by Chuck Guilford

Paradigm Online Writing Assistant

by Chuck Guilford
The same award-winning content that has made Paradigm an Internet classic is now available in this
quality paperback edition.
"[Paradigm] gives education in all facets of writing. While focused on the needs of students, [it] has
useful information for any writer who feels the need for improvement." — Tom Sneddon, merlot.org

This writer's guide and handbook accompanies the popular website, www.powa.org. It offers
strategies for mastering the writing process process, including help with discovering, organizing,
revising, and editing your writing. It also has chapters on thesis/support essays, informal essays,
exploratory essays and argumentative essays. In addition, the book offers a clear, concise discussion
of how to use MLA documentation.

About the Author

Chuck Guilford is an emeritus English professor at Boise State University,

where he taught literature and creative writing for 23 years and founded BSU’s Idaho Writers
Archive. He is the creator of two writing websites, Paradigm Online Writing
Assistant and poetryexpress.org.

His poems, short stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in a number of magazines and
anthologies, including Poetry, Kansas Quarterly, Coyote’s Journal, College English, Weber Studies,
Redneck Review of Literature, Crab Creek Review, Inland, and many other magazines and literary
journals. He is also a winner of the Western Literature Association's Willa Cather Memorial Award
(the Willa Pilla).What Counts, a chapbook collection of his poems, is available from Limberlost Press.
 We discover what to say by saying it, and in the process often surprise
ourselves with fresh insights and powerful language.

Start Writing
There is no single best way to begin a writing project. What's best is what gets you
going and builds momentum for the journey ahead. You may want to start right in on
a draft or do some pre-planning.
Often, simply Choosing a Subject can be a challenge. You could start Freewriting to
locate your subject and generate ideas. Or you might prefer to first gather
information from Outside Sources, or to brainstorm using The Journalists' Questions.
Whether you're writing an informal essay, a technical report, or the next great
American novel, the suggestions in Discovering What to Write will help you get going.

Write Strong Sentences

Effective sentences are vital to your writing. They are fundamental carriers and
shapers of meaning—the pulse of style. If you want to work on your sentences, try the
following Paradigm sections: Basic Sentence Concepts, Expanding the Basic
Pattern, Six Problem Areas, Designing Effective Sentences.
For help with punctuation, try Basic Punctuation.

Choosing Your Subject

Whether you have an assigned subject or choose your own, you need to get focused and
engaged with the project. Assigned subjects may look limiting at first, but they offer plenty of
room for individual expression. Open subjects, while promising great freedom, can be
daunting because they don't provide direction. They leave it all up to you. Yet these two
situations, different as they appear, present similar challenges.

To get started, don't worry about your subject--start writing. Let the process get
messy and complicated. Allow yourself freedom to make mistakes.

Either way, you must locate your center of interest, and find what you can say that your reader
will value. A good way to begin is to write. Worrying or "mulling things over" seldom works.
Worry increases anxiety, and ideas you don't write down get lost or forgotten. Writing gives
your thoughts substance and form, so you can return later and reshape or add to them.
To get started then, don't worry about your subject--start writing. Let the process get messy
and complicated. Allow yourself freedom to make mistakes. Or head off on a tangent.
Mistakes often turn into discoveries. A tangent can develop into a central focus. Try Free
writing or The Journalist's Questions. Experiment with the following activities. Get carried
away. Then pause. Look back over what you've written. Look for patterns, flashes of insight,
overriding concerns. Cut. Paste. Add. Move. You'll find that you're well on your way.
As you find a center of interest, you may want to narrow your subject's scope, to make it more
manageable and specific. For more information on sharpening and focusing a subject,
see Subject to Thesis.
Activities
1.1 Make a five to seven item list of writing possibilities. Include one or two "off-the-wall"
topics. For instance, if your assigned subject was the Civil War, you might list "strange army
hats" as an off-the-wall possibility and later decide it could make a good essay. If possible,
talk your list over with a partner or small group.
1.2 Take two items from the list you made for Activity 1.1 and divide the subjects into parts
on branching trees, as in the example below.

Hint: Just copy the table below to your word processor, delete the Civil War terms, and
replace them with your own.

Social

Rationale for

Economic

Acts of Reconstruction

For North

Impact

For South

1.3 Try cross-matching and combining possibilities from your branching trees. Phrase the
results as questions:
 How did the different social values of the South and the North account for the problems of
Reconstruction?
 What economic problems did the South experience as a result of the Reconstruction?
 How did economic changes caused by the Reconstruction affect social relationships in the South?

Generate as many questions as possible. Don't worry about whether your questions are
profound. Include a few off-the-wall questions if you want.

Freewriting
Talking with friends, we shape our thoughts freely and spontaneously as words rise to our
attention and find their way into conversation. We discover what to say by saying it, and in
the process often surprise ourselves with fresh insights and powerful language. Freewriting is
an attempt to capture that same verbal energy on paper. Freewriting means just what it says:
writing freely, without restrictions. When freewriting, you can write whatever you like
without regard to spelling, grammar, paragraphing, or whether it makes any sense.
Just let your thoughts wander, and follow the ones you like best. Let the others go and pick
them up later if you want. Relax and loosen the grip on your pen, enjoy feeling the ink flow,
shaping your letters, seeing your thoughts and feelings take shape on the page. Or turn off
your computer monitor so you can't see (and judge) what you're writing. If your mind slows
down, slow your writing speed. Then when thoughts come faster, pick up your pace. Try
getting your mind and fingers to work at the same speed, or let one go ahead and pull the
other along.
We discover what to say by saying it, and in the process often surprise ourselves with fresh
insights and powerful language.

The only thing you shouldn't do is stop. Then you aren't discovering, aren't writing. You may
feel a bit self-conscious at first. Most people do, but don't let that bother you. It's unavoidable.
Just keep writing, and you'll soon find what you want to say. As you do, keep following your
thoughts. Write them down as they come.
Later, you can look back over your freewriting and choose what to keep, change, or delete.
But don't reject your own thoughts before even writing them down, and as a result, lose ideas
that might prove valuable. For now, just relax and write.
Activities
1.4 Practice freewriting for fifteen minutes. You'll be amazed at how much you can write in
such a short time. Just start right in. Don't worry about not having anything to say. If that's
what you find yourself thinking, just write, "I don't have anything to say," and keep going
from there. As long as you keep your fingers moving, something will be drawn out of you.
One of the hardest things you can do is empty your mind of thoughts. Try it and you'll see.
You have the thoughts, just write them down. Don't hold them in. Let your mind go where it
will. Turn off your computer monitor. Try adjusting the flow of your thoughts to your writing
speed. You don't have to show this to anyone!
1.5 Practice focusing your freewrites. Write for twenty minutes about how you feel about
writing; whether you like it or not, whether you've had much experience, what you think you
need to work on most, what you'd like to write, or whatever else you want to say about
writing.
1.6 Try "looping" your freewriting. Look back over an earlier freewrite and find a sentence or
phrase that stands out for you. Write it down and use it as the starting point for a new
freewrite. Repeat the process.
Are you more of a planner or an improviser?
Examples allow readers to see, touch, hear, taste, and feel the actual stuff your thoughts
are made of.

Observing and Recording Details

When considering what to write, we often think first of ideas, but we'd do well to recall the
words of William Carlos Williams, "No ideas but in things." Williams wasn't knocking ideas,
just pointing out that they have roots in the concrete particulars of daily experience. Thoughts
grow from what we see, taste, smell, and feel: morning steam on a mountain lake, a
strawberry dipped in cream, or a crowd squeezing into the subway.
When we read a book, attend a concert, or simply visit with a friend, we perceive the world
through our senses. William Blake called the senses. "the doors of perception." By opening
or closing these "doors," we control the amounts and kinds of input we receive. In class, our
ears hear the teacher's words and tone of voice, the intonations and rhythms in her speech. At
the same time, our eyes see her changing facial expressions and fluttering hands, the way she
leans on the lectern, then paces from desk to window. These sensory details are all parts of the
class, and perceptive writers will note them.

William Blake called the senses "the doors of perception."

In fact, though, we aren't as aware of our environments as we might be. A college basketball
game, a lunch at the student union, even a quiet walk in the woods could overwhelm us with
stimuli if we don't limit what we take in.
Though ideas help us organize and sort this perceptual flow, we can't think about what we
aren't aware of. Sensory data is the raw material of writing. To extend your awareness of your
subject, take time to see, taste, hear, smell, and touch what you're writing about. Remove the
veil of habit and see the true subject of your writing-not ideas and opinions, but the thing
itself./p>
For instance, if you're writing a report showing why your office needs a new copy machine,
you could start by studying the present one. You could note its size and jot down the exact
dimensions. You could describe the worn rubber mat on the copy plate. You could point to
the glass plate itself, scratched and difficult to align papers on. You might also describe how
the copies look, tell how the paper is loaded and how often the machine jams, whether it
makes enlargements and reductions easily.
These details and a hundred others can provide your report's content. You don't have to think
them up or imagine them, just notice them and write them down clearly and accurately. This
habit of alertness and attention to detail is essential. The more you get involved with your
subject, the more you'll find to say about it.
Activities
1.7 Select an object you have with you now-a pen, a ring, a watch, a shoe, a book-and start
writing about it. If you have a favorite possession with you, that's fine, but what you pick isn't
important. Almost anything will do. Describe the object thoroughly. What is its shape, its
color, its texture? How long is it? Does it make a sound? Does it show signs of age? Does it
have any taste or odor? Concentrate on asking and answering questions about the item itself
rather than telling where you got it or how you feel about it.
Don't worry about grammar or mechanics; just get down a clear and complete a description.
Do notice, though, how much you can find to say about even the most trivial and unpromising
subject when you concentrate on observing and recording details.
1.8 Select a book-any book. Begin writing down as many actual details about it as you can.
What is its title? Who is its author? How many pages does it have? When was it published?
By whom? Does it have a preface? What are its major divisions? Its subdivisions? What color
is it? Just keep writing.
Don't give ideas or judgments about the book. Just give the facts. Write for about twenty
minutes. At the end, write a one sentence wrap-up statement to tie your observations together
and give a sense of completion. If you wish, use this sentence to offer an overall impression of
the book, based on the details you've observed and recorded.
To edit well, it helps to know the basics of grammar and mechanics, but
equally important are good editing practices.

The Journalists' Questions

Six questions traditionally asked by journalists — who? what? when? where? how? and
why? — can be valuable aids to invention in all types of writing. By using them as probes,
you'll look at your subject more closely, and as you do, you'll find pertinent things to say.

By using them as probes, you'll look at your subject more closely, and as you do,

you'll find pertinent things to say.

