Mastering Sentence Clarity for Effective Communication

1. Improving Clarity Katherine King

2. Why should we? • We write to communicate • Sentence clarity improves overall writing style, which implies more effective communication. • Especially relevant in academic writing • Students sometimes put a greater emphasis on sounding intelligent • Instead, students should focus on effectively conveying intelligent points • Sentence clarity forces the writer to have a better understanding of the argument

3. Check List • Avoid nominalizations • Watch out for prepositional phrases • Active voice > passive voice • Use active verbs instead of “to be” verbs • Beware of sentences that begin with expletives (It is/there are…etc.) • Be careful with pronoun references

4. Structural Concerns • Choose clear subjects • Abstractions and process often create unclear subjects • Old information  New information • Placement of subordinate clauses • Don’t interrupt the main clause • Parallel constructions

5. Practice • The cause of our schools’ failure at teaching basic skills is not understanding the influence of cultural background on learning. • Use the checklist: What do you notice? • Strings of prepositional phrases • Unclear subject • nominalizations

6. Revised • Our schools have failed to teach basic skills because educators do not understand how cultural backgrounds influence learning. • Subjects: • The cause of our school’s failure at teach basic skills Our schools…educators…cultural backgrounds • No more prepositional phrases! • Nominalizations: • Failure  failed; the influence of  influence

7. Writing Studio Resources • http://twp.duke.edu/uploads/media_items/clarity-conciseness.original.pdf • https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/600/01/ • http://writingcenter.unc.edu/handouts/style/