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Text Analysis 123

1. The document discusses the skills of close reading and textual analysis, identifying 5 analytical tools to consider when analyzing a text: audience and purpose, content and theme, tone and mood, stylistic devices, and structure. 2. It provides guidance on how to analyze each of these elements, including questions to consider about the audience, purpose, content, themes, tone, mood, stylistic devices used, and overall structure. 3. Tone refers to the language used to create an emotional response, while mood is the atmosphere created through tone. Both relate to the context and how words have denotative and connotative meanings.

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Cosmin Mateias
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131 views3 pages

Text Analysis 123

1. The document discusses the skills of close reading and textual analysis, identifying 5 analytical tools to consider when analyzing a text: audience and purpose, content and theme, tone and mood, stylistic devices, and structure. 2. It provides guidance on how to analyze each of these elements, including questions to consider about the audience, purpose, content, themes, tone, mood, stylistic devices used, and overall structure. 3. Tone refers to the language used to create an emotional response, while mood is the atmosphere created through tone. Both relate to the context and how words have denotative and connotative meanings.

Uploaded by

Cosmin Mateias
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOC, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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1

TEXT ANALYSIS OR THE SKILL OF CLOSE READING


The close reading skill refers to the practice of analysing and interpreting texts. Each text
you might be faced with will help you understand not only your own environment but also
the cultures of the Anglophone world better. To analyse texts, you should consider 5
analytical tools, each of them revealing new levels of understanding.
Therefore you should bear in mind (for Paper 1 as well as for your WTs or IOC):
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.

Audience and purpose


Content and theme
Tone and mood
Stylistic devices
Structure

Each of them relates to several questions:


a. AUDIENCE AND PURPOSE

WHO WROTE THE TEXT?

WHO WAS IT WRITTEN FOR ?


AUDIENCE = THE GROUP OF LISTENERS OR READERS FOR WHOM A
TEXT OR MESSAGE IS INTENDED
Context of interpretation refers to the factors that can influence a
reader of a text, such as time, place and personal experience.
PURPOSE = the writers intentions in writing a text, be they to entertain,
enlighten, persuade, inform, evaluate, define, instruct or explain.
Context of composition factors that influence a writer when creating a
text, such as time, place, personal experience
!!!! In TEXTUAL ANALYSIS questions on Paper 1 you must comment in
detail on audience and purpose.
b. CONTENT AND THEME
CONTENT
WHAT IS THE TEXT ABOUT?
WHO ARE THE PEOPLE INVOLVED IN THE TEXT AND WHAT ARE
THEIR ROLES?
DOES THE TEXT MAKE REFERENCE TO A PARTICULAR TIME OR
EVENT?
WHAT HAPPENS IN THE TEXT? WHAT KIND OF ACTION TAKES
PLACE?
THEME

2
All writers and speakers have a message they want to convey but the message
of a text is closely related to but different from the writers purpose.

WHAT IT THE AUTHORS MESSAGE?


WHAT IS THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE TEXT TO ITS AUDIENCE?
WHAT IS THE TEXT ACTUALLY SAYING?

c. TONE AND MOOD

WHAT IS THE WRITERS TONE?


HOW DOES THE WRITER MAKE THE READER FEEL?

d. STYLISTIC DEVICES

WHAT STYLISTIC DEVICES DOES THE WRITER USE?


HOW DOES THE WRITER INSTIGATE A PARTICULAR RESPONSE?
IS THERE A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHAT THE WRITER SAYS AND
WHAT THE WRITER MEANS?
WHAT STYLISTIC DEVICES DOES THE WRITER USE TO MAKE
COMPARISONS?
STYLISTIC DEVICES are techniques that writers and speakers
employ to instigate a response from their audience
IRONY, SARCASM, RTHETORICAL QUESTIONS, DOUBLE ENTENDRE,
FIGURATIVE SPEECH, ANALOGY AND METAPHOR

e. STRUCTURE

WHAT KIND OF TEXT IS IT?


WHAT STRUCTURAL CONVENTIONS ARE USED?

THE WHO AND THE WHAT OF A TEXT CAN BE FOUND IN THE STUDY OF THE CONCEPTS
OF AUDIENCE, PURPOSE, CONTENT AND THEME.
THE HOW OF A TEXT REFERS TO THE WAY A WRITER USES LANGUAGE TO INSTIGATE A
RESPONSE FROM THE READERS. A WRITER USES A PARTICULAR TONE, WHICH PUTS THE
READER IN A PARTICULAR MOOD. To a certain extent, it can be assimilated to a CAUSEEFFECT RELATIONSHIP.
TO sum up:
TONE refers to the language used by a speaker or writer to instigate an emotional effect
on the listener or reader.
TONE is very much related to the context of composition. If we think of the author of a
piece of writing being in a certain state of mind perhaps frustrated, troubled or hurt then we can imagine what kind of vocabulary they might use to convey the message. We
refer to this choice of vocabulary as the writers

diction.

To gain a deeper awareness of the use of tone, ask the following questions:
How does the author sound?
What is the writers tone?

3
What kind of diction does the writer use?
The jump from diction to tone is a mental exercise that relies heavily on the context of
composition.
MOOD refers to the atmosphere that is created for an audience through the tone of a
text.
MOOD relates to the following two questions:

How does the text make the reader feel?

How does the writer use diction to put the reader in a certain mood?

How do we make the jump from the diction to the mood? We imagine how the target
audience must have received the text at the time it was published. And we
also consider the resonance of the text in our context of interpretation today.
In order to understand how language puts us in a particular mood, we need to
remember that words have both a denotative and a connotative meaning. In the
case of connotation, words are surrounded by an aura of emotional meaning.

TONE WORDS
Adventuresome anxious

celebratory

confident

determined

dignified

Disappointed

encouraging euphoric

fatalistic

hopeful

hopeless

Hyperbolic

ominous

passionate

reassuring

resigned

severe

Solemn

tragic

wise

zealous

MOOD WORDS
Apprehensive

desolate

disappointed disheartened empathetic

empowered

Engaged

fascinated

frustrated

intrigued

mournful

optimistic

Sentimental

solemn

suspicious

tough

uplifted

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