Compare how a persons culture is shown to be important in Hurricane Hits England and in one other poem.

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Compare how a person’s culture is shown to be important in ‘Hurricane Hits England’

(page 18) and in one other poem.

‘Hurricane Hits England’ by Grace Nichols and ‘Search for My Tongue’ by Sujata Bhatt both shows the importance of culture in different ways.

Firstly, the language used in ‘Hurricane Hits England’ is made up of statements and questions. She talks about the “howling ship of the wind” which is a metaphor for the hurricane to show the power of the storm. There paradox of the “fearful and reassuring” storm shows that even though she is scared, it makes her feel that the storm is not such a bad thing for her. She also includes questions such as “tell me why you visit an English coast?” this shows that she does not understand why a nature has come to where she now lives. This is because hurricanes were a usual disaster in French Guyana, where she originally lived, and then when she moved to England, the storm followed her there. She also wonders why her “heart unchained?” This could show the freedom because the hurricane showed her that French Guyana is not that far away from England for an event like a hurricane to happen. It could also mean that she was a slave but has now been set free to live a normal life. In addition, Nichols personifies the storm by calling it her “sweeping, back-home cousin”; this shows that understands the storm and sees it as a usual event when she is at home, this shows that her memories from being back home have come back to comfort her. However, the language used in ‘Search for My Tongue’ has part of her poem written in her first language, Gujarati. This could show that her first language and culture is very important to her because she feared she lost it when she moved away from her home town. It could also show that her first language will always be there and that she can never lose it. Also, because she is able to write in the phonetic spelling such as “munay hutoo kay aakhee jeebh aakhee bhasha” of the Gujarati shows that she is able to use both languages at the same time. This shows that her two tongues are cooperating together and working together. In addition, she is able to have the translation underneath the Gujarati which also show the cooperation between both of her tongues.

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The imagery in ‘Hurricane Hits England’ has the metaphor of “come break the frozen lake in me” this shows that the hurricane has made her feel more at home because she originally felt out place and has now warmed to England because of the event. It could also show that her inner life was frozen because of leaving French Guyana and now she feels that she can now fit in better in England because of the hurrican. She also says “that the earth is the earth is the earth” this could show that she is the same as everyone ...

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The Quality of Written Communication is very good. Only small errors which would very unlikely cause examiners to deduct marks are made as the effort in writing is evident, as is the candidate awareness of the poems. The small spelling mistakes do not compromise the strength of the answer.

The Level of Analysis is very good. There is a clear established understanding of the theme explored in the poems and how they adapt themselves in structure, language and imagery in order to convey the importance of culture. In their comments, the candidates uses a wide variety of field-specific terminology ("free verse", "stanza"). There is also a sound appreciation of the context of both Nichols and Bhatt and how they feel in response to their culture and moving away from their homeland. Contextual appreciation is very important GCSE level as it shows the canduidates ability to conduct external research into the authorial intentions of the poets and the social and historical factors that influenced the writing of the poems.

This response is extremely well-focused on the question proposed. The candidate addresses a wide variety of different features of the two poems and how they present the idea of culture being an important poets' identity. There are points backed up excellently with an appropriate handling of quotes from both poems in equal proportion (one thing many candidates fall for, is to discuss one poem in great detail and the other in far lesser due to time constraints, but this is not an equal comparison and can lower their grade). The comparison poem this candidate has chosen is Sujatta Bhatt's 'Search For My Tongue', an excellent choice as they are both written from the view of someone who has had to move away from their homeland and misses their original culture.