Literary Elements

Literary Elements ELA - Grade 11

Open Ended

List the 9 literary elements you learnt yesterday.

Literary Elements

Literary Elements - What We Will Cover Today

• What are literary elements?

• How important is it to understand these elements and how they impact the meaning of the text?

• Main literary elements you need to know to answer your FSA questions.

Multiple Select

What topics are we covering today?

• What are literary elements?

• Main literary elements you need to know to answer your FSA questions.

• Reading informational texts.

• How important is it to understand these elements and how they impact the meaning of the text?

What are literary texts?

For this course, you will read two types of texts. Literary texts and informational texts. This lesson will focus on the literary texts.

A literary text is a piece of writing, such as a book or poem, that has the purpose of telling a story or entertaining, as in a fictional novel. Its primary function as a text is usually aesthetic, but it may also contain political messages or beliefs.

What are literary texts?

Go to Canvas and in the discussion, say what a literary text is. Use 2 minutes to do this.

Elements of Literary Texts

• Language

• Plot

• Mood

• Setting

• Theme

• Point of View

• Narrator

Elements of Literary Texts (continued)

• Conflict

• Characters

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Language

#1: Language - The most important literary element is language. Language is defined as a system of communicating ideas and feelings through signs, sounds, gestures, and/or marks. Language is the way we share ideas with one another, whether it's through speech, text, or even performance!

All literature is written in a recognizable language, since one of literature's main goals is sharing ideas, concepts, and stories with a larger audience.

Language (continued)

Since there are over 6,900 distinct languages in the world, that means literature exists in tons of different linguistic forms, too. (How cool is that?!)

Obviously, in order to read a book, you need to understand the language it's written in. But language can also be an important tool in understanding the meaning of a book, too.

Plot

The plot of a work is defined as the sequence of events that occurs from the first line to the last. In other words, the plot is what happens in a story.

All literature has a plot of some kind. Most long-form literature, like a novel or a play, follows a pretty typical plot structure, also known as a plot arc. This type of plot has six elements:

Beginning/Exposition: This is the very beginning of a story. During the exposition, authors usually introduce the major characters and settings to the reader.

Plot (continued)

Conflict: Just like in real life, the conflict of a story is the problem that the main characters have to tackle. There are two types of conflict that you'll see in a plot. The major conflict is the overarching problem that characters face. Minor conflicts, on the other hands, are the smaller obstacles characters have to overcome to resolve the major conflict.

Rising Action: Rising action is literally everything that happens in a story that leads up to the climax of the plot. Usually this involves facing and conquering minor conflicts, which is what keeps the plot moving forward. More importantly, writers use rising action to build tension that comes to a head during the plot's climax.

Plot (continued)

Climax: The climax of the plot is the part of the story where the characters finally have to face and solve the major conflict. This is the "peak" of the plot where all the tension of the rising action finally comes to a head. You can usually identify the climax by figuring out which part of the story is the moment where the hero will either succeed or totally fail.

Falling Action: Falling action is everything that happens after the book's climax but before the resolution. This is where writers tie up any loose ends and start bringing the book's action to a close.

Plot (continued)

Resolution/Denouement: This is the conclusion of a story. But just because it's called a "resolution" doesn't mean every single issue is resolved happily—or even satisfactorily. For example, the resolution in Romeo and Juliet involves (spoiler alert!) the death of both main characters. This might not be the kind of ending you want, but it is an ending, which is why it's called the resolution!

Mood

The mood of a piece of literature is defined as the emotion or feeling that readers get from reading the words on a page. So if you've ever read something that's made you feel tense, scared, or even happy...you've experienced mood firsthand!

Mood (continued)

While a story can have an overarching mood, it's more likely that the mood changes from scene to scene depending on what the writer is trying to convey. For example, the overall mood of a play like Romeo and Juliet may be tragic, but that doesn't mean there aren't funny, lighthearted moments in certain scenes.

Thinking about mood when you read literature is a great way to figure out how an author wants readers to feel about certain ideas, messages, and themes.

Multiple Choice

What language is being used in the text "By Any Other Name".

• Tagali

• Hindi

• Old English

• English

Multiple Choice

Consider the text "By Any Other Name". Which of the following describes the PLOT of the story.

• Preserving personal and cultural identity is important.

• Premila and Santha had to start an Anglo-Indian school because their mother could no longer teach them. While there their names were changed and they face discrimination which Premilia resisted. Eventually they left the school.

• Somber, pensive, melancholic, apprehensive

• Premila, Santha, the little Indian girl, the mother, the ayah

Multiple Choice

Consider the text "By Any Other Name". Which of the following describes the MOOD of the story.

• Somber, pensive, melancholic, apprehensive

• Premila and Santha had to start an Anglo-Indian school because their mother could no longer teach them. While there their names were changed and they face discrimination which Premilia resisted. Eventually they left the school.

• Preserving personal and cultural identity is important.

• Premila, Santha, the little Indian girl, the mother, the ayah

Setting

Setting is defined simply as the time and location in which the story takes place. The setting is also the background against which the action happens. For example, Hogwarts becomes the location, or setting, where Harry, Hermione, and Ron have many of their adventures.

