• What is a journalistic text?
• Objective of a journalistic text
• Journalistic genres
• Examples of journalistic texts

We explain what a journalistic text is and its main objectives. In addition, the journalistic genres that exist and examples.

The journalistic text is derived from journalism or social communication.

What is a journalistic text?

When we talk about a journalistic text, we refer to a writing (generally, although it can also be an auditory or audiovisual text), which is derived from the professional practice of journalism or journalism. communication social, that is, we speak of a text whose purpose is to update the reader regarding an event or information that could result from interest particular to public opinion.

This link between journalistic texts and current events and important events characterize them and distinguish them, for example, from the texts of the literature and of the philosophical offices, whose reading It obeys criteria of entertainment, intellectual training or study.

The journalistic text, on the other hand, is considered a way of acquiring recent information that, precisely, loses validity with the passage of time, something that does not happen with literature and philosophy.

The latter is due to the fact that journalistic texts tend to be massively printed on more or less economical and disposable material, since they will not be saved for rereading, but will be discarded once the texts contained therein lose their immediate validity.

This, of course, does not occur in databases from newspapers or newspaper archives, where published press material is archived and classified for review by future researchers.

Objective of a journalistic text

One goal of a news story is to provide the reader with information to make an opinion.

Broadly speaking, the objective of a journalistic text is, as we have said, to inform. That is, to update your eventual readers on what is happening, provide them with information so that they can formulate an opinion about something, move them before some little-known reality, alert about events of risk, and other similar public interest purposes.

This is better understood if we think that the journalistic text is a descendant of those communiqués that in times of the Roman Empire were published on the walls to inform the public. population from Caesar's decisions or recent political changes and war events, so that everyone knew what laws to abide by and, often, who now ruled them.

Journalistic genres

The genre of opinion responds to the ways of thinking of its authors.

Journalism is exercised through the production of different types of text, both written and of another nature (audiovisual, auditory), so these texts are usually classified according to the intention with which they approach the reader, as follows:

• Informative genres. Texts whose mission is to impart in an objective, impartial and exhaustive way a information of public interest, generally newsworthy or current. For example: News and the reportage.
• Genres of opinion. Texts that analyze, interpret or propose ways of understanding an event of public interest, or even another text itself, responding to the ways of thinking of its authors. For example: publishers and opinion articles.
• Hybrid genres. Texts that combine the informative desire with personal opinion, or with other more subjective approaches, even literary ones, resorting to a bit of fiction. For example: interviews and the journalistic chronicles.

Examples of journalistic texts

Some examples of journalistic text are the following:

• News:

The nightmare of the attacks on America's schools never seems to end. A shooting Friday morning at a high school in Santa Fe, Texas, left "multiple fatalities," authorities say. There is talk of at least between 8 and 10 deaths. Explosives were also found in the educational center.

(Excerpt from a news item published in the Argentine newspaperClarion as of 05/18/2018)

• Interview:

Rafael Cadenas is the author of classics such asThe Exile Notebooks YFalse maneuvers , the book that includes "Defeat" -. They followedOutdoor, Memorial (both from 1977),Lover YManagement . "I know that this title seems like a book on administration," explains the poet, "but it spoke of other, psychic steps."

(Excerpt from an interview published in the Spanish newspaperThe country as of 10/17/2014)

• Chronicle:

The fear of an earthquake similar to the one that occurred on September 19, 1985 was experienced this Thursday night in the streets of Mexico City and other parts of the Republic during the 8.2-degree earthquake that had Tonalá, Chiapas as its epicenter.

Around 11:50 p.m. the seismic alert began to sound in the capital; in the center of Mexico City the buildings were evicted, people ran to get away from the tall buildings and avoid being the victim of a collapse.

After a false alert sounded last Wednesday, most thought it was something similar; However, when I began to feel the movement and when I saw some blue and green lightning, the memory of the earthquake of 85 began in some, mainly in the elderly.

"Run, this is an earthquake", "stay away from the buildings, they are going to fall", "the buildings are creaking" were some of the shouts of the people who were looking for a space free of real estate.

(Excerpt from a chronicle published in the Mexican newspaperThe universal on 09/08/2017)