BIOGRAPHY

Meeting 12
Have you ever read a biography?
• Whose biography is it?
• Did you learn something from someone’s biography?
• Does the figure write by himself the biography?
BIOGRAPHY TEXT
• Biography text is actually part of recount text.
• It is a text which has a purpose to retell the event of famous person’s life. A detailed description or
account of a person’s life and written by someone else, it is nonfiction text.
• There are two forms of biography:
1. Short biographical recount text (focuses only on highlights of a person’s life)
2. Long biographical recount text (about life and times of someone in a lot more detail)
BIOGRAPHY FUNCTIONS
1. To know a person’s story about his/her life outside of any accomplishments this person may be known
for.
2. To give many information easily and educate the readers.
3. It can learn about lives and eras of both the past and present.
BIOGRAPHY CHARACTER
• Biography is not written by subject and always written in third person.
• Based on research: the writer usually conducted an interview to the figure or people around him/her.
• Describes the person's surroundings (where, when and how the person lived).
• Use vivid language to narrate events: the writer uses the clear language and chronology to avoid
misunderstanding and does not follow the data.
BIOGRAPHY GENERIC
STRUCTURE
• The generic structure is similar to recount text. The difference is on what was written in it.
1. Orientation: It is the opening paragraph, gives the readers the background information of the person.
2. Event : it is about the someone life story to achieve something, how his life went, how he achieved an
achievement, how he reached a goal and so on.
3. Re-orientation: It consist of conclusion or a comment or the writer. Tell about the achievement or the
contribution of the person.
BIOGRAPHY LANGUAGE
FEATURE
1. Use of simple past tense. e.g. : - The family then moved to his stepfather’s home country. - He was
born on August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, Hawaii.
2. Use of Temporal sequence e.g. : His parents separated when he was two years old.
3. Focus on Specific participants Use of Action verbs. e.g. : the family then moved to his stepfather’s
home
 EXAMPLE
Sukarno was the first president of Indonesia. He was born in 6 June 1901 and died in 21 June 1970. He led
his country to fight against Netherlands and the man who proclaimed the independence. Sukarno was a
prominent leader of nationalist movement during the colonial period. He spent more than a decade under the
detention before released by the Japanese force.
Ir. Sukarno and all his nationalist fellows collaborated to collect support in spreading nationalist ideas.
When Japan surrender the Indonesian independence was declared by Sukarno and Mohammad Hatta on 17
August 1945. At the same time, Sukarno was appointed as the president and Mohammad Hatta as vice president.
After became president, Sukarno had to fight once again against resisting Dutch re-colonization efforts.
After parliamentary democracy chaos in 1957, Sukarno put an autocratic system called Guided Democracy.
It successfully ended the rebellions and instability which were threatening the country. In the early 1960s,
Sukarno brought the country to the Soviet by giving protection and support to the Indonesian Communist Party.
Unfortunately, the 30 September movement in 1965 ended the communist era and Sukarno’s position as
president was replaced by Suharto, the man who became president for 32 years. After Suharto in charged,
Sukarno was exiled to Bogor and spent the rest of his life there.