The six main questions can also be broken down into subtopics that offer more precise
guidance than the major questions. The questions and subtopics may be used in any order.
Use them if and when they can help you achieve your writing purpose.
Who
Like the other questions, this one's value depends upon the spirit in which you use it.
On the most superficial level, it might yield only a word or two: "this guy I know" or
`Aunt Ginny." But answering the question that way is almost like not answering it at
all. Getting beyond the surfaces of people-their names, labels, sizes-takes some time
and concentration, but adds vital information and force to your writing. The list
below contains only a few examples of the kinds of information you can provide
under the heading of "who."
Subtopics for Exploring the Question of Who

Physical Personality Personal Characteristic

 Attributes Traits History Possessions
weight sense of humor religious books
height temper educational home furnishings
bone structure friendliness medical athletic equipment
hair honesty economic collections
eyes generosity military pets
musculature leadership geographic home
coordination competitiveness family clothing
body language compassion professional records
complexion self-assurance ethnic automobile

This list isn't meant to be complete. Probably you've already thought of possibilities,
even entire categories, that could be included. You may also have seen that many
subtopics could be broken down further and discussed at length, "clothing," for
instance.
When you see this, you're starting to understand what it means to ask and answer the
question of "who."
What
The question of "what" can open up interesting avenues of exploration. A whole essay might
explore what happened, some event or incident you've chosen to tell about. You may want to
show what a family reunion or a Cesarean section or a Bar Mitzvah or an elk hunt is. By
seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, and feeling the events, people, and things in your essay,
your readers discover what the subject is, what it means for you, and what you want it to
mean for them.

Subtopics of What
What is its purpose?

What is its value?

What is its shape?

What are its limits?

What class of things does it belong to?

How is it similar to other members of its class?

How does it differ from other members of its class?

What are its parts?

Is it a part of a larger whole?

What is its color, weight, texture, sound, odor?

What is its history?

What are its causes?

What are its effects?

What is its duration?

What is its meaning?

What is its formal definition?

When
Everything happens in time, and the question of "when" locates events in time. On
the most superficial level, this could mean just giving a date and time: 2:59 p.m.,
Thursday, July 12, 1996. In most writing, however, such exact fixing of time isn't
necessary. "One rainy winter morning just before breakfast" may set the time nicely
for one piece, while "Easter Sunday when I was thirteen years old" might do the job
for another. When can also be used to show relationships in time, as when we say,
"Before stepping up to the ticket booth, I stretched a little to make myself look taller."
Like the other questions, "when" can be subdivided into subtopics that may help you
uncover further possibilities for exploration.

Subtopics of When
When did this happen?
How often does it happen?
When had it happened previously?
When will it happen again?
Why didn't it happen at some other time?
What conditions must be met in order for it to happen?
What happened before this?
What happened after this?
What else was happening at the same time?
How would this have been different if it had happened at some other time?
How is it similar to things that have happened at other times?
Was this good or a bad time for it to happen?
When was it first noticed and last observed?
What were the characteristics of the time?
How long did it last?

It's hard to imagine a paper that would use all or even most of these questions. Still,
this list should give you an idea of how the question of "when" can help you discover
what to say.

To edit well, it helps to know the basics of grammar and mechanics, but equally important
are good editing practices.
Where
Everything is somewhere, and describing that place serves two important functions.
First, it permits your readers to discover the sights, sounds, smells, the whole
physical environment. Descriptive detail enriches the environmental texture, making
it fuller and more vivid. The scene is rendered and invites readers to enter it
imaginatively.
Also, "where" can show how setting shapes events. How was the battle's outcome
affected by the fact that it took place in a steep-walled canyon with only one exit?
How was the family reunion influenced by its taking place for the first time at Uncle
Ted's house? Might the crawdaddies have turned out differently if you'd cooked them
at home in your own kitchen?

Subtopics of Where
What is the immediate location?
What is its size?
What is its shape?
What are its boundaries?
Of what larger area is it a part?
What does it resemble?
How do people perceive it?
What psychological or emotional associations does it have?
What is its history?
What are its dominant sights, smells, sounds?
How is the place influenced by the participants?
How do these events happen to be occurring in this place?

Use the question of "where" to orient your readers and help them know not only
where things are happening but what this place is like and why it is of importance.

Modern argumentation theory has roots in Greek and Roman thinking.

How
The question of "how" directs us toward method and procedure, toward process.
Readers might not understand the exact nature of the action or the various parts,
steps, and stages that constitute a process. An essay on a family vacation might tell
how the destination and modes of transportation were chosen, how the reservations
were made, how the trip was financed, how the car was packed, how seating
arrangements were made, or how the tiedowns holding the roof rack worked loose.
Or you might tell how you built a campfire, cleaned a fish, roasted corn, or packed
home your trash. The point is that "how" probes large and small actions to reveal
their inner dynamics.

Subtopics of How
What is the goal of this process?
How is success measured?
What is the importance of this process?
Is it primarily a natural or a mechanical process?
Is it primarily a mental or a physical process?
What experience or training is needed?
What preparations must be made?
What equipment is needed?
How does this equipment work?
What is the order of the steps or stages?
How important is this order?
How is each step performed?
What is the level of difficulty?
What is the importance of each step in relation to the whole?
What terminology must be understood
What are the characteristic pitfalls?
What does this process resemble?

As with the other questions, your thoroughness with this one will depend on your
readers' needs and interests as well as your purposes in writing. How much do your
readers want or need to know about the process of filling out an arrest report? How
much do you want them to know? How will their having or not having this
information affect the success of your writing? These are the kinds of questions you
need to keep in mind when you work with the question of "how."

Why
More than the other questions, "why" asks for reasons, conclusions, thoughts. It asks
you to analyze and explain the actions and events you're writing about. For this rea-
son, it's less important to ask why in personal narratives than in writing about ideas.
Some writers even say explanation and analysis should be avoided altogether, letting
readers draw their own conclusions from the concrete details presented.

Subtopics of Why
Why did this happen?
Why didn't something else happen?
How can we recognize a cause?
How many causes are there?
Which causes are more or less important?
Which are the direct causes?
Which are the indirect causes?
What are the surface motives?
What are the underlying motives?
Why were the motives expressed in this way?
What are the short-term objectives?
What are the long-term objectives?
Why was this method chosen to achieve the objectives?
Were the results intentional or accidental?
If accidental, what circumstances produced the accident?
Why wasn't the accident prevented prevented?
That is, writers should show rather than tell what happened and why. For instance, if
I show a customer slamming money on a counter and stomping out of a store, I
shouldn't have to explain that she did this because she was angry. Readers will draw
that conclusion themselves. The point's a good one. Besides being unnecessary, such
explanatory passages detract from the writing's vividness, substituting analysis for
drama.
This doesn't mean, though, that the question of "why" shouldn't be asked, only that it
should be asked carefully and that its answer will often be revealed implicitly through
showing rather than explicitly through direct telling.
Whether or not you make great use of the question of "why," you should be alert to its
possibilities. Like the other questions, it can help you develop a fuller understanding
of your subject, and the better you understand your subject, the better your chances
of writing well.
Activities
1.9 Look back over the questions you wrote for Activity 1.3. What use did you make
of the Journalists' Questions? Use the Journalists' Questions, and especially the
subtopics, to expand your list. Again, don't worry if your questions are profound or
important. Include some off-the-wall questions if you want. Add at least ten new
items.
1.10 Look over the list you generated in Activity 1.9. Try to find patterns, areas of
related interest, and arrange the questions in groups according to their common
concerns.
Use your writing process to learn and discover.

Dramatism
Developed by Kenneth Burke, and sometimes called the Pentad because of its five key
terms, Dramatism offers a simple yet effective way to generate ideas. It resembles the
Journalist's Questions and, like them, can be applied to many topics.
The Five Key Terms of Dramatism
Act: What is happening?

Agent: Who is doing it?

Agency: What method is being used?

Purpose: What is the goal, intent, objective?

Scene: Where and when is it happening?

These questions themselves are useful, but the true power of the Pentad comes when the key
terms are combined to construct what Burke calls "ratios." These ratios yield a second layer of
questions, often more interesting and penetrating than the first.
 These ratios yield a second layer of questions, often more interesting and
penetrating than the first.

Act Agent Agency Purpose Scene

Act X

Agent X

Agency X

Purpose

Scene X

The ratios of the Pentad can be used to create a master/subquestion pattern:

Purpose: What was the purpose of Reconstruction?

Act/Purpose: How did the Acts of Reconstruction relate to this purpose?

Agent/Purpose: Who determined that this was necessary?

Agency/Purpose: Was this an effective means of accomplishing the purpose?

Scene/Purpose: Why was this goal considered important for the South at that time?

Activity
1.11 Use the ratios of the Pentad to construct some master/subquestion combinations on a
subject you're interested in writing about.
Agency: ______________?

Agency/Purpose: ______________?

Agency/Act: ______________?

Agency/Scene: ______________?

Agency/Agent: ______________?

Try one from scratch:

_____: ______________?

_____ /_____ ______________?

_____ /_____ ______________?

_____ /_____ ______________?

_____ /_____ ______________?

Remember, when using the Pentad or any other discovery aid, that the purpose is to help you
open up and explore a subject. You want to find new insights and ideas. Don't let the
mechanics of the system bog you down. Use the methods as springboards for your
imagination.
Knowing your words can be changed later, you won't worry about writing the perfect first
draft.

Tagmemics
Another useful aid to discovering new perspectives is the Tagmemic method, developed by
Richard Young, Alton Becker, and Kenneth Pike. This discovery method uses six master
topics to break any subject down into component parts which can then be examined
individually or in combination to yield fresh approaches and new insights.
Contrast

The Tagmemic system uses six master topics to break any subject down into
component parts which can then be examined individually or in combination to
yield fresh approaches and new insights.

The topic of contrast considers how the subject resembles or differs from other members of
its class:
How does the electronics department at Rodbelle's Department Store resemble or differ from
that at Pay & Go?
Variation
The topic of variation looks at how much and in what ways the subject could change without
losing its essential nature:
How often and how much can Rodbelle's mark down electronics prices and cut back service
before it becomes a discount store?
Distribution
The topic of distribution asks how often and in what places the subject can be observed:
How often do major department stores have an electronics department?
Particle
The topic of particle identifies the distinct and defining features of the subject:
What are the distinctive features of Rodbelle's Electronics Department?
Wave
The topic of wave considers how the subject has changed over time:
How has electronics marketing changed over the past ten years?
Field
The topic of field considers the different parts of the subject and how they interact as parts of
a whole:
In what ways does customer service at Rodbelle's relate to sales and profits?
Activities

1.12 Pick a subject from the following list, or choose a subject of your own, and use the six
Tagmemic topics to generate a list of questions. Possible subjects: your local newspaper, a
familiar t.v. show, a restaurant chain, a type of music, an organization or club.
Contrast:
Variation:
Distribution:
Particle:
Wave:
Field:
1.13 Share your list of questions from Activity 1.12 with a partner. After comparing and
discussing your questions, select two questions and freewrite for fifteen minutes on each one.

Outside Sources
Unlike the other discovery techniques, which mostly call on your internal powers of
observation and imagination, this one emphasizes investigation and research. However vast
your store of information and however well you can express your ideas, you'll often need to
extend your knowledge by drawing on the experience and expertise of others.

However vast your store of information and however well you can express your
ideas, you'll often need to extend your knowledge by drawing on the experience
and expertise of others.

