ABSTRACT
The letter to the editor shown in Figure 3.1 provides an example of a particular text type-an argument-occumng within the context of the genre “letter to the editor.” It is important to note that when someone is actually writing a letter to an editor, he or she needs to know much more than the final published text shows; he or she also needs to have an understanding of the conventions and expectations associated with letters to the editor, even though it is only the body of the letter that finally appears in print. Figure 3.1 shows this text as it might originally have been written, analyzed in terms of its generic structure (for the particular genre) and its text structure (as an instance of the text type “argument”).
