Core Textbooks (Your Foundation): 

1. AQA English Language: A Level and AS (Oxford University Press) 

• Authors: Dan Clayton, Angela Goddard, Beth Kemp, Felicity Titjen, Paul Sealey (Series Editor: Angela Goddard) 

• Essential. Written specifically for the AQA spec. Covers all core areas clearly with good activities and examples. The "Year 1/AS" and "Year 2/A Level" split editions are also available. 

2. English Language and Linguistics (Cambridge Topics in English Language) (Cambridge University Press) 

• : Ian Cushing, Dan Clayton, Angela Goddard 

• Excellent for deeper dives into linguistic theory, concepts, and debates relevant to the course. Strong on context and application. 

3. A/AS Level English Language for AQA Student Book (Cambridge University Press) 

• Authors: Marcello Giovanelli, Gary Ives, John Keen, Raj Rana, Rachel Rudman (Series Editor: Marcello Giovanelli) 

• Another strong course-specific textbook, well-structured with good analysis examples and tasks. 

Key Areas & Theorists (Go Beyond the Textbooks): 

• Child Language Development (CLD - Speech & Writing): 

• Key Names: Skinner (Behaviourism), Chomsky (Nativism - LAD, Universal Grammar), Bruner (Interactionism - LASS), Piaget (Cognitive Stages), Vygotsky (ZPD, Scaff), Tomasello (Usage-Based Theory), Berko (Wug Test), Nelson, Rescorla (Over/Underextension), Cruttenden (Intonation), Aitchison (Lexical/Semantic Development Stages: Labelling, Packaging, Network Building), Barclay (Stages of Writing Development), Kroll (Stages of Writing Development), Rothery (Categories of Children's Writing). 

• Further Reading: 

• Jean Aitchison: "The Articulate Mammal" (Classic, accessible) 

• David Crystal: "Listen to Your Child" or "How Language Works" (Relevant chapters) 

• Eve V. Clark: "First Language Acquisition" (More academic) 

• Language Diversity (Regional, Social, Ethnicity, Gender, Occupation): 

• Key Names: Trudgill (Norwich Study, Covert Prestige), Cheshire (Reading), Milroy (Belfast Study - Social Networks), Labov (Martha's Vineyard, New York Dept Store, AAVE), Bernstein (Restricted vs Elaborated Code - use critically), Tannen (Difference Model), Lakoff (Deficit Model - use critically), Zimmerman & West (Dominance Model), O'Barr & Atkins (Power, not Gender), Kerswill (Dialect Levelling, Multicultural London English), Eckert (Jocks & Burnouts), Swann (Gender & Classroom Talk), Pidgins & Creoles (Tok Pisin, Jamaican Creole), Halliday (Anti-Language). 

• Further Reading: 

• Peter Trudgill: "Sociolinguistics: An Introduction" 

• Jenny Cheshire (Ed): "English Around the World: Sociolinguistic Perspectives" 

• Deborah Tannen: "You Just Don't Understand" (Popular but) 

• David Crystal: "The Stories of English" (Historical context for diversity) 

• Paul Kerswill & Ann Williams: "New Dialects and Community Cohesion" 

• Language Change: 

• Key Names: Aitchison (Damp Spoon/Crumbling Castle/Infectious Disease metaphors), Jeanette Milroy (Complaint Tradition), Robert Lowth & Prescriptivism, Johnson (Dictionary), Caxton (Printing Press), Halliday (Functional Theory), Chen (S-Curve Model), Lexical Gaps, Euphemism Treadmill, Political Correctness, Technology Influence (Crystal "Language and the Internet"), Global English (Kachru's Circles), Pidgins/Creoles (as drivers of change). 

• Further Reading: 

• Jean Aitchison: "Language Change: Progress or Decay?" 

• David Crystal "The Stories of English" or "The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language" 

• Simon Horobin: "How English Became English" 

• John McWhorter: "Words on the Move" 

• Language Discourses (Attitudes, Representations, Debates): 

• Key Concepts: Standard Language Ideology, Prescriptivism vs Descriptivism, Overt vs Covert Prestige, Complaints Tradition (Milroy & Milroy), Verbal Hygiene (Deborah Cameron), Identity Construction, Power (Fairclough - Critical Discourse Analysis), Stereotyping, Moral Panics, Representation in Media. 

• Further Reading: 

• Deborah Cameron: "Verbal Hygiene" 

• Norman Fairclough: "Language and Power" (More advanced CDA) 

• English Language: Language Debates (AQA) (Publisher Hodder Education) - Specifically for this part of the AQA spec. 

• Tony Thorne: "Dictionary of Contemporary Slang" (For understanding attitudes to non-standard forms) 

Wider Reading & Resources: 

• Grammar & Frameworks: 

• David Crystal: "Rediscover Grammar" or "Making Sense of Grammar" (Clear explanations). 

• Geoff Barton: "Grammar Survival" (Very practical, school-focused). 

• Online: HyperGrammar (University of Ottawa), Internet Grammar of English (UCL) – reliable free resources. 

• Essential: Get very familiar with the terminology lists in your core textbooks and AQA specification 

• NEA (Language Investigation): 

• Alison Ross: "Language in Use: A Reader" (Good source of ideas/investigations). 

• Angela Goddard & Lindsey Meaney: "Doing English Language: A Guide for Students" (Covers research skills well). 

• Focus: Learn methodologies (questionnaires, interviews, corpus analysis, experiments ethically). Use resources like the British National Corpus (BNC) or iWeb Corpus. 

• General Interest & Depth: 

• David Crystal: "The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language" (A fantastic reference book). 

• Steven Pinker: "The Language Instinct" (Engaging, Chomskyan perspective). 

• Bill Bryson: "Mother Tongue" (Accessible and entertaining history). 

• Susie Dent: "Modern Tribes" or "Word Perfect" (Fun looks at contemporary language use). 

• Henry Hitchings: "The Language Wars" (Excellent on prescriptivism/descriptivism debates). 

• Gretchen McCulloch: "Because Internet" (Excellent on digital communication).