Think of this inquiry as a normal part of writing, not just something reserved for a "research
paper." The difference between a substantive exploratory essay and a research paper is one of
degree rather than of kind. The best research papers grow out of original ideas or intriguing
questions that you want to explore in depth, and the best essays show that you are well-
grounded in your subject. Whether your knowledge-gathering takes place mostly at the
library, in the field, or on the web, it's good to prepare ahead.

At the Library
If you aren't familiar with your library's resources, call in advance, explain your
purpose, and ask for a tour. Even if you know the library pretty well, go to the
Reference Room and introduce yourself. Describe your project and ask if they have
resources you might not be aware of. Ask experts you've interviewed (including
professors) where they get their information and follow the trail.
When you find a good source, check it out or photocopy it. If you photocopy it, be
sure to copy the publication information (date, volume number, etc.) so you can
document the source later. (See Documenting Your Sources.) If the book or article
you've found contains a Bibliography or Works Cited, use it. Find and read the works
listed there. Stay on the information trail.
Activity
8.4 Use the library to locate as much information as possible on one of the following
topics, or use a subject you're currently interested in writing about. When you're
finished, write up a short report telling how the experience went: what you wanted to
learn, what difficulties you experienced, what you did learn, and how the information
might be useful. Possible subjects: nuclear submarines, Charles Mingus, the great
vowel shift, passenger pigeons, biodiesel fuel, Florence Nightingale.

In The Field
Along with visits to the library, make time for direct investigation in the field. Don't
hesitate to get involved by visiting important sites, interviewing people, and
surveying opinion.
Direct Observation
Though not all subjects lend themselves to direct observation, many do. If you're
writing about competition in co-ed in junior high school physical education classes,
for instance, you might arrange to visit a few such classes. Watch, listen, take notes
on your observations. Perhaps use a handheld recorder. You might want to attend a
few such classes at different grade levels and at different schools. Then you could visit
some all-boys' or all-girls' classes for comparison. Then when you've finished, spend
some time writing reflectively on what you noticed.
Of course, you'll need to talk to the teacher beforehand to get permission and discuss
how you can observe without interfering. But this could be a good time to ask the
teacher for an interview. Maybe you could also interview a few students to get their
perspectives on coed physical education.

 More suggestions on Observing and Recording Details

Interviews
Your younger sister might be an expert on video games. Your father might be an
expert on baking bread. A real estate agent could give you information on recent
trends in home prices. A horse breeder could describe modern branding techniques.
A stock broker could explain margin buying. Experts are all around us--in all ages,
genders, and races--and most will be eager to share their knowledge if you approach
them courteously and with a genuine display of interest.
Before interviewing an expert, however, you should prepare by clarifying what you're
looking for. Do some preliminary exploration of your subject with freewriting,
the journalists' questions, and the other probing techniques. Focus your concerns
into master questions and sub-questions. Compile a list of topics you want to cover.
Make an appointment, and tell the expert that you need the information for a writing
project. Ask if you may tape the interview. Make clear that you'll give the expert credit
in the final essay. Offer to give the expert a copy. In short, be serious and professional
in your approach. If you are, you'll be amazed at how much information you can
gather.
You might also consider giving a written interview, a short list of pertinent questions
to which the interviewee can respond briefly in writing. Somewhere between a
traditional interview and a survey, a written interview assures that you get exact
quotes and can even be conducted by email.
Activity
8.5 Locate an expert on one of the following subjects, or use a subject you're currently
interested in writing about, and set up an interview. Before going, do some homework
on the subject and arrive with a list of questions.
Afterward, write up a short report telling how the experience went: what you wanted
to learn, what difficulties you experienced, what you did learn, and how the
information might be useful. Possible subjects: homeopathic medicine, self-defense,
home insulation, co-dependency, credit ratings, impressionist painting.
Surveys
Like written interviews, surveys ask people to put their ideas in writing, but surveys
are distributed to groups and are generally more highly structured. Surveys look for
patterned responses in order to gauge public opinion.
Making up, administering, and tabulating a survey can be quite rewarding. To return
to the Physical Education example, you could survey all P.E. teachers in a school
system, all students in all classes you observe. Then you could compare the students'
responses with the teachers'. Or you could compare responses from the coed classes
with responses from the all boys' and all girls' classes.
Again, you would want to clear this with the teacher. The two of you might go over the
questions beforehand to help refine and structure your list.

On The Web
These days it's easy to forget that the Internet and the World Wide Web began as
academic research networks. But they did, and today the Internet's potential as a
research tool is even more apparent. On listservs and in newsgroups, scholars
informally discuss the most recent developments in their fields. Private research
centers and government agencies accept grant applications, conduct peer reviews,
and publish papers online. By conducting a few effective searches you should be able
to turn up several excellent sources on almost any topic.
But the Internet also has a lot of what scholars call "noise"--unreliable, misleading
information that interferes with the research effort, like static disturbing a radio
station. Besides locating sources, then, it's also important to evaluate those sources
for quality of information and for relevance to your topic.
Effective Searching

To get the most from Internet research, you need to "cast a wide net." The resources
listed below are only a few of the excellent search engines available on the Web.
Experiment with a few different ones. Even if you have a favorite, trying some new
search engines, and practicing with your query language (read each site's
instructions) will help you get a wide ranging search with relevant results, sorted to
your needs.
AltaVista is almost always ranked highly for thoroughness and for allowing carefully
worded queries, but is sometimes considered difficult to use.
HighBeam searches for magazine and newspaper articles on topics of your choice.
These can be organized and arranged in folders for future reference. It is a
subscription site with limited free fea tures and a free trial of all features.
HotBot is a powerful and highly regarded search engine associat ed with Lycos. It
organizes responses into categories of relevance.
Google has become a favorite first choice for most web users. It is noted for sorting
and ranking results well to match a user's inter ests. Its clean, simple interface may be
welcome if you're feeling overwhelmed by possibilities, but Google is not good at
allowing complex queries.
Metasearch allows you to query several search engines at once. The results are well
sorted, and precise queries are possible.
Yahoo! contains vast categories of sites arranged hierarchically. Besides browsing the
listings, you can search them, but the search will not be as extensive as some others.
Northern Light organizes your results into folders to help you find categories of
response. It has a vast database and takes a spe cial interest in academic research.
About.com is a solid, well-organized resource that emphasizes education and
organizes sites into categories like Yahoo! Because the categories are maintained by
people rather than web bots, About.com covers less of the web than the big search
engines, but makes up for that by being high on quality.

Sorting and Sifting

While a good search engine may return hundreds of sites, only a few of those may
prove useful. Explore all possibilities to turn up what you can. Then sort, prioritize,
evaluate.
Many sites will be rejected as low quality or not relevant to your topic. Bookmark
other sites of interest for future reference. Pick a few of the highest quality, most
relevant sites to explore in depth.
How current is the site? Check to see when the site was last updated. Many sites will
have this information displayed in either a header or a footer on each page. Bad links,
sloppy grammar and mechanics, and poor navigation features are other signs that a
site isn't up to the standard of professionalism that you want from your sources.
Compare the quality of the site's information, design, and writing with other sites
you've visited.
Who sponsors the site? Is the site sponsored by a governmental agency or by a
university? If so, it may have more surface credibility than a site published by an
advocacy group or by an individual. The Center for Disease Control or The Johns
Hopkins Medical School, for instance, would be good places to look for information
on Multiple Sclerosis. But what about a small personal website detailing one person's
struggle with the disease? That could be valuable, too, depending on how you intend
to use the information.
Who created the site, and why? Is the author identified? Look for an "About" page to
learn who created the site and why. Check the author's credentials. Do you see any
advanced degrees or publications or professional affiliations?
It's a kind of writing that helps us learn who we are as people, helps us define our values
and clarify our vision.

Modern argumentation theory has roots in Greek and Roman thinking.

Use your writing process to learn and discover.

Knowing your words can be changed later, you won't worry about writing the perfect first
draft.
A Final Note
These discovery strategies are all useful, but not equally so for all people or projects.

The key is to be open and flexible.

If Freewriting works, stick with it. If you like Dramatism or Tagmemics, practice that
strategy until it becomes reflexive and automatic.
If one discovery method doesn't produce, try another. Trust your hunches and
feelings. The key is to be open and flexible.

In Search of Form
Everything has a form. In writing, the goal is to find a form that suits your material and
purpose. You may sense a clear pattern emerging early in your writing process, or you may
try out a few promising designs.

Sensing how your emerging ideas fit into an overall design, you can move
forward more confidently than if you had to keep spinning out words with no
sense of where they might lead.

Either way, strong organization helps you and your reader. It offers you guidance and
direction as you explore your ideas. Sensing how your emerging ideas fit into an overall
design, you can move forward more confidently than if you had to keep spinning out words
with no sense of where they might lead. Also, effective organization helps readers see how
various parts of your paper relate to each other and to your unifying purpose.
If readers sense that you're in control, that you know where you're going and how you'll get
there, they'll more likely come along than if you appear to lack direction and purpose.
The following discussion shows the general concepts that underlie most organizational
techniques and looks at some specific patterns you can use in your own writing. Notice, also,
that the Paradigm sections on Informal Essays, Thesis/Support Essays, Exploratory Essays,
and Argumentative Essays contain advice on organization.

Planning, Freewheeling, Adjusting

Some writers are heavy planners. They like to begin with an outline or at least a detailed
understanding of where the writing will go and how it will get there. Others prefer to
improvise, to follow their impulses and inspirations.

Most successful writers come to see that both planning and freewheeling are
important, that even outlines don't just spring into being without some inspiration
and improvisation.

Most successful writers come to see that both planning and freewheeling are important, that
even outlines don't just spring into being without some inspiration and improvisation. And
even the most original and expansive ideas eventually need to be shaped, evaluated, and
prioritized.
As you organize your writing, then, think about your composing style. Are you more of a
planner or an improviser? If you're a planner, try staying open to new possibilities that appear
while you're writing. If you're a freewheeler, you might pause now and then to look at the big
picture, to consider how the words you've just written could fit into an overall pattern.
Examples allow readers to see, touch, hear, taste, and feel the actual stuff your thoughts
are made of.

The Whole and Its Parts

Effective organization requires you to see your subject as a whole and as a system of
interrelated parts. As you move from a broad overview to a look at an individual detail, you
need to see, and let your reader see, how the two levels are related. Consider, for instance, a
deck of playing cards. Fresh out of the box and wrapped in cellophane, it seems to be one
single thing. Strewn randomly about the floor, each card is individual, complete, yet part of a
larger system. And of course each card has parts—a front and a back, markings for suit and
number.

As you move from a broad overview to a close-up look at an individual detail,

you need to see, and let your reader see, how the two levels are related.

