In Cat 1 and 2 essays, and through the work they have already undertaken, students may have developed an interest they wish to pursue further, for example:

• a particular genre of writing

• a particular author

• a philosophical, political or social question addressed by a literary work

A topic must be focused and is unusually shaped in the form: The portrayal of X on Y in text Z e.g. The portrayal of race to explore power dynamics in the collection "Citizen", by Claudia Rankine (Cat. 1 essay)

Students can choose literary works from any source, including the IB Diploma Programme prescribed list

of authors.

Crucially, students’ chosen text(s) should be of sufficient literary merit to sustain in-depth analysis

Category 3—appropriate texts

For the purpose of a category 3 language EE, “texts” include the widest range of oral, written and visual materials present in society:

• single and multiple images with or without written text

• literary written texts and text extracts

• media texts, eg advertising campaigns; films, radio and television programmes and their scripts

• electronic texts that share aspects of a number of media texts, eg video-sharing websites, web pages,

SMS messages, blogs, wikis and tweets

• oral texts, eg readings, speeches, broadcasts and transcripts of recorded conversation.