I have decided to deal with topic 33 which deals with EL TEXTO

DESCRIPTIVO. ESTRUCTURA Y CARACTERÍSTICAS. The topic will be

divided as follows:

0. introduction
1. definition of a descriptive text
2. structure of a descriptive text
3. features of a descriptive text
4. types of description
5. conclusion
6. bibliography

Let´s gonna start with the INTRODUCTION:

It has been with the recent concern on the communicative model that the text
has been given a special role. This topic deals with the descriptive text, but
before going into it, it will be worth speaking briefly about the concept of text.

We can define a text, in a simple way, by saying that it is language, that is

function. By functional we refer to the fact that language plays some role in
some context, as opposed to isolated words or sentences.

A text is essentially a semantic unit, because although when we write it down it

looks as though it is made of words and sentences, it is really made of
meanings.

According to Chomsky, No smoking can be considered a text, while

colourless green ideas sleep furiously is grammatical but not a text, because
it has no meaning.

Charles Fillmore points out that 2 sentences taken together as a simple

discourse can have different meanings taken separately. To illustrate this, he
asks you to imagine 2 independent signs at a swimming pool: Please use the
toilet, not the pool and Pool for members only.

If you regard each sign independently, they seem quite reasonable. But taking
them together as a single discourse makes you go back and revise your
interpretation of the first sentence after you have read the second.

For a text to be a text it has also to follow a series of features. According to

Dressler a text must follow seven standards of textuality:
 The text-centred standards of cohesion (concerning grammatical
dependencies) and coherence ( concerning the ways in which the
components of the textual world are relevant).
 The user-centred notions: intentionality, concerning the text producer´s
attitudes; acceptability, concerning the text receiver´s attitude;
informativity, concerning the extent to which the occurrences of the
presented text are expected vs. unexpected or known vs. unknown;
situationality, concerning the factors which make a text relevant to the
 situation of occurrence; and intertextuality, concerning the factors which
make the use of one text dependent upon knowledge of one or more
previously encountered texts.

But let´s gonna focus now on our point of study:

1. THE DESCRIPTIVE TEXT

A descriptive text gives a mental image of a scene, person, place, process or

even emotions. The assignment of a text to a type clearly depends on the
function of the text in communication, not merely on the surface format.

For example, the automobile repair manual “How to keep your Volkswagen
alive”, though it contains more narration and argumentation than most such
manuals, it is predominantly intended to describe the construction and
maintenance of Volkswagen.

Descriptive texts hardly appears as a dominant text, in its pure form but as
fragments subordinated to other texts such as novels, dictionaries, a tourist
guide, textbooks, a conversation, a poem or an advertisement. We can find it in
a narrative text, to understand a thesis, to know an object and so on. For
example, the Declaration of Independence contains descriptions of the situation
of the American colonies, yet the Dominant function is undeniably
argumentative, so as to induce the belief that America was justified in
“dissolving” its “political bands”.

2. STRUCTURE OF DESCRIPTIVE TEXTS

Descriptive texts usually have a common structure that consists of 2 parts: topic
/ title and extension.

 The topic is the element (person, object, process…) we want to

describe. Sometimes it coincides with the title of the text, as it happens in
definitions. With the topic it may appear a frame that specify the space-
time situation.

When you read a newspaper, you need to know whether you are reading a
news story, an editorial, or an advertisement in order to properly interpret the
text you are reading.

Years ago, when Orson Wells´ radio play “The War of the Worlds” was
broadcast, listeners who tuned in late panicked, thinking they were hearing
the actual end of the world. They mistook the frame for news instead of
drama.

 The extension develops the topic providing 2 kinds of new information:

1. the information that expresses qualities, properties or
circumstances of the topic.
2. the information that adds new topics, what is called parts.
Let us consider now an example of descriptive texts offered in the
Encyclopaedia Britanica.

Edelweiss (topic): perennial plant of the family Asteraceae (extension). It has 2

to 9 yellow flower heads, and below these flower heads 6 to 9 lance-shaped,
white leaves in the form of a star. (parts).An edelweiss plant is aboit 5 to 30cm
tall (qualities).

