Reading between

the Lines
On the Difference between Text Types
 01
.
Narrative Texts
Aim?
Narrative Aim: Tell a story (whether fiction or nonfiction

Texts e.g. fairy tales, novels, novellas, short stories,

reports, comics, scenarios, biographies, etc.
  Characters (protagonist, antagonist, foil,
etc.)
Common  Plot (setup > catalyst > rising action >
climax > falling action > denouement)
characteristics 
(conflict)
Setting
 Themes & symbols
 “Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet
Drive, were proud to say that they were

Example perfectly normal, thank you very much. They

were the last people you’d expect to be involved
in anything strange or mysterious, because they
just didn’t hold with such nonsense.”

(Rowling 1)
 02.
Informative Texts
Aim?
Informative Aim: Give information about
something/someone

Texts e.g. descriptions, (news) reports,

announcements, etc.
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
Common Someone does something somewhere at some
characteristics point
 “The WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, is due
to appear at the Old Bailey in the latest stage of
Example his legal battle against extradition to the US,
where he faces a prison sentence of up to 175
years.”

(Bowcott)
 03.
Argumentative Texts
Aim?
Argumentative Aim: Convince by means of arguments
(≠ persuasive texts (play on emotions

Texts
and personal opinions))

e.g. essays, editorials, columns, etc.

Common  Coherence & logic (!Arguments)


characteristics Structure (hook/intro > thesis statement >
arguments > conclusion)
An argumentative text tries to convince readers of a
particular claim.
 Appeal to arguments & logic

An argumentative text tries to convince readers of a

particular claim.
 = appeal to arguments & logic

An argumentative text tries to convince readers of a

particular claim.

= debatable statement
= something not everyone will agree with
≠ a fact
 “Mothers’ wellbeing is most affected [by
COVID-19], matching wider research showing
that, while women have not been more likely to
lose their jobs than men, mothers are doing so
Example more than fathers, in part because they face the
biggest burden of lockdown – childcare. The
(Opinion piece) lesson? This week’s return to school is crucial
to our children’s futures, but also to many
parents’ wellbeing in the here and now.”
(Bell)
 “It is important to remember that most
Americans — nearly two-thirds — do not have
a four-year college degree. By telling workers
Example that their inadequate education is the reason for
their troubles, meritocrats moralize success and
(Editorial) failure and unwittingly promote credentialism
— an insidious prejudice against those who do
not have college degrees.”
(Sandel)
 Fact or Claim?

Computers and automation
increase unemployment.
A good education is
Smoking is harmful to
necessary for a successful
people's health.
and happy life.

CEO salaries have grown Access to condoms will not

940% since 1978. prevent early pregnancy.
Fact or Claim?
 Example #1
Britain faces a triple crunch – and the political cost for the Tories could be huge

The combined challenges of an economic slowdown, rising energy costs and the transition to net zero loom over this government

Long before there was talk of an energy crisis, the government had been looking vulnerable. Economic growth is slowing and
inflation is rising. Despite the Indian summer, Covid-19 infection rates remain high, and the warm weather won’t last for ever.

The prop provided to the labour market by the furlough scheme will be kicked away at the end of the month, and nobody can be sure
of how that will affect the businesses that have grown used to the wages of their staff being met by the state. Millions of struggling
people are about to become £20 a week worse off when universal credit reverts to its pre-crisis level. There will be tax increases next
spring to bring down NHS waiting lists.

Add in higher fuel bills and food shortages, and it is easy to see why ministers are getting a bit jittery. The deal cobbled together to
reopen plants producing the CO2 needed to maintain food and drink supplies encapsulates the fundamental problems within the
British economy: its short-termism, its lack of investment, and its over-reliance on long supply chains.
(Elliott)
 Example #1
Britain faces a triple crunch – and the political cost for the Tories could be huge

The combined challenges of an economic slowdown, rising energy costs and the transition to net zero loom over this government

Long before there was talk of an energy crisis, the government had been looking vulnerable. Economic growth is slowing and
inflation is rising. Despite the Indian summer, Covid-19 infection rates remain high, and the warm weather won’t last for ever.

The prop provided to the labour market by the furlough scheme will be kicked away at the end of the month, and nobody can be sure
of how that will affect the businesses that have grown used to the wages of their staff being met by the state. Millions of struggling
people are about to become £20 a week worse off when universal credit reverts to its pre-crisis level. There will be tax increases next
spring to bring down NHS waiting lists.

Add in higher fuel bills and food shortages, and it is easy to see why ministers are getting a bit jittery. The deal cobbled together to
reopen plants producing the CO2 needed to maintain food and drink supplies encapsulates the fundamental problems within the
British economy: its short-termism, its lack of investment, and its over-reliance on long supply chains.
(Elliott)
 Example #1
Britain faces a triple crunch – and the political cost for the Tories could be huge

The combined challenges of an economic slowdown, rising energy costs and the transition to net zero loom over this government

Long before there was talk of an energy crisis, the government had been looking vulnerable. Economic growth is slowing and
inflation is rising. Despite the Indian summer, Covid-19 infection rates remain high, and the warm weather won’t last for ever.

