Is there any point in writing an EE in a second language?

[bemekko]

After ages and ages of trying to find a good extended essay topic, the one I have sort of settled for now is writing something on L'Etranger by Albert Camus in French (as a group 2 category 3 essay). I mainly chose to do it in French because it's a subject I am good at and I'm probably good enough at the language to write an essay in it, but looking at the assessment criteria on the extended essay guide, it looks like hardly any marks at all are given for how good you actually are at writing in the language - there seems to be no extra merit for writing in a second language. I would obviously find it easier to write exactly the same thing in English and submit it as a group 1 essay, so do you think I should do that or am I likely to get a better mark for the same thing in French? Or should I just choose a new topic?

[Superfrank]

If you write your EE in a language which is not your mother language, they will give you the IB diploma as bilingual, not a normal one.

[bemekko]

Thank you for replying I wish that was true but I'm afraid I've just done a google search and found that that rule was abolished in 2011 and I would actually only get a normal diploma :/

So what I'm wondering is: will the essay get a better mark in french than the same thing in english?

[Emmi]

Thank you for replying I wish that was true but I'm afraid I've just done a google search and found that that rule was abolished in 2011 and I would actually only get a normal diploma :/

So what I'm wondering is: will the essay get a better mark in french than the same thing in english?

You couldn't just normally do this as an EE in English, you'd have to compare it to something else, because the work wasn't originally written in English and for an English EE, at least one of the works had to be originally written in that language. Also, the mark schemes and requirements for a Group 1 (English for you) versus doing a Group 2 EE are different and do not necessarily make doing one easier than the other. If you're interested in the topic and are good enough at French, why not do it?