Journalistic & Literary Genres: An Overview

Posted on Nov 14, 2024 in Arts and Humanities

Journalistic Texts

Function and Media Genres

The press is a powerful instrument of influence in society. Its functions are:

  • To inform
  • To entertain

Newspaper Article Classification

  • Information Genres: (news, reportage, interview)
  • Opinion Genres: (editorial, column, letters to the editor, article)
  • Hybrid Genres: (chronicles, lyric)

1. The News

The news is an informative genre. A notice must meet certain requirements:

  • Impersonal
  • Truth and objectivity
  • Interest for readers
  • Clarity, conciseness, and proficiency in the style of the three “Cs”

Good news must answer six questions:

  • Who?
  • What?
  • When?
  • How?
  • Where?
  • Why?

The story structure is as follows:

  • Antetítulo (pre-title)
  • Title
  • Entradilla (lead)
  • Body or development with a pyramid structure (begins broadly and ends with the conclusion)

2. The Story

It is an informative journalistic account, wider than the news. The difference is that the news is characterized by urgency. In the story, the information needs to be complete, not necessarily quick.

Preparation:

  1. Choice of subject
  2. Documentation
  3. Research
  4. Contrast sources
  5. Final editing

3. The Interview

Research is the method used by the journalist.

There are two types:

  • Information: Usually involves asking a specialist about an issue.
  • Personality: The interest is not in the subject matter, but in the character.

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Development

4. The Editorial

It reflects the position of the newspaper on the most relevant current events.

5. Opinion Articles

It is an informative text whose author is not part of the editorial team. It is characterized by “freedom.” The structure and style are personal and free.

6. The Column

It’s a subgenre of the article and is characterized by its brevity.

7. Letters to the Editor

A space in the newspaper where readers can give their opinion.

8. The Chronicle

An informational text, written by a correspondent, about a fixed event. It is a narrative of a current event. It includes a rigorous analysis of antecedents and consequences, testimony, data, etc. It is considered a hybrid genre because it narrates what happened, is always signed, and is narrated in the first person.

9. Review

It is a specific genre of cultural information. It has a threefold purpose: to inform, to discuss, and to criticize.

Literary Genres: Theory and History

1. The Genres

Literary genres are structural models that create, classify, and group literary texts. A first characterization differentiates between fictional genres (poetry, fiction, and drama) and non-fiction (didactic genres). Over time, innovations are introduced in classical genres, and it is no longer necessary to strictly follow the pre-established genres. This trend of integration and hybridity of the arts makes it impossible for a rigid systematization. This hybridity is found in the prose poem or short story.

2. The Lyric

It consists of works in which the author subjectively expresses their ideas and most intimate and personal feelings: sadness, sorrow, love, pain, freedom, happiness, etc. Lyrical texts are known as poems.

2.1. Characteristics of Lyric

  1. Intensive use of the poetic function: They employ a large number of stylistic figures.
  2. Presence of expressive education: They manifest the feelings, sights, and emotions of the author, through evocation, allusion, and connotation.
  3. Use of the connotative value of words, which carry the reader to other worlds.
  4. Concentration and brevity: The poem focuses on a feeling, emotion, or particular issue.
  5. Scarce presence of regulatory elements: Allusions to space and time have symbolic values.
  6. Using the majority of the verse: Lyric normally uses verse as an expressive channel. The use of diversification is justified by the sound, through the efforts of condensation and its ability to style the message.
  7. Rhythm and musicality: This is achieved by the repetition of sounds, pauses, and accents. Originally, lyric was born associated with rhythm and music to be recited and sung, even accompanied by musical instruments.
  8. Variety of themes, forms, and tones: In the lyrics, the most diverse and disparate forms fit, a variety of tones, etc.

2.2. Major Subgenres of Lyric

  1. Elegy: The author expresses their grief over the death of a loved one or a circumstance. Ex: Jorge Manrique “Verses on the death of his father.”
  2. Eclogue: The poet expresses their feelings of love through the mouths of shepherds in an idealized natural landscape. Ex: The Eclogues of Garcilaso.
  3. Ode: A variable-length poem extolling high tone and feelings, characters, events, etc.
  4. Hymn: A poem that honors an outstanding person, celebrates a notable event, or expresses joy or enthusiasm. It is used to reflect the sentiments and ideals of a community.
  5. Satire: A burlesque poem in which vices, defects, or individual social behaviors are ridiculed.
  6. Song: The lyric has been associated with music. We talk about the subgenre of the song, which encompasses many different themes and tones. Flamenco is based on lyrics that are sung as letrillas. And today’s songs use a chorus, which is the musical basis of the poem.
  7. Haiku: A short composition of poetry of Japanese origin that develops a theme rooted in nature.
  8. Sonnet: A type of poem, perhaps the most widely used throughout history. It can be considered as a specific subgenre. It consists of two stanzas of four lines that have a theme or idea, followed by two trios, usually of an argumentative nature, which close the poem conclusively. (Verso isosilabismo) = same number of syllables.