To get a feel for the process of organization, imagine organizing a deck of cards. If you begin
with a holistic view, seeing the deck as one thing, your task is to divide that whole into
meaningful groups. You might divide it first by color, into red and black, then divide the red
suits into diamonds and hearts, and so forth. If you begin with an atomistic view, seeing the
deck as fifty two separate components, you need to gather those components into meaningful
categories. You might put all the aces in one pile, all the queens in another, and so forth.
The point is that there's no single best way to organize the deck, but any good way of
organizing the deck will connect the individual components (every single card) with a unified
vision (the deck as a whole) according to some system that has meaning and value for the
people involved. Bridge players might organize the cards one way, poker players another.
Activity
2.1 Select one of the lists below and organize its individual items into categories. In the table
that follows, or a similar one that you make, label your categories and copy the individual
items into their appropriate spots. The table provides for four categories, but you don't need to
have that many.
List 1: onion, pork chop, apple, hamburger, banana, carrot, green bean, peach, chicken breast,
potato, plum, hot dog
List 2: Hoe, rake, spoon, rototiller, socket wrench, screwdriver, blender, fork, hammer,
spatula, power drill
List 3: Chicago, IL; New York, NY, Olympia, WA; Detroit, MI; Miami, FL; Portland, OR;
Springfield, IL; Sacramento, CA; Lansing, MI; Seattle, WA; Albany, NY, Los Angeles, CA;
Category I Category 2 Category 3 Category 4
Items: Items: Items: Items:

Analysis and Synthesis

Analysis refers to dividing a whole into parts. Synthesis refers to the process of constructing a
whole from an assortment of pieces.

Look at the big picture, look also at the individual pieces, and find a clear,
systematic way of connecting them.

We've been considering a deck of cards, but the same principles apply almost everywhere.
Imagine an eyeball, for instance. Do you see it first as a whole that fits into a larger system, or
do you see it first as a cornea, a retina, an iris? Neither way of seeing it is better, and both
ways are important.
Consider whether you're breaking a whole into parts or constructing a unified vision from
individual components. Look at the big picture, look also at the individual pieces, and find a
clear, systematic way of connecting them.
Activities
2.2 Pick one of the following subjects (or choose one of your own), and begin to analyze it by
dividing it into parts: restaurants, teachers, automobiles, music, movies, politicians, dogs.
Construct at least two levels to your division.
Example:
Advantages

--Mongrel

Disadvantages

--Dogs

Advantages

-- Pedigreed

Disadvantages

2.3 Pick one of the following lists (or make a list of your own) and synthesize it into a single
holistic concept. Again, try to construct at least two levels to your system
A. dolphin, carp, whale, salmon, elk, wolf, bear, bird, butterfly, wasp
B. lake, bathtub, river, ocean, creek, sea, swimming pool, fishtank, pond, hot tub
C. pencil, book, computer, pen, keyboard, floppy disk, monitor, notebook, typewriter
D. walking, flying, bicycling, hitchhiking, jogging, driving, crawling
E. shirt, pants, jacket, necklace, necktie, skirt, sweater, sock, shoe, blouse,
Example:
 walking

crawling --not mechanically aided

jogging

--ways to travel

bicycling

hitchhiking --mechanically aided

driving

flying

2.4 Look at a piece of writing that you want to organize better. See it as a whole. See it as a
system of parts. Identify some essential divisions and categories. Write a short paragraph
telling why these divisions are important and how they relate to your overall purpose in
writing.

Pyramid Power
Many organizational patterns, especially outlines, are built on a hierarchical structure that
classifies ideas and facts according to their level of generalization. At the top level is the
thesis. Below this are the major conceptual divisions, each of which may be further divided
along paragraph lines. This is the essential pattern of the Thesis/Support Essay, which takes
the pyramidal structure through four levels (thesis, topic sentence, support sentence, detail).

This is the essential pattern of the Thesis/Support Essay, which takes the
pyramidal structure through four levels (thesis, topic sentence, support
sentence, detail).

This type of organization is not restricted to writing, however. Because organizational

pyramids can be expanded through many levels, pyramidal hierarchies are used to order
corporations and government agencies. For instance, you can probably imagine an
organization chart depicting the structure of a small business. At the top might come the
owner, below that the sales manager, the finance manager, and the production manager. The
pyramid could then be extended through as many levels as necessary until all employees were
ordered and ranked.
If you're trying to systematically organize a complex body of information, you may want to
use a pyramid structure:
To create such a pyramid chart, determine the central, controlling principles. Then identify the
major divisions, and continue the process of dividing and ranking through as many levels as
necessary.
Activity
2.5 Think of an organization you belong to, a business you've worked for, or a government
agency that you're familiar with. Now make a pyramid chart showing the organizational
structure.

Webs and Networks

Like pyramids, webs and networks organize ideas into meaningful clusters and
identify how the clusters are related. Here, however, the design tends to be more
freeform and open-ended, with less rigid ranking and with numerous cross links
among categories.
This sort of organization, often called mind mapping or cognitive mapping, is
especially useful in hypertext and other forms of electronic writing, but is also helpful
in planning and organizing writing that will appear on paper:
Making a mind map is a largely intuitive process. Writers identify meaningful chunks
(or "nodes") of information, label the chunks, and draw lines (or "links") to show how
the chunks are connected as parts of a unified system ("web"). If you want to try a
free online aid to mind mapping, visit bubbl.us. It's fast and fun, but not necessary.
Pencil and paper work great, too.
Activity
2.6 Using a topic you've already generated or a new one that you're interested in
writing about, make a mind map. Do it quickly, using bubbl.us or pencil and paper.
Share and compare your mind map with a partner.

Planning for Paragraphs

A paragraph is a visual cue for readers. The indentation at the beginning, like the capital letter
at the start of a sentence, signals your reader that a new thought unit is about to begin. Just as
sentences gather words and phrases into units of meaning, these sentences are gathered into
paragraphs. The paragraphs, in turn, may be gathered into major subdivisions.
Therefore, it's good to give some thought to paragraphing as you consider overall
organizational design. Let your paragraph divisions point up your organization.

Let your paragraph divisions point up your organization.

How Many?
Since paragraphs help readers see important thought units, a general guideline would be to
start a new paragraph whenever you begin writing about a new organizational topic. But this
won't always work. In practice, you may find that two or three minor points can be treated in a
single paragraph, or you may discover that what at first looked like a single sub point is
growing so big that it needs to be broken up.
Even so, if you remember that paragraphs cue your readers to important thought units below
the level of your lowest subheading, yet above the level of the sentence, you'll have a good
basis for deciding how many paragraphs you need.
How Long?
Because paragraphs are visual groupings, you also need to consider what your reader will
actually see on the page. Longer paragraphs slow the tempo, asking readers to bear down and
concentrate while a complex issue is discussed. A series of short paragraphs picks up the
tempo and invites readers to browse or skim lightly.
A single, unbroken page of text appears under-differentiated. Readers may wonder what the
point is and why they can't find it. A whole page of single sentence paragraphs appears over-
differentiated. Here, too, readers may wonder what the point is and why they can't find it.
So, what is your font size? Are you double spacing? In a standard format of double-spaced
Courier 10, you should get about 250 words per page. This means you might want your
average paragraphs to run about 175 words. Longer paragraphs will give a feel of
thoroughness and complexity but may bog readers down. Shorter paragraphs will move
briskly but may fragment your readers' perceptions. You may want to vary your paragraph
length. Use long paragraphs to explore and develop ideas and shorter ones to summarize or
make transitions.
You may want to vary your paragraph length. Use long paragraphs to explore and develop
ideas and shorter ones to summarize or make transitions.
Briefly, there's no set rule for how long a paragraph should be. Consider your important
divisions. Consider how the paragraph will look on the page. Consider your reader and your
purpose in writing. Make the best decision you can. If you need suggestions for fully
developing your paragraphs, check Thesis/Support Essays.
Activity
2.7 Choose a sequence of four or five paragraphs from a textbook and another sequence from
a popular magazine. Study the paragraphing in each; consider the writing's audience and
purpose as well as its subject and format. Then write your own paragraph explaining the
similarities and differences you see in the paragraphing.

Arranging and Ordering

Unlike pyramid charts and cluster maps, which can show complex organizational
relationships in a single glance, your writing itself is sequential. Readers don't encounter your
ideas all at once but one after another.

Readers don't encounter your ideas all at once, but one after another.

Keeping this in mind, you need to consider how best to order your discussion and how to
provide signposts that help readers locate themselves and see where they're headed.
Create Expectations
Often this involves little more than forecasting or predicting where the discussion will go. If
you tell readers that you'll cover four points, they'll expect you to do so, and to cover those
points in the order you list them. If you honor your commitment by satisfying these
expectations, readers will perceive your writing to be organized.
You can forecast on the level of the essay as a whole or on the sentence and paragraph levels.
Doing so not only helps readers see where you're headed, it can help set you up as a writer, so
you know where you're headed and how close you are to your destination.
In fact, you may find it helpful to think of yourself as a tour guide telling readers what they
can expect to encounter both on the trip as a whole and at each stop along the way
Consider a Strategy of Disclosure
You may not always want to give away your whole plan at the beginning. You may want
readers to feel some suspense and anticipation about where the discussion is heading. If so,
you may want to hint at what lies ahead but to withhold some details, enticing readers to keep
moving forward in order to have their curiosity satisfied.
Such an approach can be quite effective, partly because it piques reader interest, but also
because it forces you to carefully consider possible reader response. If you give away too
much, you'll break the suspense. If you give away too little, readers may lose the thread you
want them to follow.
You need to ask yourself how much information and what kind of information your readers
need to have at each step of the discussion. In the end, readers should feel that their
expectations have been satisfied.
Showing the Links
Even though you've organized everything carefully, your paper may still feel somewhat
choppy and disjointed. All the pieces are in place, yet the writing lacks fluidity, rhythm,
continuity. The methods used to achieve this fluid quality are called transitional devices.
These techniques will help you emphasize the links between levels on a pyramid or between
chunks on a cluster map.
Some useful transitional devices are given below. Get to know them, and more importantly,
learn how to use them in your own writing.

These techniques will help you emphasize the links between levels on a pyramid
or between chunks on a cluster map.

