What the photograph leaves outside
Original practice source: a commentary about photographs and descriptions.
A photograph can preserve details a writer might omit or fail to notice. It can challenge a description by showing something which an account has left out. Yet it also has an edge, a moment and a point of view. A visible detail does not explain every cause or consequence around it.
A written description selects too, but it can identify time, context and uncertainty which the image cannot supply alone. Either form can be used carefully or misleadingly. Trust may depend on how an account explains its evidence and limits, rather than on whether the evidence arrives as words or an image.
A national newspaper is running an essay competition on the statement: “A photograph is always more trustworthy than a written description.”
Write an essay for the competition arguing your view. You may use ideas from the source and your own ideas.
60 exam-style questions on Oxford AQA IGCSE English Language 2.2.1 Writing for audience and purpose. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.