Keep in mind that longer works often have multiple settings. The Harry Potter series, for example, has tons of memorable locations, like Hogsmeade, Diagon Alley, and Gringotts. Each of these settings plays an important role in bringing the Wizarding World to life.

The setting of a work is important because it helps convey important information about the world that impact other literary elements, like plot and theme.

Theme

All literary works have themes, or central messages, that authors are trying to convey. Sometimes theme is described as the main idea of a work...but more accurately, themes are any ideas that appear repeatedly throughout a text. That means that most works have multiple themes!

All literature has themes because a major purpose of literature is to share, explore, and advocate for ideas. Even the shortest poems have themes

Open Ended

Describe the Setting in By Any Other Name.

Multiple Select

Select themes found in By Any Other Name.

• Preserving personal and cultural identity is important.

• War has devastating effects on children.

• Colonization often results in the ostracization of indigenous cultures.

• Family can offer love and support that can help affirm your identity.

Point of View

Point of view is the position of the narrator in relationship to the plot of a piece of literature. In other words, point of view is the perspective from which the story is told.

Literature can be written from one of four points of view.

First person: This is told by one of the characters of the story from their perspective. You can easily identify first-person points of view by looking for first-person pronouns, like "I," "you," and "my."

Second person: second-person point of view happens when the audience is made a character in the story. In this instance, the narrator uses second person pronouns, like "you" and "your." If you ever get confused, just remember that "Choose Your Own Adventure" books use second person.

Point of View (continued)

Third person limited: this is when the narrator is removed from the story and tells it from an outside perspective. To do this, the narrator uses pronouns like "he," "she," and "they" to refer to the characters in the story. In a third person limited point of view, this narrator focuses on the story as it surrounds one character. It's almost like there's a camera crew following the protagonist that reports on everything that happens to them.

Third person omniscient: in this point of view, the narrator still uses third-person pronouns...but instead of being limited to one character, the narrator can tell readers what's happening with all characters at all times. It's almost like the narrator is God: they can see all, hear all, and explain all!

Point of View (continued)

Point of view is an important literary element for two reasons. First, it helps us better understand the characters in a story. For example, a first person point of view lets readers get to know the main character in detail, since they experience the main character's thoughts, feelings, and actions.

Second, point of view establishes a narrator, or a character whose job it is to tell the story.

Narrator

The narrator is the person who's telling the story. All literature has a narrator, even if that narrator isn't named or an active part of the plot.

Here's what we mean: when you read a newspaper article, it's the reporter's job to tell you all the details of a particular event. That makes the reporter the narrator. They're taking a combination of interviews, research, and their own eyewitness account to help you better understand a topic.

The same is true for the narrator of a book or poem too. The narrator helps make sense of the plot for the reader. It's their job to explain, describe, and even dramatically reveal plot points to the audience.

Multiple Choice

From which point of view is the story By Any Other Name being told?

• Second person

• Third person limited

• Third person omniscient

• First person

Multiple Choice

Who is the narrator of the story?

• Santha

• Premila

• The mother

• Th teacher

Conflict

Because conflict is a part of plot—and as we've already established, all literature has some sort of plot—that means conflict is a literary element, too. A conflict is the central struggle that motivates the characters and leads to a work's climax. Generally, conflict occurs between the protagonist, or hero, and the antagonist, or villain...but it can also exist between secondary characters, man and nature, social structures, or even between the hero and his own mind.

Conflict (continued)

More importantly, conflict gives a story purpose and motivates a story's plot. Put another way, conflict causes the protagonist to act. Sometimes these conflicts are large in scale, like a war...but they can also be small, like conflict in a relationship between the hero and their parents.

One of the most important things to understand about conflict is it can be both explicit and implicit. Explicit conflict is explained within the text; it's an obvious moment where something goes wrong and characters have to fix it.

Conflict (continued)

Implicit conflict is more common in poetry, where there isn't a specific occurrence that obviously screams, "this is a problem." Instead, you have to read between the lines to find the conflict that's motivating the narrator.

Types of Conflict

Multiple Choice

Identify the type of conflict found in the text By Any Other Name.

• Implicit

• Explicit

Characters

A piece of literature has to have at least one character which can be a person, an object, or an animal.

While there are many different character types, the two you absolutely need to know are the protagonist and the antagonist.

The protagonist of a work is its main character. The plot circles around this person or object, and he/she is central to solving the conflict of the story. Protagonists are often heroic, but they don't have to be: many stories focus on the struggles of average people too. For the most part, protagonists are the characters that you remember long after the book is over

Characters (continued)

Antagonists on the other hand, are the characters that oppose the protagonist in some way. (This opposition is what causes the conflict of the story!) There can be multiple antagonists in a story, though usually there's one major character, animal, or object that continues to impede the protagonist's progress. If you ever forget what an antagonist is, just think of your favorite Marvel villains. (Loki, Magneto, Thanos, Hela, Mystique)

Multiple Select

Select the antagonist(s) from the list below.

• Premila

• Santha

• The teacher

• Headmistress

• The ayah

Study and Practice

You will need to know how to define these elements, identifying them in a text and understanding how they impact the meaning of the text. Practice and study these elements. In another lesson, we will look at literary text question types you will see on the FSA and the relating standards.