A text is a passage of words that conveys a set of meanings to the person who is reading it. It’s a body of written work in various forms and structures, which can be words, phrases, and sentences that piece together a passage of written work.
What is a piece of text?
A text is a passage of words that conveys a set of meanings to the person who is reading it. It’s a body of written work in various forms and structures, which can be words, phrases, and sentences that piece together a passage of written work.
To put it as simply as possible, it is a group of words. But it can come in many different forms.
A text can be written materials, such as books, magazines, newspapers, or online content. But it can also be other things that we may not associate with standard text. For example, the text could be movies, scripts, paintings, songs, political cartoons, advertisements, and maps. If we can look at something with words and sentences, explore it, find layers of meaning, and draw information and conclusions from it, we’re looking at a text.
Examples of a text
As noted above, a text can take many forms and be seen within different types of work.
These are just some of the examples of types of different texts:
- Books
- Scripts
- Magazines
- Newspapers
- Instruction manuals
- Cartoons with speech and comics
- Notes and references
Texts can be small or large, shot in content, or long, winding novels. Passages of text can be seen above and in various places. For example:
- The safety information in an airplane
- Ingredients on the back of a food product
- Contents of a letter or email
- A text message from a friend
- The contents of a shopping list
Essentially, the text is seen everywhere — passages and groupings of the written word — and can be short or long, coming in vastly different forms.
