Types of Texts

Types of Texts

Texts are pieces of writing that we read or create. The type or characteristics of a text are crucial for any work of summarization as they determine the ease of extracting the main ideas from the text. Texts are categorized based on their purpose, structure, and language features. Three main categories of text materials are:

1. Expository texts: These texts are intended to identify and characterise experiences, facts, situations, and actions in abstract or real elements. They are meant to explain, inform, or describe and are often used to write structures. Expository structures can be classified into five categories:

   • Description: The author describes a topic's characteristics, features, attributes, etc., and gives examples.
   • Procedure or sequence: The author lists different activities in their chronological order or enumerates items in a numerical order.
   • Comparison: The author explains how two or more objects, events, experiences, are alike and/or different.
   • Cause-effect explanation: The author presents ideas, events in time, or facts as causes and the resulting effect(s) in time.
   • Problem-solution presentation: The author describes a problem and gives one or more solutions to the problem.

2. Narrative texts: These texts entertain, instruct, or inform readers by telling a story. They can be fictional (fairy tales, novels, science fiction, horror or adventure stories, fables, myths, legends, etc.) or non-fictional (articles, newspaper reports, historical writings).

3. Argumentative texts: The aim of these texts is to change the readers’ beliefs. They often contain negative qualities or characteristics of something/someone, or try to persuade their readers that an object, product, idea is in some way better than others.

It is important to note that few texts are purely one type: expository or argumentative texts can contain narration or evaluative elements. The text types refer to the meaning of the writing and should not be confused with writing (or other materials) formats such as books, articles, letters, or reports.

Texts can be written in various formats, depending on the area of use, including business (reports, letters, executive summaries), journalism (essays, news reports, press releases, sports news), technical communication (user guides, technical reports or standards), academic and scientific communication (textbooks, student guides, scientific reports, scientific journals’ articles, encyclopedia articles), and general reference works (encyclopedia articles or online, multi-domain informative texts like Wikipedia articles).

In summary, texts are pieces of writing that are categorized based on their purpose, structure, and language features. They can be broadly classified into three main categories: expository, narrative, and argumentative. Each category has its unique features and serves different purposes.