and can carry tone: she closed the door quietly is not the same as she closed the door sharply.

Writers who want to sound factual often use fewer adjectives and adverbs, and writers who want to move the reader tend to use more. An accumulation of adjectives, particularly emotive ones, is one of the clearest signs of persuasive intent.

Pronouns

A pronoun stands in for a noun. The person of the pronoun matters because it sets the relationship between writer and reader.

A relative pronoun (who, which, that, whose) introduces a relative clause and links it to a noun, as in "the girl who stood up".

Linking and positioning words

A preposition shows how a noun relates to another word, often in place or time (under, beside, after). A determiner comes before a noun to show which one or how many (the, a, this, several, my). A coordinating conjunction (and, but, or, so) joins two words, phrases or main clauses of equal weight. A subordinating conjunction (because, although, while, if, unless) joins a subordinate clause to a main clause and shows how the two relate, whether cause, contrast, time or condition.

The choice between these tells the reader how the writer sees the relationship between ideas. "He was tired but he carried on" and "Although he was tired, he carried on" describe the same facts, but the second gives the tiredness less weight and puts the persistence at the end.

Interjections

An interjection is a word or short phrase that expresses sudden feeling and stands outside the grammar of a sentence (oh, ugh, hey). Interjections make writing sound spoken and spontaneous, so they appear in monologues, dialogue, blogs and transcripts.

Naming the effect

An analysis sentence names the feature, quotes or points to it, and says what it does. For example: the repeated imperatives ("look", "listen") give the speaker authority and treat the audience as people who need to be told. The effect is tied to this text, this audience and this purpose; the same word class can do the opposite job somewhere else, so a label on its own explains nothing.