3. The Narrative Genre

It is one in which real or fictional facts are told by the voice of a narrator. It involves one or more characters whose qualities or circumstances change over the course of the work in space and time.

3.1. Components of a Narrative Text

A. Narrator and Point of View

The narrator is the voice that tells the narrative story; their mission is to communicate the facts to the reader. Every author, when starting to write, decides what type of speaker to use, that is, what point of view (or focus) they will take to present the facts.

There are different types of focus:

  • Omniscient narrator: Zero focus. Third person. Knows everything, even the innermost thoughts of the characters. Expresses their views on the events.
  • Witness narrator: External focus. Third person. The objective narrator describes what they see, without opinion or value judgments.
  • Character narrator: Internal focus. First person. A character becomes the narrator.

The internal focus may be unique (always the same character speaking) or multiple (different characters alternating as narrators). It can be the protagonist (autobiographical aspect) or a secondary character.

B. The Plot: Narrative Structure

In a story, different events occur that form the fabric of a work.

Types of Narratives:

  • Actual: Include events that occurred objectively or fictitious stories that are told as if they were real.
  • Invented, plausible, credible, or unlikely: Facts that are illogical or impossible.

The plot can be made up of four parts:

  • Approach or initial situation: Locates the action in a particular time and place and introduces the characters.
  • Conflict or knot: Alters the initial situation and creates a problem to be solved.
  • Action: The central part of the story, where the incidents that occur trigger the characters’ actions.
  • Outcome: The story usually ends with the resolution of the initial conflict. We can speak of two types of outcome: Closed ending (clear resolution) and Open ending (the ending allows for various interpretations).

Narrative Structures:

  • Linear structure: Events are ordered chronologically from start to finish.
  • Non-linear structure: There are jumps in time: starting from the end and going back to the beginning (flashback), anticipating future events (prolepsis), altering past and present times.
C. The Characters

They are the beings involved in the action of the story.

Classification of Characters:

  1. According to their presence:
    • Protagonist: The subject of the main action. May be heroic or unheroic. The character who opposes the protagonist is called the antagonist. There are also works with collective protagonists, involving many characters where none stand out from the others.
    • Secondary character: Accompany the protagonist.
  2. According to their characterization:
    • Flat or archetypal characters: Portraits with few features that represent a fixed prototype: the hero, the lady, the traitor, etc.
    • Round or psychological characters: Have multiple traits that are described and may vary throughout the work.
  3. According to their function:
    • Actants: Relevant to the plot, they decisively intervene one or more times, making the plot move forward.
    • Extras: Characters whose actions do not alter the plot development.
D. Time

A constitutional element of the narrative.

Two Levels of Time:

  • External time: The real-time point of the story, can be measured in concrete chronological units to measure the duration of the action.
  • Internal time: Narrative pace. There are different narrative times: You can remove or condense facts, you can slow down or expand with descriptions, etc.

Five Narrative Times:

  1. Ellipsis: Some facts of the story are omitted.
  2. Summary or abstract: The material of the story is condensed.
  3. Scene time: Presents the facts as they happen in real life through dialogues, monologues, etc.
  4. Pause: Slows down the pace of the story. It happens with descriptions.
  5. Narrative digression: There is a pause in the action to introduce a thought that is foreign to the development of the plot.
E. Space

The medium in which events unfold and the characters live.

Classification of Space:

  1. Depending on its location: Closed or open spaces, rural or urban, etc.
  2. According to its relationship with reality: Real or fictional spaces.

3.2. Major Subgenres of Narrative

  1. Epic poem: Tells in verse the exploits of a hero. It is a medieval genre, although it has been used in times of political crisis or war.
  2. Tale: Short story, of exemplary character, with educational purposes. If the story is of a very short extension, we talk about a micro-story or micro-narrative.
  3. Fable: A tale starring animals with an educational purpose. It’s a genre still in use.
  4. Legend: An oral or written report of a legendary event. Often mixes reality and fantasy.
  5. Travel books: Works or novels that describe a given space. The characters have a secondary value.
  6. Biography: A story between expository and narrative that accounts for the entire life of a real person. An important type of biography is the autobiography, written in the first person by the protagonist themselves.

