TOPIC 35. EXPOSITORY TEXTS.

STRUCTURE AND CHARACTERISTICS

1. INTRODUCTION
In everyday popular use it might be said that the term text is restricted to written
language, while discourse is restricted to spoken language. However, modern
linguistics has introduced a concept of text that includes every type of utterance;
therefore, a text may be a magazine article, a television interview, a conversation or a
cooking recipe, just to give a few examples.
De Beaugrande and Dressler (1981) define text as a communicative event that
must satisfy the following seven criteria: cohesion, coherence, intentionality,
intertextuality, informativity, acceptability and situationality.
Cohesion: it has to do with the relationship between text and syntax.
Coherence: it has to do with meaning of the text.
Intentionality: it relates to the attitude and purpose of the addresser.
Acceptability: it concerns the preparation of the addressee to assess the relevance
of a given text.
Informativity: it refers to the quantity and quality of new or expected information.
Situationality: it refers to the situation in which the text is produced, playing a crucial
role in the production and reception of the message.
Intertextuality: it refers to two main facts: a text is always related to other discourses
and is always linked and grouped in particular text varieties.
Once a text meets the seven criteria mentioned above, and depending on the
addresser’s purposefulness, i.e. what they want to convey through the text, linguists
elaborated a classification of texts whose features, structure, subject matter and
purpose are vital for their production; we can distinguish five major text types:
narrative, expository, argumentative, descriptive and dialogic.
Regarding the topic at hand, expository texts; what this essay intends to do is
to expose the main characteristics of this text type in order to have a general overview
that can be of use when students of Secondary and Bachillerato face this text typology.
Students need to be exposed to textual material both oral and written that resembles
the kind of material that they will find in real life. Students of these academic levels are
used to work with descriptive and narrative texts since Primary, however, exposition,
alongside argumentation, is a higher function in the evaluation of language that

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requires, on the part of the addressee, a higher level of cognitive development, that is
why they are not usually used in Primary. It is particularly crucial at this stage if
teachers want to work (and they should) with the cross-curricular training involved in
enabling students to become critical users of texts, by working with essays, trade
books, articles, reports, textbooks, interviews, to name but a few.

2. EXPOSITORY TEXTS
Exposition is a type of informational text that provides factual information about
a topic using a clear, non-narrative organizational structure with a major topic and
supporting information.
Expository texts can include topics such as historical, scientific or economic
information, which is presented with a clear organizational text structure which
includes but is not limited to: description, chronology, comparison, cause/effect,
problem/solution.
The language in exposition is precise, specific, to the subject and includes
domain specific vocabulary to explain concepts and information, although they often
include organizational tools such as tables of content, headings, index, glossary,
pronunciation guides or appendices.
In order to enhance the text, this text typology usually includes photograph,
illustrations, captions, charts, diagrams, tables, graphs and timelines.

3. LINGUISTIC FEATURES IN EXPOSITION

The main textual features in expository texts are given by textual and lexical
items, that is, textual devices which are words used to enhance the effectiveness of
the exposition: action verbs to explain cause in the present simple tense; adversative,
additive and causal connectors, as well as specific syntactic structures; use of complex
noun phrases to build detailed descriptions; precise, focused on the subject, domain
specific vocabulary rather than figurative language; use of reference devices such as
anaphora and cataphora; use of passive voice and nominalization to link the events
through cause and effect; technical terms or word chains about a subject; often written
in paragraphs.

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4. STRUCTURE OF EXPOSITORY TEXTS
The structure of expository texts, which seek to clarify and explain a subject in
a clear and organised way, cannot be a sequence of disordered arguments. In fact,
the discourse organization is essential, so both structure and content must be
organised in a clear and coherent manner for the reader/listener to follow the issue
development step by step. Even in oral expository texts the discourse is fully planned
and non-spontaneous.
Expository texts have an open structure because they offer a lot of new
information that must be logically organised. We may distinguish two main types of
structure: inductive and deductive.
The inductive structure develops the explanation in a progressive way going
from the particular to the general. Here, the writer moves from particular explanations
to general conclusions as the basis of their exposition.
Deductive structure deals with the opposite direction: from the general to the
particular. This order is also respected in the organization of the components, and of
their possible relations in the case of scientific expository text. In addition, specific
terminology and formulae are used with the aim of clarifying the steps to follow.
The sequence of exposition, i.e. the election of the chronological and logical
order, depends on the author’s communicative intention. So, the structure of
expository texts may follow these three steps: introduction, development and
conclusion. Before the introduction, it is common to present an outline of the exposition
to get acquainted with the concept, and then to begin with the exposition itself of what
is to be communicated; finally, it is usual to end up the exposition with a conclusion,
which summarizes the previous steps.
The INTRODUCTION presents the concept to be explained. It may also inform
the main objectives, temporal settings, spatial location and bibliographical
references of the text. Actually, this introductory paragraph is quite relevant
since it helps to know about the previous knowledge the speaker has about the
subject. In some way, the speaker selects their audience through their use of
vocabulary, inferences or implicit references.
The DEVELOPMENT may involve several paragraphs whose number depends
on the topic. Hence, every paragraph is a thematic unit which works as theme
(new information) and rheme (old information) at the same time. In addition, they
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constantly recover information from previous paragraphs to make the
information develop in a logical way. This is achieved by means of conjunct
clauses (summative, adversative, temporal or causal).
The CONCLUSION is a summary of all the information given about the subject.
It usually reflects the author’s position with respect to the issue.

5. MAIN TYPES OF EXPOSITORY TEXTS

Several types of expository texts can be distinguished on two main parameters:
first, the audience it is addressed to and second, the author’s purpose.
Regarding the audience, the main types of expository texts may be objective
and subjective. Objective texts are used to inform about a subject or general interest
in a clear and objective way. Objective expository texts are not complex and easily
understood by an ordinary audience. This modality is used on television or radio news,
for instance.
Subjective expository texts require the knowledge of a particular discipline or
science (or part of it at least) on the part of the addressee, therefore, they are not
suitable for a general audience and related to scientific, technological, or linguistic
fields, to name a few.
Regarding the author’s purpose, expository texts may aim at defining,
classifying, illustrating, giving examples, instructing, analysing, comparing, and
contrasting, and finally, showing relationships of cause and effect.

6. CONCLUSION AND TEACHING IMPLICATIONS

Students are exposed to texts since a very early stage in their academic lives.
In English Language Teaching (ELT), the legal framework that develops the content
teachers need to teach at Secondary and Bachillerato levels namely Royal Decree
217/2020, 29 March and 243/2020, 5 April at national level, and Decrees 65/2020 and
64/2020, 20 July at regional level, contain a specific competence, number two, which
encourages students to produce texts, therefore a specific competence dealing with
the topic at hand.
The ability to write effectively using standard written English is particularly
important in higher education. Students at these academic levels are used to dealing
with simple, well-structured written language; however, it is particularly crucial at this

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stage that teachers take advantage of the students’ writing skills and introduce more
demanding written text types such as challenging expositions.
6. BIBLIOGRAPHY
- Alba-Juez, Laura. Perspectives of Discourse Analysis: Theory and Practice.
Cambridge Scholar Publishing. 2009.
- Alba-Juez, Laura. Pragmatics: Cognitive, Context and Culture. McGrow Hills. 2016.
- Chacón, Manuel Rubén. Sociolinguistics. UNED. 2016
- De Beaugrande, Robert-Alain and, Wolfgang U. Dressler. Introduction to text
linguistics. London: longman. 1981