Pearson Edexcel International GCSE In English Language A (4EA1) Paper 02: Poetry and Prose Texts and Imaginative Writing Mark Scheme (Results) November 2021

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Question Number Indicative content 1 Reward responses that explain how the writer presents the idea of being proud. Responses may include the following points about how the narrator’s pride in... herself is presented: • the narrator shows that she is proud of how she overcomes the oppression of others by opening the poem with ‘You may write me down in history/With your bitter, twisted lies’, and then saying ‘still, like dust, I’ll rise’ • the narrator shows pride in qualities she has by referring to them as belonging to her: ‘my sassiness’, ‘my haughtiness’, ‘my sexiness’ • her questions to others repeat and foreground her views of her own strengths, showing pride in showing them off: ‘Does my sassiness upset you?’, ‘Does my haughtiness offend you?’, ‘Does my sexiness upset you?’ • the writer’s strength and pride are shown in the way she describes the others as unhappy, while she is strong and positive: ‘bitter, twisted’, ‘upset’, ‘beset with gloom’, ‘take it awful hard’ • the narrator’s description of how she walks, laughs and dances shows her pride in how she does things, as she links these actions to symbols of wealth and power: ‘oil wells’, ‘gold mines’, ‘diamonds’ • the narrator’s pride in her strength is seen in the way she aligns herself with the planets and elements: ‘like moons and like suns’, ‘certainty of tides’, ‘like air’ • she is proud of being a woman, seen in her reference to ‘my sexiness’ and ‘diamonds/At the meeting of my thighs?’ • the narrator’s description of how others expect her to be shows she is proud that she does not behave in that way: ‘Bowed head and lowered eyes?/Shoulders falling down like teardrops,/Weakened by my soulful cries?’ • the narrator shows pride in her determination to rise above the actions of others by repeating: ‘I’ll rise’ • the way the narrator moves from the hopeful ‘I’ll rise’ to the definitive ‘I rise’ at the end of the poem shows power and control that come from strength and pride. Responses may include the following points about how pride in the narrator’s background is presented: • the narrator’s pride in her background is shown in the way she can affirm that her people have been misrepresented: ‘write me down in history’ • the narrator shows that she challenges the views of others about her background: ‘your bitter, twisted lies’, ‘You may shoot me with your words’ • the narrator’s reactions to the treatment by others show her sense of pride in herself and her background: ‘trod me in the very dirt’, ‘You may cut me with your eyes,/You may kill me with your hatefulness’ https://britishstudentroom-b430a.web.app/7 • the repeated descriptions of the behaviour of others to the narrator, from verbal abuse to being metaphorically physically abusive, indirectly show how proud she is of her background: ‘trod me in the very dirt’, ‘You may shoot me … You may cut me … You may kill me’ • the narrator feels proud of her background and is unapologetic when presenting it as difficult: ‘huts of history’s shame’, ‘a past that’s rooted in pain’ • the narrator is proud of her background as an African-American woman: ‘I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,/Welling and swelling I bear in the tide’ • the narrator sees her background as a source of pride rather than as a disadvantage, as her ancestors gave her ‘gifts’: ‘Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave’ • towards the end of the poem she is proud to be the figurehead for more than just her own feelings: ‘I am the dream and the hope of the slave.’ Responses may include the following points about the use of language and structure: • the writer uses rhyme to show the balance and control of someone who feels proud: ‘lies/rise’, ‘gloom/room’, ‘eyes/cries’ • the sense of pride in the poem is contrasted with the negative descriptions used to show the behaviour and attitudes of others: ‘bitter, twisted’, ‘trod me in the very dirt’, ‘beset with gloom’, ‘broken’, ‘teardrops’, ‘hatefulness’, ‘terror and fear’ • the writer uses nouns that describe strong personal qualities to demonstrate how proud she is of them: ‘sassiness’, ‘haughtiness’, ‘sexiness’ • the possessive pronoun ‘my’ is used to show that these qualities belong to the narrator and that she is proud to show them off • the use of powerful metaphor links to the writer’s feeling of personal power: ‘oil wells/Pumping in my living room’, ‘gold mines/Diggin’ in my own backyard’ • the writer uses rhetorical questions to show that she is proud enough to challenge others in a taunting, mocking tone of voice: ‘Does my haughtiness offend you?’, ‘Does it come as a surprise/That I dance like I’ve got diamonds/At the meeting of my thighs?’ • in contrast, the writer’s use of statements about herself shows her confidence and security in her sense of pride: ‘But still, like dust, I’ll rise’, ‘I am the dream and the hope of the slave’ • the use of colloquial Americanisms indicates the writer’s pride in her background: ‘sassiness’, ‘awful hard’ • powerful verbs are used to show that the narrator is proud to have overcome the actions of others and their intended impact: ‘Shoulders falling down’, ‘Weakened’, ‘offend’ • the writer uses personification to show the sense of power the narrator’s pride gives her: ‘I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide’ • alliteration is used to create emphasis on pride by showing a positive future and moving on from the past: ‘hopes springing high’, ‘huts of history’s shame’, ‘past that’s rooted in pain [Show More]

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