Transitional Expressions
These words and phrases act as signposts for readers, telling which direction the writing is
about to move in. They usually come at the beginning of a sentence, where they show how a
new thought relates to what has come before. Some common transitional expressions are
listed below, according to the type of relationship they indicate.
contrast and qualification--on the contrary, however, in contrast, still, yet, nevertheless, on
the other hand
continuity--besides, furthermore, in addition, also, secondly, to continue, next, similarly,
likewise, moreover, indeed, again, in other words
cause/effect--thus, therefore, as a result, consequently, hence, for this reason
exemplification--for instance, for example, in fact, more specifically, to illustrate
summation--finally, in conclusion, to sum up, in brief, lastly, as we have seen
Pronoun Reference
Pronouns stand in place of other words that have already been used. This makes them useful
as transitional devices. They look back at and connect with what has come before, and in
doing so they help readers see connections between thoughts.
The paragraph below uses pronouns as transitional devices:
Pronouns stand in place of other words that have been used. This characteristic makes them
very useful as transitional devices. They look back at and connect with what has come before,
and in doing so they help readers see connections between thoughts.
Notice the word "this" in the second sentence. It combines with "characteristic" and refers
back to "stand in place of other words," thereby working much like a pronoun to provide a
sense of continuity. "This," "that," "these," and "those" are called demonstratives and can be
effective transitional devices. Be careful, though, to make the demonstrative's reference clear.
Key Words and Synonyms
Key words are words that refer to your central ideas. Often they appear in the subject or the
verb slot of the main clause. Repeating these essential terms not only keeps them at the
forefront of your readers' attention, but also helps stitch your sentences together, providing
coherence and continuity between thoughts. When a key term begins to feel over used,
substitute a synonym. Then, after using the synonym a few times, come back to the key word.
Careless, unconscious repetition is, of course, almost always weak and should be avoided, but
deliberate, purposeful repetition is often an effective writing technique.
Sentence Patterns
Like key words, individual sentence patterns can be echoed and repeated from one place to
another. Doing so helps to establish a rhythmic style, and if the repetitions accentuate
organizational levels, readers will have an enhanced sense of order and design. As with key
words, repeated sentence patterns also need to be varied now and then. Doing so adds interest
and helps prevent monotony.
Activity
2.8 Choose a sequence of four or five paragraphs from a textbook and another from a popular
magazine. Study the transitional devices in each and then write a paragraph of your own
explaining the similarities and differences. Consider the writing's audience and purpose as
well as its subject and format.

Revising
The Writer's Voice
Style refers to the ways in which we consciously or unconsciously reveal ourselves in our
writing, and it should be tailored to the specific situation that prompts the writing.

Being yourself, being natural and authentic, doesn't mean being inflexible and
one dimensional; it means having the confidence to respond authentically to the
variety of situations that comprise your life.

These two statements seem contradictory, the first suggesting that each of us has a unique,
individual voice that comes across in all our writing and the second that, chameleon-like, we
should change our style to get what we want or to impress a reader. One way to resolve this is
to see style as an activity, a way of relating yourself to and distinguishing yourself from
others.
Thus, while you always behave in ways that are characteristically and uniquely your own, you
understand that building successful relationships with other people demands sensitivity and
responsiveness to their needs and interests. A sprinkling of profanity might be just the thing in
a letter to an old Marine Corps buddy, but chances are you'd leave it out of a letter to your
grandmother. When you go out to play touch football, you throw on your faded sweatpants
and your old high-school football jersey. Later, when you eat at a nice restaurant, you put on
your best Western shirt, your tooled leather belt with the silver buckle, and your lizard skin
boots.
Being yourself, being natural and authentic, doesn't mean being inflexible and one-
dimensional; it means having the confidence to respond authentically to the variety of
situations that comprise your life.
A Reminder
Style in writing, as in other areas of life, is a highly personal matter. Different people have
different ways of expressing themselves, and any individual may have several ways,
depending on the situation. The more you grow as a writer, the more confidence you'll gain in
your ability to respond readily, naturally, and effectively to the many different writing
situations that you encounter.
Such confidence, however, can't be gained entirely from reading. True, you can learn the
dynamics of various writing situations, develop your awareness of how slang or technical
jargon affects certain readers, and become more aware of different ways to state and structure
your thoughts. Such knowledge is vital to developing an effective style. But more important
than abstract knowledge is the actual experience of writing. In the act of writing, and
especially in sharing your writing and receiving a response, you develop a sensitivity to style,
especially your own style, that no textbook can give.
In the act of writing, and especially in sharing your writing and receiving a response, you
develop a sensitivity to style, especially your own style, that no textbook can give.
Activities
3.2 The adjectives in List I could be used to describe various aspects of a person's style. List
II contains brief descriptions of three different writing situations. Which qualities from List I
might you try to incorporate in your style for each situation in List II? Some terms may be
appropriate to more than one situation, while others may be totally inappropriate. You may
think of a few terms that don't appear in List I but seem appropriate for one of the writing
situations. If so, jot them down.
List I
Clever, sophisticated, grateful, confident, eager, dismayed, plain, frank, dignified, relaxed,
furious, amused, worried, abrupt, cute, powerful, intelligent, sarcastic, concerned, playful,
sincere, zany, friendly, distant, submissive, aloof, formal, informal, carefully considered,
spontaneous, exaggerated, understated, witty.
List II
a. Your water was shut off by the city while you were on vacation. You spent a whole day
trying to call them, but all you got was a recording. Your payment was two weeks overdue but
is now in the mail. You have never paid late before. The neighbor was unable to water your
lawn or garden. You are writing to the director of the city water and sewage department.
b. You have four weeks left in the term. You have just learned that you have mononucleosis
and will be unable to attend classes for the remainder of the term. You have told your
professors. They have all been very understanding, giving you your assignments and
generally going out of their way to help you finish the courses on schedule, all except your
German professor. She says there is very little chance of your passing. She wants you to drop
the course and take it again because so much of the grade is based on class participation and
recitation. Unfortunately, you need this course so that you can get into German II next term.
As nearly as you can figure, your grade is about a B-. You are writing to your teacher.
c. You've just returned home from an exciting week as a guest at a close friend's cabin in the
mountains. Your friend was not there. You caught plenty of fish. You explored some of the
local attractions. You met a few of your friend's neighbors. You put a hole in the bottom of
your friend's canoe. You had the hole fixed. It looks pretty good but not quite perfect. You
were thrown out of the canoe when it hit some rocks in a fast part of the river. You were
bruised but not seriously injured. You are writing to your friend.
3.3 Write a letter responding to a situation from List II in the previous activity. Use your
imagination to fill in the details. When you've finished, share and compare your letter with
those your partner has done on the same topic. Discuss the similarities and differences in your
responses. What do these similarities and differences reveal about your perceptions of the
situation? What do they reveal about you as writers?
Global and Local Perspectives
Revision means "re-seeing." Strong revisers develop a "critical zoom lens" that allows them to
shift perspective from broad overview to minute detail, and to see how these levels of
composition relate. To revise well, then, you must become a perceptive and imaginative
reader of your own work, a reader who can anticipate another reader's response and see new
ways the writing might evolve.
Knowing you'll revise, you can relax and speak your mind early in your writing process.
Because your words can be changed later, you won't worry about writing the perfect first
draft.

Since your words can be changed later, you won't worry about writing the
perfect first draft.

That's one important difference between writing and speaking. When you speak, you get only
one chance. Whatever you say, appropriate or not, has been said. Maybe that's why we have
the sayings, "Think before you speak," and "Make sure brain is in gear before engaging
tongue." If you write something inappropriate, however, you can change it, or even tear it up
and throw it away. With writing you get a second chance, or a third or a fourth. And each time
you revise, you find new potential in the evolving text.
Too often, inexperienced writers don't see this potential. They are too careful and self-critical
at the start of a project and too easily satisfied toward the end. Having agonized through a first
draft, they quickly check for grammar and mechanics and consider themselves done.
More experienced writers usually do just the reverse. Early on, they work at discovering what
to say, getting their ideas out onto disk or paper. They write quickly, accepting chance
discoveries, trusting hunches and gut-feelings, willingly making mistakes. Gradually, though,
they feel a need to look back over their work, to ask whether it makes sense, how their readers
will respond. Thus begins the process of revision.
Spotting grammatical and mechanical problems is only a minor concern here. Much more
important is the need to see the big picture, the overall effect. Consider the structure, the level
of complexity. Then focus in on individual sentences and words. Read for fluency and
precision. Step back and imagine you're another person coming to this piece for the first time:

 Is the style authentic and engaging?

 Does the writing have a clear sense of purpose?
 Could the major divisions and sub points be presented in a better order? Are sentences fluent,
tight, and well-constructed?
 Is the language precise and appropriate to the writing context?

Revising well means asking and answering such questions about your own writing. It requires
keeping an open mind about your work and going back over it again and again, until you get it
just right.

Developing Your Style

Everyone has an individual style, not only professional writers. We all—the Hell's Angel in
denim and leathers, the banker in pinstripes and bifocals—reveal our personalities and values
in our appearance, in our possessions, and in our language.
Do you have a sense of humor? Is it biting and sarcastic or lighthearted and jolly? Are you
direct and blunt? Or do you like to hint and suggest what's on your mind? Do you get
emotionally involved or stay coolly detached? Are you casual or formal? Confident or
insecure? What part of the country do you come from? How much education do you have? By
studying a few pages of your writing, a perceptive reader should be able to form a fairly
accurate impression of you as a person. Style refers to the way you, the person behind the
writing, come across to your readers; more precisely, it refers to the elements of your writing
that mark it as being uniquely yours.

Stylistic awareness helps you gauge the impression your words will make on
others.

If you think about it, you'll probably find that sometimes when reading you've had strong
feelings about the personality behind the writing. Letters from friends or relatives, for
instance, are often valued less for their news (Uncle Henry got a new toupee, or your little
sister lost her second tooth)than for the individual voice that comes across, the familiar
expressions and ways of thinking, the tone of friendliness and caring. Or maybe you know a
qualified person who was passed over for a job interview because the selection committee
thought the candidate's letter of application sounded "too arrogant and condescending" or "too
desperate and insecure."
Such impressions are often subliminal. That is, we may not be fully aware of our feelings, and
we might not be able to say exactly what features of the language are responsible. Style is
subtle, perhaps more so in writing than in other areas of life. Still, developing your individual
writing style is essential, not just because style is an expression of your self, but because
stylistic awareness helps you gauge the impression your words will make on others.

The Writing Context

Few people enjoy writing so much that they do it just for fun. Sometimes an impulse or
insight may inspire us to sit down and write "just for the heck of it," without any sense of
readers or purpose. Poems and journals often start like that. If you've kept a journal, you know
such writing can be enjoyable and worthwhile. You can explore your experience and sift it for
meaning. Yet even such expressive writing springs from a real life context that elicits
language. All writing is situation bound. It's a response prompted by various needs, desires,
and demands from both inside and outside.
The better you understand the circumstances that prompt you to write, the better you can
respond, adjusting your style to suit the specific context. The following figure may help you
envision the writing context:
When you write, you may first look at the context from your own viewpoint. As you size up
the situation, you begin to ask: Who is my reader? What purpose do I hope to achieve? What
should I say in order to achieve my purpose?

The better you understand the circumstances that prompt you to write, the better
you can respond, adjusting your style to suit the specific context.