The prop provided to the labour market by the furlough scheme will be kicked away at the end of the month, and nobody can be sure
of how that will affect the businesses that have grown used to the wages of their staff being met by the state. Millions of struggling
people are about to become £20 a week worse off when universal credit reverts to its pre-crisis level. There will be tax increases next
spring to bring down NHS waiting lists.

Add in higher fuel bills and food shortages, and it is easy to see why ministers are getting a bit jittery. The deal cobbled together to
reopen plants producing the CO2 needed to maintain food and drink supplies encapsulates the fundamental problems within the
British economy: its short-termism, its lack of investment, and its over-reliance on long supply chains.
(Elliott)
 Example #1
Britain faces a triple crunch – and the political cost for the Tories could be huge

The combined challenges of an economic slowdown, rising energy costs and the transition to net zero loom over this government

Long before there was talk of an energy crisis, the government had been looking vulnerable. Economic growth is slowing and
inflation is rising. Despite the Indian summer, Covid-19 infection rates remain high, and the warm weather won’t last for ever.

The prop provided to the labour market by the furlough scheme will be kicked away at the end of the month, and nobody can be sure
of how that will affect the businesses that have grown used to the wages of their staff being met by the state. Millions of struggling
people are about to become £20 a week worse off when universal credit reverts to its pre-crisis level. There will be tax increases next
spring to bring down NHS waiting lists.

Add in higher fuel bills and food shortages, and it is easy to see why ministers are getting a bit jittery. The deal cobbled together to
reopen plants producing the CO2 needed to maintain food and drink supplies encapsulates the fundamental problems within the
British economy: its short-termism, its lack of investment, and its over-reliance on long supply chains.
(Elliott)
 Example #1
Britain faces a triple crunch – and the political cost for the Tories could be huge

The combined challenges of an economic slowdown, rising energy costs and the transition to net zero loom over this government

Long before there was talk of an energy crisis, the government had been looking vulnerable. Economic growth is slowing and
inflation is rising. Despite the Indian summer, Covid-19 infection rates remain high, and the warm weather won’t last for ever.

The prop provided to the labour market by the furlough scheme will be kicked away at the end of the month, and nobody can be sure
of how that will affect the businesses that have grown used to the wages of their staff being met by the state. Millions of struggling
people are about to become £20 a week worse off when universal credit reverts to its pre-crisis level. There will be tax increases next
spring to bring down NHS waiting lists.

Add in higher fuel bills and food shortages, and it is easy to see why ministers are getting a bit jittery. The deal cobbled together to
reopen plants producing the CO2 needed to maintain food and drink supplies encapsulates the fundamental problems within the
British economy: its short-termism, its lack of investment, and its over-reliance on long supply chains .
(Elliott)
 Example #2
The universal credit cut is outrageous, but this callousness is nothing new

From the bedroom tax to ESA reductions, a gulf between those who make policy and those affected by it has brought a decade of
misery.

Next month, universal credit will be cut back by £20 to its pre-pandemic level. A policy that will – by the admission of the
government’s own internal analysis – likely cause “catastrophic” suffering, pushing 800,000 people into poverty.

The cut has been described as unprecedented, but this is one more contraction in the decade-long shrinking of the British welfare
state. The bedroom tax penalised social housing tenants for supposed “under-occupancy”, in practice docking housing benefit for
some for the crime of needing space for oxygen cylinders. Child tax credit changes pulled help from some of the poorest children,
with women who had been raped told to prove their abuse to earn their benefits. The cut to employment and support allowance
took £30 a week from people too ill to work, targeting the “bloated benefit bill” of an ex-nurse with Parkinson’s disease.

Each policy was greeted with outrage at the time. Each went ahead anyway, and is still in force today. We do not need the universal
credit cut to come into effect for children to go hungry due to the British state. This is already happening, and it has been happening
for some time.
(Ryan)
 Example #2
The universal credit cut is outrageous, but this callousness is nothing new

From the bedroom tax to ESA reductions, a gulf between those who make policy and those affected by it has brought a decade of
misery.

Next month, universal credit will be cut back by £20 to its pre-pandemic level. A policy that will – by the admission of the
government’s own internal analysis – likely cause “catastrophic” suffering, pushing 800,000 people into poverty.

The cut has been described as unprecedented, but this is one more contraction in the decade-long shrinking of the British welfare
state. The bedroom tax penalised social housing tenants for supposed “under-occupancy”, in practice docking housing benefit for
some for the crime of needing space for oxygen cylinders. Child tax credit changes pulled help from some of the poorest children,
with women who had been raped told to prove their abuse to earn their benefits. The cut to employment and support allowance
took £30 a week from people too ill to work, targeting the “bloated benefit bill” of an ex-nurse with Parkinson’s disease.