The Novel:

The novel deserves special mention as the main narrative subgenre. It is a complex work in which several characters experience various events and adventures. Novels are often structured into chapters and reach a variable length. Originally, novels had archetypal heroic protagonists. From the 16th century onwards, the Spanish novel begins to feature anti-heroic characters who evolve throughout the narrative. Novels are characterized by a thematic approach:

  1. Detective novel: A detective, due to their ability of observation and deduction, must solve a criminal case. Mysterious deaths occur and strange enigmas arise. The plot is complex, and the characters are often stereotyped.
  2. Science fiction novel: A story of characters, imaginary places, and events whose plot is based on scientific or technological discoveries. Usually set in a future time.
  3. Horror or suspense novel: Tells a story surrounded by fear and uncertainty. They are characterized by the presence of sinister elements: restless places, supernatural elements, etc.
  4. Historical novel: Set in concrete moments of the past. The author requires an effort of documentation to refer to certain true facts. Characters can be real or fictitious.
  5. Adventure novel: Action predominates.
  6. Character novel: Those in which the action is subject to the psychological analysis of the characters, whose concerns and experiences form the core of the work.
  7. Romance novel: Features a love affair, sentimental, refined, and highly idealized, with a happy ending.

4. The Drama

Theater and drama encompass those works, written in verse or prose, intended to be represented before an audience, in the form of direct dialogue between characters, with actions that create a happy or unhappy story.

4.1. Constituents of Theater

A dramatic work has different elements that distinguish it from other genres.

  1. Written text:
    • Context A: Set of dialogues for the characters.
    • Context B: Stage directions, provides the information needed to stage the work so it can be represented.
  2. Director: Responsible for the adaptation, assembly, and staging of the play.
  3. Actors: Embody the characters through words, gestures, and movements.
  4. Scenography: Also called set design, it is the set of elements located on the stage whose function is to mark and characterize the theatrical space. This function is performed by the set designer.

4.2. Features of the Theatrical Genre

Drama has the following features:

  1. The texts are intended for theatrical representation.
  2. The play creates a dual communicative situation. On the one hand, the characters communicate with each other, and on the other hand, there is extra-scenic communication between actors and spectators.
  3. The usual mode of discourse is dialogue, with monologue to a lesser extent. In some 20th-century works, we can talk about the presence of a narrator (epic theater).
  4. Plays include both verbal and nonverbal codes.

4.3. Structure of Theater

  1. The external structure of a play: Characterized by the visual and graphic arrangement of space to divide the work into acts. Scenes are usually shown without interruption in classical plays. A gap between two acts is called an interval.
  2. The internal structure: Marked by the theme, plot, and subplot.

4.4. Main Theatrical Subgenres

  1. Tragedy: Born in Greece as part of religious ceremonies. The plot of the tragedy is based on the individual’s struggle against an unstoppable fate, caused in part by the sin of hubris. The characters are noble or of high social standing.
  2. Comedy: A composition starring characters from all social classes, although more frequently from the middle and lower classes. It is intended to distract and entertain the viewer and sometimes to criticize or censure vices.
  3. Farce: A comic piece designed to make people laugh, with improbable characters and situations, tending to exaggeration.
  4. Sainete: Usually a funny play, but sometimes it may have a serious nature. It can include songs.
  5. Atracanada or Astrakhan: A theatrical form of comic character common in the first third of the 20th century. Its purpose is to provoke laughter in the audience through different situations.
  6. Esperpento: A literary genre created by Ramón María del Valle-Inclán, which distorts reality and exaggerates its grotesque features.
  7. Parody: A work that, using irony, seeks to transform an earlier work.
  8. Commedia dell’arte: A theatrical form born in the Italian Renaissance, characterized by the constant repetition of characters, gestures, and the presence of very striking masks.
  9. Epic theater: A type of theater that tries to create critical attitudes and opinions in the viewer, not emotions. It features the presence of a narrator, which is why it is considered a hybrid subgenre.
  10. Happening: An artistic expression in the form of entertainment that relies on the spontaneous participation of the spectators. It is characterized by the absence of a previous text.
  11. Street theater: A type of theater that takes place outside the established venues. Its purpose is to bring the genre to an audience that does not attend the theater or is unable to do so.

5. The Essay

Started by Michel de Montaigne in the 16th century with his work “Essais.” The essay is a personal reflection on a subject (scientific, humanistic, legal, philosophical, political, social, cultural, sports, etc.) written freely and with a desire for style, which currently enjoys great development.

5.1. Features

This subgenre has the following common features:

  1. They are written with variable length.
  2. They are fundamentally argumentative texts, in which the author holds a particular thesis.
  3. We can distinguish between subject-specific essays that have a cryptic nature and informative essays aimed at a broad audience.
  4. Thematic variety and without scientific demonstrations.
  5. Extensive creative freedom.
  6. These texts present a didactic purpose as they convey a scientific, moral, etc. message or provoke reflection in the receiver.
  7. The most common form of representation is written language.