You may note that your reader will be looking at the context from a different viewpoint. A
reader might ask: What sort of person wrote this? What does the writer hope to accomplish?
How has the content been shaped by the writer's experience and motives?
Responding well to the writing context requires seeing from multiple viewpoints, and seeing
how these viewpoints interrelate. New questions appear: What sort of person will my reader
perceive me to be? Will my reader understand and sympathize with my purpose in writing?
What kinds and amounts of information does my reader require? How should I present this
information in order to achieve my purpose? Consider the following example:
Writer: A college freshman away from home and working part-time at a fast-food restaurant
to pay her expenses, a serious student majoring in pre-medicine but getting mentally and
emotionally exhausted from the various pressures in her life.
Reader: Her parents, but especially her father who, she knows, will make the final decision
after talking the issue out with her mother. Her father is a successful banker, generally loving
and supportive but a bit old-fashioned in that he wants the daughter to get the kind of
education that would fit her for a more conventional "woman's role" in society, maybe dental
hygiene or nursing since she is interested in medicine. Her mother almost always remains
subordinate to the father, but exerts a great deal of influence on the father and has at least
hinted that she supports the girl's desire to become a doctor.
Purpose: To persuade her father to temporarily increase his level of financial support by a
hundred dollars a month so that she can quit her job and concentrate more on her studies.
This is a tricky situation, but no more so than many others, once you analyze them closely.
Thinking about the three points of our triangle, the girl begins to make decisions about the
content of her message, what she wants to say and how she wants to say it. She wonders how
to phrase the actual request for money and whether it should begin or end the letter. She wants
to be sure to tell her parents the restaurant requires her to work every Thursday evening and
she usually has an Organic Chemistry quiz on Friday morning. She wants to sound respectful,
mature, and serious-not desperate or insistent. Very importantly, she wants to tell them that
whatever they decide, she'll understand that they believe it to be in her best interest. She
wonders whether she should speak of the money as a loan and offer to repay it the following
summer. Finally, though, she decides against this, choosing to save it for a follow-up request
if necessary.
You might be thinking you'd have approached the situation differently, omitting certain points
and including others. If so, you're getting the idea of what it means to size-up the writing
context.
Activity
3.1 Prepare a brief situation statement covering the four elements of the writing context:
writer, reader, purpose, content. Imagine you are writing a letter asking someone to do a favor
or help with a problem. If possible, choose a real person and a real problem. Use the
following format:
SITUATION STATEMENT
Writer:
Reader:
Purpose:
Content:

Unity of Purpose
As you revise you'll want to get all parts of your paper working together to produce a
unified effect. Just as a basketball team whose members work as a unit has a better
chance of success than one whose members work at cross-purposes, the papers you
write-whether letters, reports, or essays will more likely succeed if they're unified, if
they have a singleness of purpose to which every word contributes.
Hardly ever do you write something unless you have a purpose. That purpose may be
to ask a favor, to inform, to console, or any of a hundred other things; but it will be
there even if only partially defined in your own mind. The first step toward creating
unity is to make that purpose clear, first to yourself and then to your reader. In other
words, know why you're writing, and let your reader know also.

... know why you're writing, and let your reader know also.

See if you can discover the purpose of the following letter:

Dear D & L Lawn Sprinkling:
As you know, we've had an unusually hot summer, hot and dry. It hasn't rained for
weeks, and though the farmers are glad for a chance to dry out their hay, I'm not a
farmer, and I'm not so glad to see my lawn drying out and turning brown.
The other day I had some friends over for supper, and even though they didn't say
anything about it, I'm sure they wondered why my yard looked like a miniature dust
bowl.
Of course it's important to conserve water, and I've been using a lot less water on my
lawn lately. That will save me some money, but not enough to pay the $535 bill you
sent for overhauling my sprinklers, which still don't work right.
You've spent two weeks on this problem with no luck, and I'm starting to wonder how
long it will take and whether I'll have any lawn left to sprinkle when you get done or
whether I should just pave my yard and use it for parking.
Sincerely,
Arthur Bledsoe
Mr. Bledsoe is clearly unhappy about his sprinkler system, but his letter isn't clear
about whether he intends to pay the $535 bill, and the points about the farmers,
about conserving water, and about turning his yard into a parking lot cloud the
letter's overall purpose.
If you can state your purpose clearly in one sentence, so much the better. That
sentence can serve as a center around which to organize your ideas. Whether you use
it in your writing or not, it will help you clarify your thoughts so you can decide what
you should say and what you should leave out. If, for instance, Mr. Bledsoe said to
himself after writing his first draft, "I want the sprinkler company to know that I'm
not paying anything until my sprinklers are working. Will everything I've written help
to convey that?" he would hardly leave the letter as it stands. Probably he would see
that some of what he'd written was irrelevant and delete it. After that, he might
decide what was left didn't look like much and develop it a little, but without losing
sight of his purpose. The end result might look something like this:
Dear D & L Lawn Sprinkling:

Yesterday I was surprised to receive your bill for $535 for repairing my sprinkler
system. Although your men have been working on the system for two weeks, it still
doesn't work. During this period my yard has been torn up, and what remains of my
grass has turned brown and may be past saving.
I don't know what the problem is. I've talked to the repairmen, and they don't know
either. I do know, however, that I have no intention of paying this bill or any other
you may send until my sprinklers are working.
If you have a suggestion as to how we can resolve this problem, please contact me. I
just want to get my sprinklers working again and will be happy to pay you a fair price
once the job is completed.
Sincerely,
Arthur Bledsoe
Notice how the clearly defined purpose provides a basis for deciding what should be
cut out and what should be kept and developed. Of course if you have a definite
purpose before you begin, so much the better.
Activities

3.4Revise the following letter for unity of purpose. What is the writer's main idea? Is
it ever stated directly? How could it be made more clear? What parts ought to be cut
or expanded?

Dear Friend of the Arts:

As you know, the budget deficit is a big problem for all Americans, and we must all do
our share to reduce it. In the last presidential campaign several candidates spoke
about this issue. Some say the problem is with congress. Others blame the
administration.
Only a small portion of the budget goes to the arts, and many people think this is too
much. They think artists are just a bunch of beatniks who should get regular jobs
instead of asking for tax money to pay for works that they don't like. But who are
these people, anyway? Didn't we elect them? And what about the Air Force? They
whine if someone even talks about closing a base.
So, as you can see, the arts are suffering. Please write your representative or even the
president, and send us a contribution so we can keep the arts alive.
Sincerely,
Eunice E Gladstone, State Arts Campaign
3.5 Go back over a piece of your earlier writing and edit it for unity of purpose. First
try to phrase your most important point in one sentence. Next, cut out everything
that doesn't clearly relate to your central purpose. As you your new draft emerges,
you may want to expand and develop some points that relate to your main idea. If you
find it helpful, use your purpose sentence as part of your revised paper.

Creating Emphasis
If writing is like making a movie, emphasis could be compared to a photographer's zoom lens,
moving in for a close-up one moment and back for a wide-angle shot the next. Emphasis
allows you to create similar special effects by magnifying, reducing, or even eliminating
certain details. By controlling emphasis, you can focus your readers' attention on what is most
important.
In speech we create emphasis by pausing or speaking louder, but in writing we don't have that
opportunity. Still, besides underlining and using exclamation marks, you can focus attention
by using selection, placement, and repetition.
Selection
If you've been using the discovery aids in Discovering What to Write you've probably noticed
that you must constantly make decisions about what to include and what to leave out. Failure
to make such decisions can cause you to get lost in irrelevancies. By keeping your purpose in
mind, however, you have a basis for deciding what to say and what to leave out.

By controlling emphasis, you can focus your readers' attention on what is most
important.

Simply because we have different personalities, purposes, and readers, we see some aspects of
our subject as more important than others. Imagine, for instance, that two reporters have been
sent to cover a tennis tournament: one is in the fashion department and one in the sports
department of the local newspaper. Even if they spend most of their time together, their final
reports will have little in common. The fashion reporter will concentrate on describing the
clothing, hairstyles, and manners of the players and spectators. The sports reporter, on the
other hand, will describe the shots made and missed, the players' energy cycles, anything that
helps readers get into the feel of the action. Probably, though, the players' clothes will be
mentioned only briefly if at all. The same thing happens, although perhaps in a more subtle
way, in all writing. Simply because we have different personalities, purposes, and readers, we
see some aspects of our subject as more important than others.
Placement
In any piece of writing—a sentence, a paragraph, an essay, a whole book—the first and last
positions are vitally important. At the beginning of any of these units, the reader's mind is
clear, fresh, and ready to absorb whatever it encounters. That's why the topic sentence of a
paragraph so often comes at the beginning. Again, at the end of even so short a unit as a
sentence, comes a place just before completion where expectations and attention are very
high, where readers expect to get the essence of the message, the point of it all.

In any piece of writing-a sentence, a paragraph, an essay, a whole book-the first

and last positions are vitally important.

By effective placement, we can take advantage of these expectations. We can use openings
and closings as locations for concepts or facts that we want to highlight. Putting the topic
sentence in the first position of a paragraph is a good example of using placement effectively,
as is saving the most important detail for last rather than sandwiching it between two less
important points where it could go unnoticed. Likewise, getting the most important words of a
sentence up front focuses attention on them, while placing a key word at the end of a sentence
will cause it to linger a while in the reader's mind.
Repetition

Repeat consciously, rather than unconsciously.

Used carelessly, repetition can weaken writing by making it monotonous and predictable, but
effective repetition can strengthen writing by setting up reader expectations which can be
satisfied or frustrated as you choose. For this reason and also because repetition puts key
words and concepts before your reader more than once, you can use it to center attention on
vital facts and thought patterns.
Probably you've already used repetition in your writing without realizing it. You won't
necessarily strengthen your paper by adding more, and may weaken it. Use repetition
sparingly. Repeat consciously, rather than unconsciously.

Tightening
Tightening means cutting extra words, all those that don't contribute to your message.
Inexperienced writers often use far more words than necessary. They don't attach enough
value to the individual word.

Make every word work.

As a result, the writing appears cluttered. The central ideas are hard to focus on because
unimportant words get in the way. Let's look at an example:
All my intentions were is to experience prison from the inside looking out and not from the
outside looking in. I knew if I played my cards right and if the opportunity presented itself I
wouldn't hesitate or be afraid to experience a short period behind bars, walls, fences, or
prison for that matter in order to get an insider's view.
The idea here is interesting, but obscured by clutter. We could easily cut some excess. Maybe
a little meaning is lost, but nothing crucial, and notice how much more smoothly it reads:
My intentions were to experience prison from the inside, and I wasn't afraid to spend a short
period behinds bars to get an insider's view.
And we could tighten it even more:
I wasn't afraid to spend a short time behind bars just for the experience.
The sixty-one words in the first version have been cut to fourteen. Not all writing can be
tightened this much, but most early drafts profit by being trimmed to the essentials. Not only
does the meaning become clearer, the writing gets easier to read, more vivid and lively. As a
hidden bonus, many grammatical problems eliminate themselves during tightening since
they're as often caused by clutter as by broken rules.

One way to tighten is to join several short sentences into a longer one:

I have always had this one dream. My dream has been to be a famous writer. Everyone would
read my books. I would become very wealthy.
This could all be made into one sentence:
I have always dreamed of being a wealthy, famous writer, read by everyone.
Besides cutting five words, we've eliminated the choppy rhythm, creating a more fluid and
mature sentence. Tightening isn't hard, although there is a kind of knack to it, and a person
gets better with practice. The following suggestions may help:
1. Look for words that don't do their share of work:
Change: There's a light on the scoreboard that flashes on and off.

to: The scoreboard light flashes on and off.

2. Use strong verbs:

Change: In a cautious manner the car went around the corner.

to: The car negotiated the corner.

