Authors make deliberate choices in style, register, tone, and structure to position the reader. The IB examines how these choices shape meaning and reader response.
Register — the formality/informality of language relative to audience
Tone — the writer's attitude expressed through word choice (diction)
Mode — spoken, written, visual, or multimodal text
Purpose — to inform, persuade, entertain, instruct, provoke
Q: A political speech uses short, simple sentences and repetition. Which term best describes this technique?
✓ Answer: (A) Anaphora — repetition of a word/phrase at the start of successive clauses to create emphasis and rhythm, a common rhetorical strategy.
Unit 2 · Time & Space
🌍 Context & Setting
Texts are produced and consumed within specific historical, cultural, and geographical contexts. The IB requires students to analyse how setting and time period shape meaning.
Chronotope — Bakhtin's term for the intrinsic connectedness of time and space in a text
Spatial imagery — how physical locations carry symbolic meaning
Historical context — events contemporary to the text that influence its production
Q: A novel begins in the middle of an action scene before explaining earlier events. This technique is called:
✓ Answer: (B) In medias res — a Latin term meaning "into the middle of things"; the narrative starts mid-action rather than from the chronological beginning.
Unit 3 · Intertextuality: Connecting Texts
🔗 Intertextuality & Allusion
Texts do not exist in isolation — they reference, borrow, subvert, or respond to other texts. Intertextuality enriches meaning and positions the reader within a literary tradition.
Allusion — indirect reference to another text, event, or figure
Parody — imitation of a text's style for comic or critical effect
Pastiche — imitation without satirical intent
Archetype — a universal character/pattern recurring across cultures (e.g. the hero, the trickster)
Q: "The sun smiled down on us" — identify the device and its effect.
✓ Answer: Personification — the sun is given a human action ("smiled"), creating a warm, benevolent atmosphere and suggesting the natural world is in harmony with the speaker's mood.
Official Exam Section
20 Past-Paper Style Questions
📋 Instructions
Select the single best answer for each question. You will receive immediate feedback after each answer. Correct answers trigger confetti 🎉. Incorrect answers reveal the explanation at once. Your final score appears after Q20. The answer key is also available below the exam.