OCR GCSE English Language

Why word choice matters

Every word belongs to a word class, and a writer's pattern of classes shapes how a passage feels. A passage built on verbs moves quickly; one built on adjectives slows down to look at things. Naming a word class earns little by itself. What matters is the effect: what the word suggests, what the reader pictures, and how their attitude is nudged.

The main classes

Nouns

A concrete noun names something that can be seen or touched (gravel, radiator) and an abstract noun names an idea or feeling (dread, liberty). A proper noun names a particular person or place and takes a capital letter, and a collective noun names a group (a crowd, the staff). A run of concrete nouns builds a physical scene, so a room described through a stained mattress, a cracked basin and one bare bulb leaves the reader to draw the conclusion that it is neglected. Abstract nouns tend to give a text a reflective or serious tone, and persuasive writers use them (justice, waste, security) because they stand for things almost everyone already feels strongly about.

Verbs

Verbs carry most of a sentence's energy. A dynamic verb describes an action (hurled, crept) and a stative verb describes a state (was, seemed, remained). Three verbs for the same action show how much one choice can do: walked is neutral, trudged suggests weariness and strode suggests confidence.

Verbs also carry tense. The past tense is the ordinary choice for telling a story, the present tense gives immediacy, as if events are happening as the reader reads, and the future tense can build anticipation or threat.

A modal verb (must, should, will, might, could) expresses certainty, obligation or possibility. We must act is a demand, we might act is a suggestion and we will act is a promise. A writer who moves from could to must across an article is tightening the pressure on the reader.

Voice matters as well. In the active voice the doer comes first (the council closed the library) and in the passive voice the receiver comes first (the library was closed). The passive can leave out who is responsible altogether, which is why evasive official statements often use it, and in a news report it can put the victim at the front of the sentence instead.

Adjectives and adverbs

Stacked adjectives and adverbs can create a thick sensory description, but one well-chosen word often does more. Thin light suggests weakness, greasy light suggests dirt, and the noun has not changed. An adverb often tells the reader how to take an action: she answered curtly puts the speaker's mood into a single word. Too many modifiers can sound breathless or exaggerated, which is sometimes intended.

Adjectives can be comparative (darker) or superlative (darkest). A superlative claims the extreme, and writers of adverts, speeches and reviews use them to make a claim sound unarguable.

Pronouns

Pronouns decide who is included. We and us draw the reader into the writer's group, you speaks to the reader directly, they and them set up an outsider group, and I makes a text personal. A leader who says we have all made sacrifices is building a shared identity, while they never listen builds a divide. Pronoun choice is therefore one of the first things to check when a text is about loyalty, blame or persuasion.

Connotation and denotation

The denotation of a word is its literal meaning, and its connotations are the ideas and feelings that come with it. Slim and scrawny denote much the same thing, but slim is approving and scrawny is not. When two writers describe the same event with different words, the gap between the words shows the gap between their attitudes.

A good way to analyse a word is to ask what else it could have been. The crowd surged forward could have been the crowd moved forward, and the replacement shows what surged adds: force, water and a loss of individual control.

Emotive and loaded language

Emotive language is chosen to provoke a feeling such as pity, anger or pride (heartbreaking, disgraceful, heroic). Loaded language carries a built-in judgement, so that calling a protest an uprising or a disturbance tells the reader what to think of it before any evidence has been given.

Semantic fields

A semantic field is a group of words linked by meaning. A description of a city that draws on machinery, grind, gears and cogs sets up an industrial field, and it quietly says that the city treats people as parts. When several words from one field recur, name the field, say what its words have in common, and then say what it implies about the thing being described.

Register and vocabulary level

Words can be formal (purchase, assist, inadequate), informal (buy, help, rubbish) or colloquial (gonna, mate), and a writer may use technical vocabulary (cartilage, algorithm) or archaic words that sound old-fashioned (whilst, thither). Formal vocabulary suggests authority or distance, informal vocabulary suggests closeness, and technical vocabulary suggests expertise. These choices connect to register, covered in the note on tone, register and voice.

Naming and labelling

How a writer names a person or thing is a choice. A child can be a pupil, a youngster, a lad or the problem, and each label places the child differently. A writer who calls a place home rather than the property has chosen warmth over detachment. When a text refers to the same thing in several ways, look for what changes from one label to the next.