Understanding the Essay: Types, Characteristics, and Subjectivity
Understanding the Essay
The word “essay” originates from the work of French writer Michel de Montaigne, Essais. Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the term became widespread in England, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain to designate different types of writings, speeches, experiences, and life events. An essay is a prose composition, brief and discursive in nature, where the author chooses the subject, structure, and style.
Its versatility allows the style to vary greatly, from scientific disclosure to free literary expression, engaging the reader in a creative way. The focus is on the subject matter, encouraging intellectual reflection.
The Informative Essay
The informative essay deals with scientific content and is written by professionals to popularize science and culture for intellectuals and stakeholders. Examples range from the history of the telescope and the moon to Isaac Asimov’s “Tragedy of the Moon,” Don Juan, Amiel, nonverbal communication (Flora Davis), and witches and their world (J. Caro Baroja).
The Free Essay
The free essay addresses a current issue or cultural topic, treated from a personal and subjective viewpoint. With Ortega at the helm, the entire twentieth century is full of fine essays by authors such as Unamuno, AzorÃn, and P. Salinas.
The essayist is an intellectual who speculates on various issues and presents their ideas in a generally conceptual and carefully crafted language. Along with an elegant and denotative function, the expressive and poetic functions are prominent, utilizing the writer’s own resources.
Subjectivity of Expression in Texts
The method considers the presence of the issuer in the text. This presence is perceived through modalizers. Modalizers are strong indicators of subjective texts. Elements of modalization include:
- Sentence mode and communicative intention
- Evaluative lexicon
- Rhetorical figures
- Punctuation signs
- Theming
A) Sentence Pattern and Communicative Attitude
The sentence pattern shows the issuer’s communicative attitude and intention, whether to deny or affirm (declarative), to ask something (interrogative), to show surprise (exclamatory), to command (hortatory), or to express doubt (dubitative) or desire (wishful).
- Declarative
- Interrogative: The issuer calls the receiver’s attention and leads them to seek an answer. Interrogative sentences can be total or partial, direct or indirect, affirmative or negative.
- Exclamatory: The sender expresses their feelings explicitly for the receiver. The main function is emotional.
- Dubitative: The issuer presents the statement as possible, leaving the receiver to reflect. Validity is emphasized through the same emotional function.
- Wishful: The sender expresses a desire, involving the receiver in the same sentiment.
- Imperative: The sender influences the receiver directly through their statement.
B) Evaluative Lexicon
The vocabulary the author uses shows the degree of the issuer’s implication in their statement. We can find:
- Evaluative adjectives: Connotative value, which can be enhanced by derivational morphemes.
- Nouns: Nouns sometimes express pleasure or displeasure through derivational morphemes.
- Adverbs and adverbial locutions: To express certainty, doubt, implication, possibility, etc.
- Verbs: Indicating thought, speech, and feeling.