Style

Albert Einstein supposedly said, "Keep everything as simple as possible but not simpler," and for the past few decades, that has been excellent advice for good style: rhetorical flourishes are out of fashion. Excessive wordiness (and I mean not just the number of words but the number of syllables) dilutes the impact of what you have to say. A point made with six syllables has more punch than the same point made with twenty-three. Complexity may come, but intricate sentence structure and impressive vocabulary should not be sought out. Use them -- don't make things simpler than possible -- but use them only when necessary.

Generally, verbs do the heavy work of a sentence, and most of the time it is the verbs that will interest. Therefore, verbs are good. However, English is very good at taking verbs and turning them into nouns, thereby making prose styles duller. Look at two examples: "We must consider this" and "This must be taken under consideration." The second has turned its verb into a noun, becoming unnecessarily wordy and less interesting.

Another way to dilute the impact of verbs is to use the passive voice when the situation does not require it. (The passive voice, by the way, is when the grammatical subject of the sentence is not the agent doing the action but instead the object to which the action is done: "the door was painted" is passive; "I painted the door" is active). There are times when the passive voice is appropriate, but many people (including, unfortunately, many academics) use it far more often. Resist! Use the passive voice only when it is necessary to hide the subject of a sentence -- if you're telling a ghost story, "the door was being closed behind them is fine, as is "mistakes were made" if you're a politician trying to hide from a scandal, or "further experiments were done" if you're a chemist working in a discipline which avoids the use of "I" to foster the sense of scientific objectivity. Also use the passive voice if for some reason the action is far more important than the agent. "The button was pushed, and World War III began," focuses attention on the war and its horrors while sidestepping the debate of who began it and whether it is was justified. Otherwise, make your verbs active.

One last point on verbs: the split infinitive is becoming more common, but high stylists will still disapprove. (An infinitive is the verb form with "to" in front, "to be," "to run" and so on). A natural tendency in spoken English is to put adverbs in the middle, as in "to boldly go," thus splitting the infinitive; the grammarians disapprove, saying it should be either "boldly to go" or "to go boldly." The grammarians are losing -- I see more and more split infinitives in The New York Times -- but in academic writing you might try to avoid it.

Word choice also matters. Good authors use words that mean precisely what they mean: the literal meaning fits exactly, and the connotations fit the subject. To have this kind of control over language, they need to know the words they use very well. What often happens in student writing is that students start using words they don't know well to try to sound smart, or because the professor used them and the students have only a vague sense of what they mean. When this happens, the consequences can be very funny. Students may say something precisely opposite of what they mean, or their sentences may not make sense, or there will be a secondary meaning they are not aware of that turns the whole sentence into a joke. The way to avoid this is not to use words you don't know well -- and the emphasis is on the "well." If you're not sure of something, look it up, or use a simpler word if a simpler word will fit. Remember, simplicity is good, and it sounds smarter than advanced vocabulary used unnecessarily.

There are times, however, you need to use the longer words. In most cases, "The poem tells readers how to read appropriately" is must better than "The text interpellates a hegemonically normalized subject," but if you're discussing high literary theory, the second sentence might be better: the long words have been given precise meanings in literary-theoretical discussions, and using those words not only conveys precise nuances of meaning but also signals to readers what theoretical texts and ideas the writer is drawing upon. If you don't know the precise meanings and you don't know the theorists associated with those words, however, don't fake it; it will ruin your style, and small errors of meaning may make your argument ridiculous.

As you are writing, check to make sure your sentence structure is varied. If you always have sentences that begin subject-verb-object, the repetition will grow tedious. If your sentences are always the same length, that rhythm will grow monotonous. In academic writing, what often works is to have longer, more complex sentences in the middle of a paragraph, where you are explaining and supporting complex ideas. A short sentence at the end stands out. Use that for your conclusion and for your break in the rhythm.

Avoid claims about what you are going to do, such as "In this paper I will argue that brevity is the soul of wit." They are unnecessary -- any reader who sees a claim in a paper is going to know that it will be argued for -- and they add unnecessary words.

The problem with the earlier example is this wordiness and not the use of "I." It is permissible to use "I" and "we" in English papers, but you should do so only when necessary, and that is rarely. You can use the first person when relevant evidence comes from your own experience (early feminists did this to explode the myth that white European men spoke for all readers in their criticism), or, occasionally, if you are so expert that your guesses will be of interest to your audience, but you want to distinguish clearly between guesses and claims (for instance: "Thus we can document a mortality rate of 25% for the black death, but I would guess it was closer to 40%). Don't pretend to be an expert if you're not. Avoid uses of the first person that are overly bragging ("As I have shown . . .") or overly meek ("People have argued many things, but I think he's a hero"). Let your claims speak for themselves. Note well that rules on using the first person vary by discipline. In chemistry, I have heard you cannot use it at all. In math, you can use "we" but not "I." Learn the rules of your discipline on this.

Common Errors

Late modifers often cause sentence fragments. When sentences first say something simply and then go back to modify it, in spoken English there is often a significant pause in the middle, and some students mark this pause with a period -- wrongly. Usually, only a comma is required. Examples: "Godzilla was a lizard. A really big lizard." The second "sentence" is a fragment, and the two should be combined like this: "Godzilla was a lizard, a really big lizard." Here's a second example: "Beowulf was a hero. Although he faltered at the end." The second sentence is a fragment; this kind of afterthought needs to be attached to the main sentence like this: "Beowulf was a hero, although he did falter at the end."

Commas separating subject and verb. A single comma should not come between a subject and its verb. In the simplest sentences, this is obvious: "The dog, chased the cat." In more complex sentences, however, writers can do this by mistake. One way is by modifying a noun and not being sure whether to set off the description with a pair of commas or not. "The dog, who was a handsome dalmatian chased the cat." See that erroneous single comma between the subject and its verb. The sentence can be rewritten as either "The dog, who was a handsome dalmatian, chased the cat" or as "The dog who was a handsome dalmatian chased the cat." (There's actually a slight difference in meaning here: the first sentence with the pair of commas gives more information about the one dog in question: the second sentence with no commas specifies which dog among several possible candidates chased the cat). The longer and more detailed the description of the subject, the more tempting it will be to put a comma afterward -- but don't if you haven't gotten to the verb yet. A second way of falling into the mistake of separating a subject from its verb is to be careless when one subject does several actions, and you are deciding whether to repeat the subject. "I went to the store, and then I went home" or "I went to the store and then went home" are both correct -- but if you change your mind about which form you're going to use as you write, you get "I went to the store, and then went home," which is not. (The first sentence needs a comma because it repeats the subject "I"; the second has only one subject, and it needs to be connected to both verbs without a comma interfering).

Dangling modifiers. If you start the sentence with a descriptive participle (a verb form used as an adjective ending in -ing or ending in -ed), that description applies to the closest noun. It's possible to make comic errors if the modifier is cut off from its subject and left dangling: "Running down the street, buildings flashed by me" means that the buildings are running, not me.

Spellcheckers. Spellcheckers lull you into a sense of false security, and they're especially deadly for students studying medieval literature. I've gotten lots of King Author sitting on his thrown with his nights of the round table. (Even worse, one author who wrote about Arthur was named Malory, and spellcheckers keep trying to turn him into Mallory). There is no substitute for reading your paper. Do not trust some anonymous computer programmer to check your spelling and grammar.