UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper PDF, Detailed Solution

UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper is the official question paper released by the National Testing Agency (NTA) for the December 2025 session. It includes questions from general aptitude and the English subject, designed to evaluate candidates’ conceptual understanding, analytical ability, and subject knowledge.

UGC NET December 2025 Exam Overview

Below are the key details regarding the UGC NET December 2025 examination for the English subject. These particulars offer a concise summary of the test's structure and schedule.

UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper PDF

The UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper PDF is a useful resource for candidates preparing for the upcoming UGC NET English exams. It helps aspirants understand the latest exam pattern, question difficulty level, and important topics asked in the English paper. Practicing with the question

UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper PDF

UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper 1 Summary

The UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper tested candidates on literature, literary theory, linguistics, and research aptitude with a balanced mix of conceptual and analytical questions. Overall, the paper focused on syllabus-based topics while including a few challenging questions requiring critical understanding. 

Paper 1- General Paper: Data Interpretation

This section includes a comprehension passage accompanied by a table. The table provides data on "Store-wise sales of Laptops" across five stores (A-E) for five months (January to May in 2025). Questions require calculations such as percentage differences, average sales, sales percentages, identifying the number of stores exceeding sales thresholds, and determining differences in combined sales figures.

Paper 1- General Paper: Aptitude & Reasoning

This part of the examination assesses candidates' quantitative and logical reasoning skills. Questions cover a range of topics within these domains.

• Quantitative Questions: These include problems related to profit/loss percentages, simple and compound interest calculations, and number series.

• Reasoning Questions: This segment involves tasks like arranging events or concepts in chronological order (e.g., Lesson Plan, communication models, institutional establishment), identifying correct logical statements, and coding/decoding puzzles.

Paper 1- General Paper: Education & Environment

This section focuses on concepts related to education and environmental protection, testing awareness and understanding in these crucial areas.

• Education: Questions address lesson plan arrangement, characteristics of quantitative research, various types of evaluation, the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, memory levels of teaching, and university associations.

• Environment: This segment includes questions on gaseous pollutants, the chronological order of international environmental agreements (such as the Stockholm conference, Paris agreement, Montreal protocol, Kyoto protocol, and Earth Summit), and matching environment-related acts with their respective years.

UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper (Paper 2) Summary

Paper 2- English Paper: Literary Studies

The English paper extensively covers various facets of literary criticism, theory, and history. This section tests candidates' depth of knowledge in these areas.

• Literary Criticism & Theory: Questions delve into analyses by Angela McRobbie, Jeremy Hawthorn's theories of the gaze, Sidney's Apologie for Poetrie, Elaine Showalter's 'feminine phase,' Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield's 'Cultural materialism,' Freud's psychoanalytic interpretation of symbols, Toril Moi's works on feminist criticism, Raymond Williams' definition of 'culture,' Northrop Frye's Anatomy of Criticism, and formalist ideas on art.

• Poetry: This segment includes tasks such as arranging poetic lines chronologically, identifying literary genres (e.g., Empedocles on Etna as a Narrative Poem), and matching poetry genres with specific poems.

• Literary History: Features questions on movements like the Kailyard School and the three silent revolutions in England as described by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

English Paper: Language & Linguistics

This part of the UGC NET December 2025 English Question Paper focuses on the structure and variation of language. It examines fundamental concepts in linguistics.

• Sociolinguistics: Definitions of social variations in language, including convergence, register, slang, and jargons, are covered.

• Components of Language: Matching phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics with their respective areas is a common question type.

• Phonetics & Phonology: Questions explore voiced and voiceless sounds, the space between vocal folds (glottis), and the chronological order of manner of articulation of English consonants.

• Morphology: Identification of functional morphemes is assessed.

• Semiotics: Ferdinand de Saussure's concept of the arbitrary nature of the sign is also included.

English Paper: Authors & Works

This section evaluates candidates' familiarity with prominent authors and their literary creations. A wide range of authors and their major works are covered.

Topics include works by Geoffrey Chaucer, like The Book of the Duchess and The Canterbury Tales, identification of famous lines from Shakespeare's plays, chronological arrangement of Thomas Hardy's novels, and novel identification based on descriptions (e.g., Charles Dickens' Bleak House). Other questions focus on Samuel Beckett's novels, George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion and Arms and the Man, Anita Desai's themes, E. M. Forster's contrasts, William Congreve's characters, Mulk Raj Anand's education and works, R. K. Narayan's themes, and essays by Francis Bacon. Comparisons between Thomas Mann and Girish Karnad, and authors of critical essays are also tested.

English Paper: Cultural & Postcolonial Studies

This segment delves into cultural theories and postcolonial discourse, reflecting contemporary academic interests.

• Cultural Theory: Questions cover John Storey's interpretation of Will Wright's stages of the Western, popular postmodernist philosophers like Derrida, and the Storm and Stress Movement.

• Media Studies: This includes questions on works by I Ang and John Fiske's theories on audience power.

• Postcolonialism: The definition of colonialism by Anis Loomba and the evolution of the Indian literary scene are discussed.

• Indian English Writing: Poets such as Jayanta Mahapatra and Sharankumar Limbale's conceptions of Dalit aesthetics are featured.

• Feminism: Feminist questions posed by Virginia Woolf and the concept of Essentialism in feminist debates are also examined.

English Paper: Critical Theory & Referencing

This section explores critical theories and academic referencing practices. It tests understanding of scholarly methods and concepts.

• Critical Concepts: Matching archetype symbols with their meanings (e.g., sea, rivers, sun, serpent) and matching terms like "Feral," "Grand Narrative," "Gaze," and "Diegesis" with their definitions are common.

• Research Material & References: Questions involve matching sources like Bartleby, Project Muse, WorldCat, and Shodhganga with types of research material. Knowledge of the MLA Handbook 9th edition for parenthetical citations is also assessed.

• Thesis Format: Candidates are required to chronologically arrange components of a thesis, such as Preface, Table of Contents, Introduction, Conclusion, and Bibliography.

• Critical Statements: Identification of correct statements about critical works and research methods is also a key part of this section.

English Paper: Comprehension

The English paper includes comprehension passages designed for analysis and question-answering. These passages test reading comprehension and analytical skills. Examples include a poetic piece titled 'When I was fair and young' and a prose passage discussing 'secret stabs to a man's reputation.'