Notes, summaries, assignments, exams, and problems for Language

Newspaper Articles

Newspaper articles organize information to allow for selective reading, enabling readers to choose their preferred order.

Structure of Newspaper Articles

Newspaper articles typically consist of two main parts:

• Headline/Lead: This summarizes the central theme of the text, sometimes accompanied by a subtitle. It serves three key functions: opening, summary, and reminder.
• Body Text: This section develops the subject matter in detail.
• Lead Paragraph (Entradilla): This summarizes key data, aiming to answer the fundamental questions: what, who, how, when, where, and why.

Main Structural Approaches in Journalism

Journalistic texts often employ distinct structural patterns:

• Inverted Pyramid Structure: Contents are arranged with the most important

Sentence Types and Moods

Types of Predicative Sentences:

• Transitive
• Intransitive
• Active
• Passive
• Reflexive
• Reciprocal
• Impersonal (no subject: e.g., "It is raining")

Sentence Modality (Mood):

• Declarative (Enunciativa)
• Interrogative
• Exclamative
• Tentative/Dubitative
• Desiderative (Expressing desire)
• Imperative (Command)

Verbs and Tenses

Examples of tenses:

• Past Simple: I ate.
• Perfect: I have eaten.

Polyphony in Communication

Polyphony refers to the set of voices participating in the development of any communicative situation. We can distinguish between:

1. External Reality: The actual author of the text (the issuer who truly produces the text) and the actual reader (the real receptor).
2. Model: The model or image of each participant that the other creates. The author has a

The Style and Narrative Techniques in Unamuno's Work

The content, style, character in the novel, ideological and conceptual, determines the style of the text. It is permeated with narration. The terminology is abstract, full of paradoxes, antitheses, metaphors, metonymy, and symbols. In addition, the style is determined by the presence of a fictional narrator: a 50-year-old woman, who, in writing her memoirs, recalls past events. There are digressions and reflections—some with an ironic tone—of the narrative thread, with exaggerations and reiterations.

Narrative Techniques

All the novel is reconstructed on the literary device of the found manuscript. Using the found manuscript, Unamuno strengthens the intended verisimilitude, making the reader... Continue reading "Style and Narrative Techniques in Unamuno's Work" »

Language Functions in Communication

Referential Function: The act of communication focuses on the context, i.e., the topic or issue being referenced. Declarative sentences are used, and they can be affirmative or negative.

Poetic Function: Primarily used in literature. The act of communication focuses on the message itself, its provision, and how it is transmitted. Expressive resources such as rhyme and alliteration are employed.

Phatic Function: Consists of starting, stopping, continuing, or terminating communication. This involves salutations (Greetings, Hi, How are you?, etc.), farewells (Goodbye, See ya, Have a good time, etc.), and formulas to interrupt a conversation and then continue (Pardon me..., Wait a minute... As I was saying... We... Continue reading "Understanding Language Functions and Textual Cohesion" »

Novel Experimental: Renewal of the Novel

Most Important Innovations:

• Argument: Loses significance in some novels and completely disappears in others.
• Characters: The individual character returns, but always in conflict with itself.
• Structure: The external structure disappears, and the chapter introduces the sequence in internal chronological order.
• Point of View: The omniscient narrator returns and shares digressions. It reproduces the interior monologue of a character's thoughts as they arise in their consciousness. Digressions are comments the author makes about some fact or character.
• Language and Style: The imposing baroque language is inadequate to the poor reality the author tells. Concerning the style, the features are:
  • Risk variety of languages,

Understanding Language Functions

• Referential (Representative): Focuses on the context, conveying objective information about reality.
• Expressive (Emotive): Focuses on the sender, expressing emotions, attitudes, or subjective feelings.
• Conative (Appellative): Focuses on the receiver, aiming to influence or elicit a response from them.
• Phatic: Focuses on the communication channel, used to establish, maintain, or close communication (e.g., social greetings).
• Metalinguistic: Focuses on the code itself, using language to talk about language.
• Poetic: Focuses on the message for its own sake, emphasizing aesthetic or artistic qualities of the language.

Spanish Language Varieties and Dialects

Castilian Spanish: First appearances in the Glosas Emilianenses (... Continue reading "Linguistic Concepts and Literary Forms Explained" »

Jorge Manrique's Verses on His Father's Death

Verses on the Death of His Father Jorge Manrique is an elegy in which the painful experience of the disappearance of Rodrigo Manrique leads the poet to meditate on death. The couplets are placed within a long stream of literature that addresses the issue of death. Away from the coldness and the ornate cultist scholarship, such poems reflected the preoccupation with death and have a macabre vision of it that causes fear. It contains a number of ideas for consideration by the world as vanity: vanity, contempt of earthly life, the convention of the ubi sunt, the instability of fortune, and the relentless presence of death. The only lyrics are verses of the poem of the 16th to 24th. The couplets are... Continue reading "Analysis of Jorge Manrique's Poetry and Celestina's World" »

Interpretative Journalism

The News

Objective stories without comment or intervention of the issuer (impersonal), novel facts or events of general interest. Narrative. Variable length, short or long.

Structure

• Body of Headlines: Minor (title only) and highest (pre-title or subtitle). Summarize objectively.
• Input: The first paragraph, the key event. The 6 Ws, six questions to which the first paragraph has to answer. Sometimes highlighted with capital letters.
• Body of the News: Data development. Can take two forms:
  • Inverted Pyramid Structure: Data or ideas in order of importance, 1 being the most interesting.
  • Chronological Narrative: Progress chronologically from the beginning to the end.
  • Mixed Story: Mixture of the above.

The Feature

Broad, informative,... Continue reading "Journalism Genres: News, Opinion, and Hybrid Forms" »

Definition of Literary Arts

Literary manifestation is an art whose raw materials are the units of language. The writer manipulates these units to produce an aesthetic and emotional effect on the receiver. In other words, it includes texts that have been developed with an artistic intention.

Defining Elements of Literature

• Fiction: Refers to the peculiar relationship that literary works have with reality, verisimilitude.
• Aesthetic language: Used for creating impressions and emotions in the reader.

Functions of Literature

• Diversion/Entertainment: Reading is one of the usual distractions for many people.
• Transmission of Ideas/Didactic: Throughout history, literature has transmitted many ideas and has served speculative thought for improving society.
• Cause

Brand Identity and Company Image

A company's design reflects its technical and economic philosophy, and its image reveals its character and defines its mentality. The designer acts as the company's philosopher, visualizing its essence and highlighting its differentiating attributes within a consistent visual management system. Effective communication sets a company apart from the competition, leading to market gains.

Creative Design Process

To achieve a design solution, we'll follow Bruno Munari's problem-solving approach:

1. Problem Definition
2. Problem Elements
3. Data Collection
4. Data Analysis
5. Creativity
6. Materials & Technology
7. Experimentation
8. Models
9. Verification
10. Construction Drawings
11. Solution

Defining Identity

Identity encompasses the unique and non-transferable... Continue reading "Company Branding and Visual Identity" »