On the other hand, the extension information can be organised following these
patterns:

 linear, where the elements described are arranged successively, placed

in a coordinated way. It is wide, rectangular and made of paper.
 From general things to particular ones or viceversa , i.e., we can
describe a place, first talking about a global vision and later starting to
describe it thoroughly.
 Temporal, i.e., ordering data from what is nearer related to time or to
what is distant.
 Round, that is to say, all or some facts that appear at the beginning are
repeated at the end.
 Recurrent, i.e., a structure where periodically fragments that had
appeared before reappear with slightly changes. This kind of structure
can clearly be seen in some sketches of Samuel Becket as “The last to
go” or in his famous play “Waiting for Godot”, or even in the film starred
by Bill Murray “Groundhog Day”.

3. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE DESCRIPTIVE TEXT

An exemplary piece of descriptive writing should contain all or most of the

following characteristics:

 It should establish and maintain a single impression.

 It should maintain a realistic point of view.
 It should make a vivid description through a careful selection of detail.

Vividness is the quality which gives life to a piece of writing.

What he did say presented pictures to me, and not mere words. In the
excited and exalted state of my brain, I could not think of a place without
seeing it, or persons without seeing them. It is impossible to overstate the
vividness of these images. (Great Expectations Ch. 53. p.460)

When we think of a Dickens novel it is pictures which spring first to mind. In

pictures we see, for example, Peggoty's boathouse at Yarmouth in David
Copperfield, the interior of Fagin's den in Oliver Twist, and the frozen wedding
feast in Miss Havisham's room in GreatExpectations.

Dickens's 'pictures' are an integral part of the fabric of the narrative, conveying
meanings in themselves, and unlike, for example James Joyce's descriptions,
we are not required to interpret the images looking for symbolism, but to see
them vividly.

The author can achieve this vividness through figurative language and the
appeal to senses. Virginia Woolf made use of this figurative language by
means of the use of similes and metaphors in her literature, specifically in
Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse, and The Waves. Woolf uses similes to
compare death to “crudities, odds and ends, this and that”, which are crushed
“like glass splinters” into “the blue, the red-fringed tide”. In To the Lighthouse
and The Waves, in particular, symbols and metaphors are used to substitute for
the old conventions of plot, exposition, denouement, setting and descriptive
detail. . I metaphor of 'that flowing water, now a dry channel', and

On the other hand, the appeal to senses can be achieved through

synaesthesia.The language of Joyce only came alive when read aloud,
creating a synaesthesia or interplay of the senses. Dickens also reflects this use
of language in his David Copperfield, the evocative juxtaposition of general
impressions such as 'the silent gliding on of my existence' with specific
impression such as 'the earthy smell, the sunless air'.

The use of caricatures is another way of achieving this appeal to senses. The
variety and memorability of Dickens's characters caricatures is perhaps his
greatest achievement as a writer:

Oliver Twist, a poor, nameless orphan boy.

Bill Sikes, a brutal thief and housebreaker.
Fagin, a crafty old Jew, a receiver of stolen goods.
Mr Brownlow, a benevolent old gentleman.

Memorable are also his topographies. Dickens wrote so evocatively of the

city's sites - many of which can still be found.
London is as much a character in Charles Dickens's novels as Nicholas
Nickleby or David Copperfield is. To Dickens, London was a living, breathing
entity for which he had an enduring fascination. He loved its diversity yet hated
its inequalities, and his descriptions of the sights, sounds, and smells of the city
are among the most evocative passages in English literature.

We must also make reference to the syntactic and lexical features that may
characterize descriptive texts.
Referring to the syntactical ones, in a descriptive text we may find verbs forms
in simple present or past, the construction there is/are, passive verbs, purpose
clauses, conditional and final clauses, prepositional and adverbial clauses.

As far as the lexical characteristics are concerned, we can mention the

appearance of both concrete and abstract nouns. Adverbs also enable the
writer to get an effect with great economy by fusing the quality of a thing with its
action.
4. TYPES OF DESCRIPTIVE TEXTS

According to the goal the writer wants to achieve, the descriptive text may be
technical and objective or imaginative and subjective. It is the tenor that
indicates if the description is objective or subjective.

