1. Definition
- News item is a factual text which informs the readers about events of the day which are considered newsworthy or important.
2. Social Function
- The social function of news item is to inform readers, listeners or viewers about events of the day which are considered newsworthy or important.
3. Generic Structure
- Newsworthy Event(s): recounts the events in summary form.
- Background Event(s): elaborate what happened, to WHOM, in WHAT circumstances.
- Sources: comments by participants in, witnesses to, and expert on the event.
4. Significant Grammar Features
- Short, telegraphic information about story captured in headline
- Generally using Simple Past Tense
- Use of Material Processes to retell the event
- Using Action Verbs, e.g.: were, run, go, kill, etc.
- Using Saying Verbs, e.g.: say, tell
- Focus on Circumstances
- Use of projecting Verbal Processes in Sources stages
5. Some rules that can help to make newspaper headlines more comprehensible
- The passive voice is used without the appropriate form of “be”.
- Example: Town ‘Contaminated’
- Complete Sentence: Town is contaminated.
- It is unusual to find complex forms, generally the simple present form is used
- Example: Fire Destroys over 2,511 acres of Forest in 2003-2004
- Complete Sentence: Fire has destroyed over 2,511 acres of forest in 2003-2004.
- The present progressive tense is used, usually to describe something that is changing or developing, but the auxiliary verb is usually left out.
- Example: World Heading for Energy Crisis
- Complete Sentence: The world is heading for an energy crisis.
- To refer to the future, headlines often use the infinitive.
- Example: Queen to Visit Samoa.
- Complete Sentence: The Queen is going to visit Samoa.
- Headlines are not always complete sentences.
- Example: More earthquakes in Japan.
- Complete Sentence: More earthquakes happened in Japan
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