A method and apparatus for determining and displaying icons representing files containing text, such as e-mail, web pages, text documents, word-processor documents, etc. In particular, the system determines the content of the text by examining words in the document. For example, if words relating to cars appear several times in the document, then the document's topic probably relates to car. Next, the system searches in a database of icons, which are labeled according to type. For example, the database may contain graphics relating to transportation (cars, planes, trains, etc.) computers (hard disk, monitor, keyboard, etc.), animals (mammal, reptile, amphibian), and many other categories. The system chooses the closest icon available and displays it as the icon representing the text document. (For example, the system may associate the document on cars with a car icon, and the car icon is displayed in appropriate regions of the desktop such as in file listings, desktop shortcuts, menus task bars, etc.).