Thus, a newspaper story which appears in 2 different newspapers, will be of a

different tenor according to the type of paper it appears in, and the idea the
editor has of its readers. For example, a tabloid paper is more concerned with
subjective and emotional impressions, while a serious paper is more concerned
with an objective description of the facts.

Let´s see in more detail the two types of description:

OBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION

It occurs whenever and wherever the final goal is to give mere information
about the object, so it gives generalised information containing lists of facts,
qualities or characteristics.

The main language function is referential. The essential characteristic with

distinguishes objective description form other forms of exposition is a visual or
photographic quality. Its main target is to give readers a clear and thorough
vision of the object described, it is factual and impersonal.

She was dressed in rich materials - satins, and lace, and silks - all of
white. Her shoes were white. And she had a long white veil dependent
from her hair, and she had bridal flowers in her hair, but her hair was
white. Some bright jewels sparkled on her neck and on her hands, and
some other jewels lay sparkling on the table.

The words of this passage from Great Expectations serve only one
purpose,that we should see the scene in our imagination. The writer's stance is
that of an objective reporter, and the short factual sentences, packed with
detailed observation, do not in themselves convey any response or judgement.
The reader responds not to the words, but to the picture. In fact the passage is
notable for the total absence of emotive words.

The objective description is also found in technical and scientific texts, which
present a formal style, which denote respect for the audience and
characterized by formal language and syntactical care.

They can also have a technical style, used when the description is directed to
an audience which shares with the encoder some specialized items.

SUBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION
The main function in subjective descriptive texts is the aesthetic one. In
subjective description the writer adds his imagination or peculiar intuition. In
imaginative and impressionistic description, therefore, although it does not
abandon objective fact and disciplined order, the reaction of the author and the
reader become involved in this form of discourse.

She was most noticeable, I thought, in respect of her extremities; for her
hair always wanted brushed, her hands always wanted washing, and her
shoes always wanted mending and pulling up at heel.

The reader might create a visual picture of Biddy from these fragments, but the
passage really conveys ideas rather than images, and makes its impact through
the use of language

It is characterised by informal style, used to reflect the encoder’s view. Irony

may be also used by emphatic stress, paralinguistic clues or deliberate change
of intonation. Well-known are Orwell’s ironical descriptions of technology to
show how the government controlled citizens.

The evocative style will be also used to raise emotional responses. In Joyce’s
Dubliners we find the story with the most—and the most evocative—
descriptions “The Dead”. For example, Joyce uses closely observed details to
add to the reader’s understanding of the story’s characters, as in this
description of Freddy Malins:

“His face was fleshy and pallid, touched with colour only at the thick
hanging lobes of his ears and at the wide wings of his nose.”

Not once but twice Freddy is described as “rubbing the knuckles of his left
fist backwards and forwards into his left eye.” As a result he is easily
visualized, and despite Freddy’s movement in and out of the Morkin sisters’
party, the reader never quite loses track of him.

The hyperbolic style is also used in subjective description so as to reflect the

encoder’s feeling of unusual excitement of surprise at the phenomena he refers
to. We cannot forget the exaggerated descriptions to hilarious degree in some
Joyce’s Ulysses scenes.

5. CONCLUSION

We have reached the end of the topic, and to conclude we can say that all
through it we have studied the features, structure and types of descriptive texts
and we have tried to illustrate it with examples of the British literature, with
authors like Joyce and Dickens, or even Virginia Woolf.
Productive skills are highlighten in ESO and Bachillerato. Students are asked to
write compositions and they are assessed for the books read each term.
We should not only teach our students to write organised essays, but we must
make them aware of the importance of the arrangement of the ideas, the
purpose and the process of writing and specially of that “good thinking lies
behind good writing”.
It´s not worth teaching our students how to write different types of texts by
means of artificial and out-of-context sources. We have a brilliant and wide
American and British literature to show them this text typology, at the same time
we are encouraging them to read and appreciate these wonderful works.