Abstract

This article draws upon practitioner research to argue that success with unseen texts depends upon explicit instruction in substantive literary concepts, such as the detective archetype, rather than generic approaches to analysis. Findings from literature and classroom practice suggest that in horizontal disciplines such as English Literature, the deeper features of key concepts are more mutable and context-bound than in hierarchical disciplines. Implications for instruction are explored, including using archetypes and boundary cases, rather than examples and non-examples, to deepen disciplinary knowledge and improve student responses across assessment objectives.