3. Don't pile up modifiers in front of nouns:

Change: He was a weak, timid sort of individual.

to: He was a mouse.

4. Make the agent the subject:

Change: The report was read to us by Mr. Coleman.

to: Mr. Coleman read us the report.

5. Keep it clear and simple:

Change: Bluegrass music might be said to have certain qualities which render it in a
 disagreeable light to a clear majority of my peers.

to: Most of my friends don't like bluegrass music.

6. Try combining several short sentences into a longer one:

Change: I have this beautiful watch. It is silver. It was given to me by my father. He gave it to
me last year.

to: Last year my father gave me this beautiful silver watch.

The aim in every case is to make your writing more smooth and vivid, more expressive of
your meaning. In fact, that's the aim of revision in general: to make every word work.
Activities
3.6 Tighten the following sentences. As you do, remember that any of several possibilities
may work well. Sometimes you will find that many words can be cut out, other times only a
few. Compare your revisions with those of your classmates.
a. Several unnecessary words can be cut here. They can be cut by combining the two
sentences together into one single sentence.
b. My last English teacher was somewhat more advanced in age than my present English
teacher. His hair had turned mostly gray, but it still had some black flecks left in it.
c. We are going to North Carolina and West Virginia. Both of these are very beautiful states
located in the southeastern portion of the country.
d. If a person looking for a job has a good physical appearance, a job in general will be easier
to find. This is because an employer wants a person who is neat looking in appearance.
e. Well, it seems I kind of got off the track of what I was intending to write about, but I don't
really much care.
f. Regular gasoline is what is needed to make my car run. This fact makes my car an
economical car, so practical and inexpensive at this time of rising prices and inflation.
g. It even seems as though these two specimens could possibly be of the same species because
of the color coordination and also because of how the shapes are similar.
h. Because of the great amount of people in such a small area, there is of course a high
amount of crime in this same area.
i. In the fall of the year is the time when Jim likes to go hunting for elk. It is during that
season that Jim heads off into the woods armed with his gun and his camera. In many cases
Jim's camera gets more use than his gun does.
j. The average person, male or female, who is in good physical condition likes to let others
know it. Whether it be on the beach with a muscle man shirt on or in the park with shorts on,
people in good shape will let you know they are in shape.
3.7 Go back over an early draft of a paper you wrote and cut all unnecessary words. Don't cut
any that carry important meaning, just those that only take up space. Then exchange your
paper with a partner and see if you agree on your decisions. Can you find more words that
should be cut? Can you find some that shouldn't have been cut?

Designing Effective Sentences

Article Index
 Designing Effective Sentences

 Expletives and Passive Constructions

 Combining Sentences

 Balance and Parallelism

 Periodic and Cumulative Structure

 Relative Clauses

 Participial Phrases

 Further Possibilities

 All Pages
Page 1 of 8

Basic Sentence Concepts explains the subject-verb/complement pattern and shows how you
can expand that pattern almost indefinitely with a few simple principles such as coordination
and subordination. Now we'll look at some more advanced sentence strategies. Again the aim
is to increase your versatility as a writer, to help you see the full range of options for solving
writing problems. As your flexibility increases, you'll not only satisfy minimal standards of
clarity and correctness, you'll express yourself with new-found energy and power.
While the S V/C pattern, with agent as subject, is by far the most common pattern for building
English sentences, it's by no means the only one. Nor is it best in every situation. Sometimes
you may wish to turn things around in order to create a particular kind of emphasis or rhythm:
She always caught fly balls. She usually missed grounders.
Fly balls she always caught. Grounders she usually missed.

... the aim is to increase your versatility as a writer, to help you see the full range
of options for solving writing problems.

Sometimes you'll see more than one possible variation:

My bicycle stood by the tree.
By the tree stood my bicycle.
By the tree my bicycle stood.
Such inverted sentences can be used to vary the rhythm or shift your reader's attention to an
important word or phrase. When used carelessly or too often, however, they can produce an
artificial, even awkward style.
Activity
3.8 Try inverting the following sentences. Come up with at least one variation for each. When
you're finished, compare your results with those of your classmates. Are any sentences better
in normal order? Does inversion ever change the meaning?
a. The night is tender.
b. My brother burst into the house.
c. The lion climbed onto the table. d. Some rain must fall into each life.
e. Lithuania lost the war.
f. A rifle hung in the truck's rear window.
g. Money is the root of all evil.
h. The bottle was empty.
i. A rolling stone gathers no moss.

Designing Effective Sentences - Expletives and Passive

Constructions
Expletives and Passive Constructions

These constructions can drain your style of vigor and confuse meaning.

These common sentence patterns are undeniably useful, but overused by beginners who don't
see that these constructions can drain their style of vigor and confuse meaning.
Expletives, as the term is used here, are words used primarily to take up space. They fill a slot
in a sentence or round out a rhythm. Their meaning isn't important. They're commonly placed
in the subject slot when a writer either doesn't know or doesn't want to name the agent. Notice
how "it" and "there" work in the following examples.
With expletive: It has been decided that we will meet next Monday.
Without expletive: We have decided to meet next Monday.
With expletive: There are good job opportunities in computer science.
Without expletive: Computer science offers good job opportunities.
In both cases the second choice is more economical, more direct, and therefore preferable for
most situations. Another concern with expletives as subjects is subject-verb agreement.
Because "there" is neither singular nor plural, it can't tell you whether you'll need a singular or
a plural verb. To learn that, you need to look at the complement.
Not in agreement: There's two good catchers on our team.
In agreement: There are two good catchers on our team.
Rewrite the sentence above without an expletive. Is it weaker or stronger?
In passive constructions the subject is the receiver of the action rather than the agent. Like
constructions that open with expletives, passives can be useful when you wish to emphasize
the results of an action or when you don't want to draw attention to the doer of the action.
Passive: Most of those mansions were built by wealthy lumber barons.
Active: Wealthy lumber barons built most of those mansions.
Which is stronger? It's hard to say. True, the second sentence is slightly shorter, but the
guiding factor here probably would be whether the writer wanted to emphasize the mansions
or the lumber barons.
Passive voice most often causes problems when it adds unnecessary words without producing
any clear benefits. Find weak passive constructions in the following passage:
I played the fish slowly and carefully, not wanting to take a chance that it might snap the thin
tippet at the end of my line. At last it grew tired. When it finally turned over on its side in
exhaustion, I eased it into my net. The fly was carefully taken from its mouth, but as I paused
for a moment to admire the trout's colors before putting it away in my creel, one last leap was
made by it, out of my hands and back into the stream.
Activity
3.9 Read the following sentences to see if any could be improved by using expletives or
passive constructions differently. Some may be fine as they stand; if so, make no change.
Otherwise, rewrite the sentence to make it stronger.
a. It's supposed to rain again this afternoon.
b. My motorcycle was bought by a dentist. My stereo was bought by a young girl.
Everyone bought something.
c. There's several ways of solving the problem.
d. A person can solve the problem in several ways.
e. There are many benefits to come from living in the city.
f. Last night a very funny story about my father was told to me by a total stranger.
g. Whoever was there at the time built a quaint cabin near the marsh.
h. There's a candidate for every office.
i. It's amazing to me that I could have flunked chemistry.
j. There was only one point that was raised by him that I objected to.

Designing Effective Sentences - Combining Sentences

Combining Sentences

... you'll discover several alternatives for expressing a single idea, and you can
weigh the advantages and disadvantages of each.

Most of the following activities will give you practice in combining, "de-combining,"
or even "re-combining" sentences. Others will ask you to write sentences that imitate
specific patterns. Combining short sentences into longer ones can eliminate
unnecessary words and provide more expressive flexibility. Both advantages, but
especially the second, are important stylistically. As you do the activities, remember
that the ultimate goal is to discover new options for self-expression.
If you practice combining sentences, You can build rhythmic effects that create
precisely the kinds of fluid and dynamic structures needed to express thoughts with
individuality and distinction, and you can see how different patterns change the
emphasis or meaning of an essential concept.

The Best Word

In every kind of writing, it's essential to choose the best word to express your intended
meaning. If you take time to choose the best word rather than simply accepting the first word
that comes to mind, you'll be taking an important step toward writing effectiveness. Use the
following four questions to help you choose the best word for your needs.

 Is this word specific enough?

 Does this word have unwanted connotations?
 Will my reader understand this word in the same way I do?
 Is this word overused?

1 . Is this word specific enough?

Briefly, a general word refers to a large group of loosely related members, while
a specific word refers to a smaller group of more closely related members.

Just as "large" is the opposite of "small" and "fast" is the opposite of "slow," "specific" is the
opposite of "general," and understanding one concept depends largely upon understanding the
other. Briefly, a general word refers to a large group of loosely related members, while a
specific word refers to a smaller group of more closely related members. For instance,
because the word "animal" could refer to any of a million different creatures from ants to
elephants, it is a very general term. The word "fire ant," however, narrows the range of
possible reference to a more limited and closely related group and is therefore more specific.
General: animal

invertebrate

insect

ant

Specific: fire ant

As the above diagram shows, general and specific are relative rather than absolute terms. That
is, a given word may be either general or specific depending upon what it's being compared
with, just as a runner who is fast when compared with college teammates may be slow at the
NCAA Outdoor Meet. Yet the runner's speed may not have changed at all in an absolute
sense, only in relation to the competitors. So it is with words. If compared with "animal,"
"insect" seems specific because it refers to a group with fewer and more closely related
members. When compared with "fire ant," however, "insect" seems general because it can
refer to so many different kinds of creatures.
In choosing the specific word over the general one you limit the number of possible
meanings. When you restrict meaning in this way, you increase the sharpness of the image
your reader receives and decrease the chance of misunderstanding and communication failure.
2. Does this word have unwanted connotations?
Up to now we've been talking only about the representational part of a word's meaning, but
this isn't the only important aspect of a word's total meaning. It's quite common, in fact, for
several words that mean the same, or nearly the same, thing to have vastly different impacts
on a reader. This is because in addition to the strictly rational part of meaning
(called denotation) words also carry emotional overtones (called connotations). These
connotations are stronger in some words than in others. While a word like "mixed-breed" is a
neutral way to describe a dog that is not "pure-bred," "mongrel" adds a slightly unfavorable
judgment about the dog, and "mutt" proclaims it nearly worthless.

It's quite common, in fact, for several words that mean the same, or nearly the
same, thing to have vastly different impacts on a reader.
Learning to recognize the emotional overtones in our language allows us greater control over
the way readers respond to our writing. Not only do we avoid creating an undercurrent that
works against our central purpose, we gain a valuable tool for shaping readers' attitudes
toward our subject. Notice the very different effects of these two sentences whose denotative
meanings are substantially the same:
That primitive cabin set miles from the reach of developers has been allowed to stand
undisturbed for centuries.
That rickety shack in the middle of nowhere hasn't been cared for in ages.
Either of these could be an effective topic sentence for a descriptive paragraph, depending on
whether we wanted to get the cabin preserved or torn down.
Be especially careful of connotations if you're in the habit of using a thesaurus to find
synonyms for words in your active vocabulary since the difference in meaning between two
words listed in a single thesaurus entry is often due to the different connotations they have. If
you substitute a less familiar word for a more familiar one, you need to be aware of this and
be sure the connotations of the new word are suited to your needs.
3. Will my reader understand this word in the same way I do?
How a word is finally understood depends on many factors, not all of which are under the
writer's control. Writers must anticipate how readers will respond to language, estimating
whether certain words are within their vocabularies and whether others, such
as environmentalist, have the same connotations for both reader and writer. Anticipating the
reader's reactions is always important, and no place is it more so than in choosing your words.

