1. Characterization
Indirect and Direct

2. What is characterization?
Characterization is the way writers create and describe a character for the reader.
There are two types of characterization:
Direct characterization
Indirect characterization

3. Direct Characterization
Narrator explicitly describes a character. They tell us what type of character we are reading about.
Ex: Kat was popular but snobby.
Tim was a nice, honest boy.
Explicit= clearly stated…so, it would be direct characterization.

4. For the character that corresponds to your number, provide a detail of him or her using direct characterization. 1 3 2

5. Indirect Characterization
Writers most often use indirect characterization to show (not tell) things that reveal the personality of a character:
The character’s speech,
The character’s thoughts,
The effect the character has on others,
The character’s actions,
The physical “looks” of the character

6. More on Indirect Characterization
Ex: Jess left the pizza crust on the floor.
What can we infer about Jess?
Tim helped Ms. Jones with her bags.
What can we infer about Tim?
Indirect characterizations are implicit.
Implicit: not clearly stated, but implied (so we need to infer). Think “show not tell.”

7. Indirect characterization
It is more like the way we learn about people in real life because we naturally observe people and characters in films, etc. to figure out his/her/its personality.
Remember the word, STEAL…

8. What we SAY reveals a lot about our personality.
“STEAL”
The acronym “STEAL” can help you remember the five different ways writers use indirect characterization to create characters:
“S” stands for SPEECH.
What we SAY reveals a lot about our personality.

9. “T” stands for THOUGHTS.
“STEAL”
“T” stands for THOUGHTS.
When a writer reveals a character’s thoughts, we learn about the character’s true self.

10. “STEAL” “E” stands for EFFECT ON OTHERS
Knowing how others act around a character or feel towards a character tells the reader a great deal about the character.

11. “STEAL” “A” stands for ACTIONS.
Paying attention to what the character DOES or the way the character behaves gives the reader insight into the character’s personality.

12. “STEAL” “L” stands for LOOKS.
Writers use descriptions of characters’ physical attributes (how he looks…how he dresses) to reveal important information about the character.

13. For the character that corresponds to your number, provide a detail of him or her using one STEAL indirect characterization strategy. 1 3 2

14. Quick Review
Direct characterization: the narrator explicitly describes the character.
Indirect characterization: character’s traits are implicitly revealed through their speech, thoughts, effect on others, actions, and looks (show not tell).

15. Practice Read the passage.
Determine a character trait and whether it is direct or indirect.

16. Example
Mr. Morton was teaching the students about characterizations. Kyle let out a big yawn.
1. Kyle is bored or tired.
Ex: Indirect - he yawned, which shows he’s either bored or tired.

17. 1
Before class, Debbie asked Michelle a question, “Since I was absent yesterday, will you tell me what we had for homework?”
Michelle huffed and rolled her eyes. She snapped at Debbie, “Uh, I don’t know. I don’t have time for this.”

18. 2
While playing football with his friends, Evan overthrew the ball and accidently broke the living room window. When his mom came home, she asked what had happened. Evan looked her in the face and said, “A bird smashed into the window, Mom.”

19. 3
John was in excruciating pain from football practice. He could hardly sleep ten minutes before the pain caused him to roll around. His body was telling him to quit the team, but John refused to give up.
“I will make the team,” he repeated over and over as he tried to sleep.

20. 4
Tim was walking around the store when he bumped into a display of soup cans, knocking them all over. Tim bought two cartons of eggs then got hit by the automatic door on the way out. While walking through the parking lot, Tim tripped over the curb and landed on the eggs, getting them all over his shirt.