Each policy was greeted with outrage at the time. Each went ahead anyway, and is still in force today. We do not need the universal
credit cut to come into effect for children to go hungry due to the British state. This is already happening, and it has been happening
for some time.
(Ryan)
 Example #2
The universal credit cut is outrageous, but this callousness is nothing new

From the bedroom tax to ESA reductions, a gulf between those who make policy and those affected by it has brought a decade of
misery.

Next month, universal credit will be cut back by £20 to its pre-pandemic level. A policy that will – by the admission of the
government’s own internal analysis – likely cause “catastrophic” suffering, pushing 800,000 people into poverty.

The cut has been described as unprecedented, but this is one more contraction in the decade-long shrinking of the British welfare
state. The bedroom tax penalised social housing tenants for supposed “under-occupancy”, in practice docking housing benefit for
some for the crime of needing space for oxygen cylinders. Child tax credit changes pulled help from some of the poorest children,
with women who had been raped told to prove their abuse to earn their benefits. The cut to employment and support allowance
took £30 a week from people too ill to work, targeting the “bloated benefit bill” of an ex-nurse with Parkinson’s disease.

Each policy was greeted with outrage at the time. Each went ahead anyway, and is still in force today. We do not need the universal
credit cut to come into effect for children to go hungry due to the British state. This is already happening, and it has been happening
for some time.
(Ryan)
 Example #2
The universal credit cut is outrageous, but this callousness is nothing new

From the bedroom tax to ESA reductions, a gulf between those who make policy and those affected by it has brought a decade of
misery.

Next month, universal credit will be cut back by £20 to its pre-pandemic level. A policy that will – by the admission of the
government’s own internal analysis – likely cause “catastrophic” suffering, pushing 800,000 people into poverty.

The cut has been described as unprecedented, but this is one more contraction in the decade-long shrinking of the British welfare
state. The bedroom tax penalised social housing tenants for supposed “under-occupancy”, in practice docking housing benefit for
some for the crime of needing space for oxygen cylinders. Child tax credit changes pulled help from some of the poorest children,
with women who had been raped told to prove their abuse to earn their benefits. The cut to employment and support allowance
took £30 a week from people too ill to work, targeting the “bloated benefit bill” of an ex-nurse with Parkinson’s disease.

Each policy was greeted with outrage at the time. Each went ahead anyway, and is still in force today. We do not need the universal
credit cut to come into effect for children to go hungry due to the British state. This is already happening, and it has been happening
for some time.
(Ryan)
Your Turn!
 References

The Argument’s Best Friends: Ethos, Pathos, and Logos & Appropriate Connotative Words. Mesa Community College.
Retrieved September 5, 2020, from www.mesacc.edu/~paoih30491/ArgumentsBestFriends.html.
Bell, T. (2020, August 30). Why coronavirus is worse for the mental health of mothers. The Guardian.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/30/why-coronavirus-is-worse-for-the-mental-health-of-mothers.
Bowcott, O. (2020, September 7). Julian Assange due in court in latest stage of fight against US extradition. The Guardian.
www.theguardian.com/media/2020/sep/07/julian-assange-due-court-latest-stage-fight-against-us-extradition.
Characteristics of Narrative Writing. Mr. Helmer’s Website, Retrieved September 6, 2020, from
www.sites.google.com/site/oloagr8/language-arts/characteristics-of-narrative-writing.
Coconi, A. (2017, June 13). What Are the Characteristics of Narrative Writing? Pen & the Pad.
www.penandthepad.com/characteristics-narrative-writing-8652332.html.
Elliott, L. (2021, September 22). Britain Faces a Triple Crunch – and the Political Cost for the Tories Could Be Huge. The
Guardian. www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/22/triple-crunch-tories-labour.
 References

Janovsky, A. What is Narrative Writing? – Definition, Types, Characteristics & Examples. Study.com,
www.study.com/academy/lesson/what-is-narrative-writing-definition-types-characteristics-
examples.html#:~:text=Characteristics%20of%20narrative%20writing%20include,setting%2C%20and%20point
%20of%20view.
Martinez, D. (2018). 10 characteristics of the argumentation. gnsegypt.com. gnsegypt.com/10-characteristics-of-the-
argumentation/.
Rowling, J. K. (1998). Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Scholastic Press.
Ryan, F. (2021, September 22). “The Universal Credit Cut Is Outrageous, but THIS Callousness Is Nothing New.” The
Guardian. www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/22/universal-credit-cut-bedroom-tax-esa-reductions-policy.
Sandel, M. J. (2020, September 7). “The consequences of the diploma divide.” The New York Times International Edition,
42(760), p. 11.