Definition of Biography: Form, Type, Structure, Characteristics, Elements

The word biography comes from the Greek word bios which means is life and graphene which means is write. A biography is a piece of writing that discusses a person's life. In simple terms, this biography can be interpreted as a story of someone's life history. For more details, read the article below:

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Definition of Biography

A biography is a story or information about a person's life. The biography describes in full the life of a character from childhood to old age, even to death. All services, works, and all forms produced or also performed by a character are also explained. The biographical text was composed or written by someone else, not done by myself.

This biography often tells about a historical figure, but not infrequently also tells about people who are still alive. This biography requires main material as well as supporting material. This main material can be in the form of objects, such as diaries, letters, newspaper clippings, and so on. As for the supporting material, it is usually in the form of other biographies, reference books, history that describes the role of people in the biography and so on.

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Biography Form

The biography consists of two forms, namely a short biography and a long biography, which only contains facts about a person's life and important roles. As for the long biography, it is formed from important information that is told in more detail and is also written in a good storytelling style.

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Types of Biography

This biography can be divided into three groups. Below are the types of biographies including the following:

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Biography Based on Authorization

1. Authorized Biography
   is a biography whose writing has obtained permission or with the knowledge of the character whose life story will be told.
2. Unauthorized Biography
   is a biography whose writing was not with permission or without the knowledge of the character whose life story will be told. Generally, writing on unauthorized biographies is done because the character to be told has died or died.

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Biography Based on Content

1. Biography of Life's Journey
   is a biography whose contents are about the life journey of a character in full or also by taking some parts of the journey of life that are considered very memorable.
2. Biography of Career Journey
   is a biography whose contents are about the career journey of a character from the beginning to the career that has been carried out until now. Or it could also tell the career path of a character in achieving certain success.

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Biography Based on the Issues Discussed

• Political Biography
  is a biography whose contents are about the life story of a country's figure seen from a political point of view. Even though through research, in general, this political biography contains the interests of the author or the character being told.
• Intellectual Biography
  is a biography whose contents explain the life story of an intellectual figure from a scientific point of view. This intellectual biography was made through various researches and also written using scientific language.
• Based on journalism
  is a biography whose writing is obtained from the results of direct interviews with the character whose life story will be written.

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Biography By Publisher

• Own book
  is a biography of a character who was made into a book by the publisher with the production costs ranging from writing, printing and also marketing to be borne by himself. The purpose of writing this biography is to be sold in the market or also to get public attention.
• Subsidy book
  is a biography of a character whose writing and production costs are borne by the sponsor. If viewed from a commercial perspective, this type of biography will not sell or the selling price is too high so it is difficult to reach.

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Biography Structure

Below is a biographical structure consisting of orientation, events & problems, reorientation. The explanation is as follows:

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• Orientation

Orientation is a section which in this section describes the introduction of characters, which contains an initial description of the characters told in a biography.

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• Events and Problems

The event/event section is the section that contains an event/event that has been experienced, including it contains about a problem he has faced in achieving a goal and also his ideals. The interesting, amazing, impressive, and also touching things that have been experienced by the characters are also described in this section.

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• reorientation

Reorientation is the closing part of a biography. This reorientation section explains the author's view of the characters told. This reorientation is optional, meaning that this section may or may not exist.

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Biographical Features

Below are the characteristics of a biography, including the following:

• This biography has a structure consisting or formed of: orientation, events or problems, as well as reorientation.
• This biography describes based on factual information and is also presented in narrative form.
• It is factual (facts) based on a person's life experience as told in the biographical character.
• Things to note in the biographical text, including the following:
  1. Biography title
  2. Interesting and impressive things that are shown in the lives of the characters being told
  3. Amazing and touching things that appear in the lives of the characters being told
  4. Things that can be used as examples or examples from the lives of characters.

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Linguistic elements of biographical text:

1. Conjunction
2. Referring to Words
3. Verb
4. Time, activity and place

Information :

1. CONJUNCTION

Conjunctions or conjunctions are often also calledconjunction, which is a word that functions as a liaison between one word and another word in a sentence. In addition, conjunctions also function to connect one sentence with another sentence.

1. intra-sentence conjunction

If the conjunction functions as a connecting word in a sentence. For example: and, but, then, then.

Intra-sentence conjunctions are divided into 3, namely:

1. Coordinative conjunction

used to connect two or more elements

equally important.

For example and, as well as, but.

1. correlative conjunction

used to connect two words or phrases that have the same status, usually separated by one word or phrase.

For example: neither… nor…, not only…, but also….

1. subordinating conjunction

used to connect two words or phrases that do not have the same status.

For example: after, so that, so, because

1. conjunctions between sentences

if the conjunction serves to connect one sentence with another sentence. for example; however, even so, therefore.

Meaning of Connecting Words:

1. Meaning of 'addition' relationship

for example: and

1. Means 'contradictory'

for example: nevertheless, however,

1. Means 'continuation'

for example: then

1. REFERRING WORD

Consider the following example:

Ki Hajar Dewantara's life journey was truly marked by his struggle and dedication to the interests of his nation and country.

The example sentence above shows –nya in the word country, its refers to Ki Hajar Dewantara.

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Comparing Biography Text

In comparing biographical texts you need to pay attention to:

1. biographical text
2. biographical text structure
3. linguistic rules of biographical text

After paying attention to these things, you will find the differences and similarities between the two biographical texts being compared.

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