Has ‘Of Mice and Men’ been banned for GCSE?

There’s been a lot of good sense talked in the media in recent days, in response to the DfE’s changes to the Literature requirements for GCSE…and a lot of nonsense too!

In our usual style, EMC is keen to set out some of the facts and arguments and set the record straight on some of the more curious aspects of media responses.

1. Is Michael Gove right in claiming that he’s not banning American texts and that it’s the Awarding Bodies’ fault for narrowly sticking to the set of minimum requirements?

The Subject Content for GCSE Literature, as set out by the DfE, makes some fairly substantial stipulations about what’s required. A complete nineteenth century text, a collection of poetry, including ‘representative Romantic poetry’ (whatever that is supposed to mean), a play by Shakespeare and a piece of drama or fiction written in ‘the British Isles’. There is a requirement…