Anticipating the reader's reactions is always important, and no place is it more

so than in choosing your words.

Failure to take the reader sufficiently into account often shows up in a writer's abuse
of jargon, which in one sense means the specialized vocabulary of people in a particular
group or profession and in a broader sense means the use of technical or scientific language in
place of equally appropriate everyday words.
Jargon in the first sense can be an effective way to communicate with members of a
profession who understand the jargon and who recognize by your use of the specialized
vocabulary that you belong to the group. The problem comes when you unconsciously use
jargon on people outside the group, who may not know what it means. The stock expressions
that seem clear and apt to those within your group may bewilder and frustrate an outsider.
Jargon in the second sense is almost always bad. Unless you're writing a diplomatic
agreement, a warranty, or an insurance policy, in which you want to baffle the reader,
prefabricated phrases such as "assume the initiative," "render inoperative," and "prioritization
of values," would be better replaced by the clearer and more vivid "take charge," "break,"
"decide what matters most."
As George Orwell and others have pointed out, writers who rely on such inflated diction are
usually trying to dress up ordinary ideas, to make them look more important than they really
are, so the reader will be impressed and slightly mystified.
Most readers, however, recognize the trick and regard writers who use jargon with justified
suspicion. If you find yourself writing this way, slow down and carefully choose synonyms
that are fresher, more vivid, and more generally understood.
Put yourself in the reader's place and look back at what you've written. What words might be
unfamiliar? Can you find substitutes? If not, should you take a sentence or two to define
them? Are any words ambiguous, capable of meaning more than one thing?
I already own a fine comb.
What should "fine" be changed to so that its intended meaning will come across to the reader?
Are you using any words in a special or unusual way that your reader might not be aware of?
If so, shouldn't you explain?
4. Is this word overused?
The words and expressions we hear and see most often become integral parts of us and find
their way into our writing. This is as it should be, unless a word or expression has grown stale
or trite through overuse.

Find a fresher way to put it.

If your readers have seen a phrase often, it will no longer evoke a fresh image for them.
"Stood out like a sore thumb," for instance, is so familiar we don't consider how noticeable a
sore thumb is and how difficult to hide. Words like "groovy" or "Mickey Mouse" (in the sense
of meaning pointless and easy) have lost most of their impact because their novelty is gone.
The writer who uses such tired language may not be misunderstood, but may be thought
unimaginative and lazy. Such overused expressions are called clichés. They make your
writing, and therefore your thoughts, appear routine, predictable, and stale. Find a fresher way
to put it.
Activities
3.23 With each group below, arrange the terms in order from least to most specific.
a. animal, living thing, mammal, leopard, cat
b. western seaport, seaport, place, Seattle, Pier 45 c. sport, kick off, activity, football, team
sport
d. clogged fuel line, situation, problem, engine trouble, car problem
e. quadrangle, shape, parallelogram, geometric figure, rectangle
3.24 With a partner discuss the connotations of the italicized words. Then change each one to
a word with a similar denotation but a different connotation.
a. We had an uneventful stay there.
b. Curtiss is quite confident, isn't he?
c. Mr. Simpson would be here himself, but he's busy.
d. The stench was everywhere.
e. You could hear the loud cars cruising past all night.
f. I'll have the ground beef sandwich.
g. The Rockefellers are a rich family.
h. Next, Sarah strolled in and plopped down. i. His face was weathered and lined.
j. Ms. Prochaska's inexpensive, unadorned designs delighted the stuffy board of directors.
3.25 Look up each of the following words in your word processor's thesaurus. For each word,
use two alternatives in a complete sentence.
examine, event, produce, undesirable, magic, disobedience
3.26 For each sentence you wrote in Activity 3.25, substitute a third word for the original.
How is the effect of the sentence changed by the substitution.
3.27 Translate the following jargon-clogged sentences into more vivid, effective English.
a. These dividend dollars give you the opportunity to increase your insurance from $25,000 to
$50,000 with a minimal out-of-pocket expenditure of cash commencing in five years from the
initial application date.
b. All emergency floatation devices have been conspicuously located on both port and
starboard sides to facilitate passenger accessibility.
c. The following program has been determined to contain material intended for viewing by
mature audiences: parental discretion advised.
d. This regulation supersedes all comparable regulations currently in effect.
e. Faculty advisers assist students in defining goals to be reached during college, give
information regarding appropriate curricula and courses, and discuss personal problems
students may have, especially problems related to the student's progress and plans for
subsequent work.
f. It is inevitable that a President confronted by our current complex international relations
will want a staff near at hand to meet his needs and to be sensitive to his political position.
g. After being apprehended in the act of commission, the suspect was released on her own
recognizance.
h. The current reciprocal trade agreement has ceased to be mutually beneficial.
i. Continued uninterrupted service depends upon your immediate settlement of all delinquent
accounts.
j. I promise to pay such TOTAL (together with any other charges due thereon) subject to and
in accordance with the agreement governing the use of such card.
3.28 Rewrite each of the following clichés, making the same point more vividly and clearly in
your own language.
a. I was hungry enough to eat a horse.
b. We ran up against a brick wall.
c. Don't make a federal case out of it.
d. You're on thin ice with that excuse.
e. Now it's a whole new ball game.
f. That really gets my goat.
g. Since my back operation my tennis hasn't been up to par.
h. Our new branch manager really delivers the goods.
i. Ever since then she's kept her nose clean.
j. Here's where we separate the men from the mice.

Editing
The Editing Process
Producing a clean, error-free final draft isn't easy. Even the most carefully edited professional
publications contain occasional typos. Most readers understand this and aren't bothered by
such infrequent problems. Yet when errors occur often, they undermine the writer's authority
and disrupt communication.
To edit well, it helps to know the basics of grammar and mechanics, but equally important are
good editing practices. You'll need to be patient and attentive to detail. Use the suggestions
below to improve your editing.

1. Know what you're looking for. What types of errors

 To edit well, it helps to know the basics of grammar and mechanics, but
equally important are good editing practices.

do you tend to make most often? Do you have problems with Subject/Verb Agreement or with
Tense Shifts? Look for patterns in your errors and focus on eliminating the more serious and
higher frequency errors first. Then check for less obvious problems.

2. Edit printed copy. If you're writing at the computer, check your work quickly on the screen and
run a spell-check. Then print out a draft to go over meticulously, looking for anything you may
have missed.

3. Edit actively. Go through your draft carefully, pencil in hand. Actually touch each word with your
pencil. Look especially at word endings. Have you dropped any s or ed endings? Do subjects and
verbs agree? Does each pronoun have a clear antecedent?

4. If possible, edit with a partner. Read your draft slowly aloud while your partner, pencil in hand,
reads another copy of the draft. Have your partner stop you whenever there might be a
problem. Discuss each questionable punctuation mark or word choice.

All this may seem tedious at first, but it pays big dividends. A clean, well-edited final draft
makes a good impression. It shows that you care about your writing, and when readers sense
your care, they'll care, too.

Grammar for Writing

It's helpful to think of grammar and mechanics as matters of convention or mutual agreement
among language users. Such agreement is necessary for language to work. To communicate
with even the simplest words, for example, we must agree on their meaning. Conventions of
grammar come partly from tradition and partly from a need to be clear and accurate. And like
other conventions, rules of grammar change continually.
Learning grammar, then, isn't just a matter of memorizing rigid laws laid down by English
teachers, but of attending to how our language is actually used today: how it works, why it
works the way it does, how it affects others.

And like other conventions, rules of grammar change continually.

If you've used the language most of your life, you've developed a feel for its grammar from
experiences with family and friends, and from television, newspapers, movies, and books. If
someone wrote, "This like book I," you'd sense something was wrong. If asked what, you
might reply correctly that the words aren't in the right order and so the sentence is awkward
and hard to understand. To correct it, you might edit it to read, "I like this book." If asked why
you changed it, you could say, "Well, it just sounds better this way. The words are in the right
order, and the meaning is more clear."
If you're new to the language, welcome. Throughout the world, millions of people have
learned to use English effectively. With effort and persistence, you'll soon be among them. In
learning more about grammar, you'll learn why we use language as we do. As you become
attuned to the whys and hows of language use, you'll feel more confident about expressing
yourself. Instead of seeing grammar as an obstacle, you'll find that it helps keep your writing
clear, fluid, and readable.

Basic Sentence Concepts

Our language organizes thoughts into sentences. As a core, these sentences have a two-part
structure. For simplicity and easy reference, we can represent the two parts as follows:
SUBJECT PREDICATE
The subject, a noun or noun-substitute, tells who or what is doing something.
The predicate tells what the subject is doing.
SUBJECT PREDICATE

This bird sings.

Marcus plays soccer.

My old Chevy still runs.

This pen leaks.

These books are heavy.

This two part structure is so basic that a thought doesn't feel complete when one part is
missing. Both are needed for a complete sentence. Of course most sentences are longer and
more sophisticated than those above, but even the most complex sentences are based on this
two part principle. Learning to recognize it, to listen for it, and to use it are the first steps to
mastering English sentence structure.
The S V/C Pattern
Another step, slightly less important but still useful, is to see that the predicate is often
composed of two parts.
SUBJECT PREDICATE
SUBJECT VERB/COMPLEMENT
The verb is the word or cluster of words actually naming the action performed by the subject.
The complement comes after the verb. It may do a number of different things, but most often
it's the receiver of the action performed by the subject and named by the verb:
SUBJECT VERB/COMPLEMENT
John hit/the ball.
Here John is an agent, the one doing something. "Hit" names the action he's performing, and
"the ball" receives the effect of the action. Not all cases are so clear, however. Sometimes the
complement modifies the subject, as in "John is tall." Here, "tall" doesn't receive the effect of
the action. In fact, there doesn't seem to be any action at all, unless we consider merely
existing to be an action. But such cases need not cause problems as long as we recognize the
basic pattern and sense that it has been completed. For us, as writers, a detailed understanding
of linguistics is secondary. Learning to use the language effectively comes first.
For now, it's enough to say that the basic pattern upon which English sentences are built is:
SUBJECT VERB / COMPLEMENT

V /C
S

eats / apples.
Luis

is / happy.
Carla

form / governments.
People

serves / everyone.
Justice
are / dangerous.
Cigarettes
builds / endurance.
Running
Each of these is a simple sentence. Because it can stand by itself as a complete sentence, it's
also called an independent clause. Because it often serves as the foundation of a much longer
sentence, it's sometimes called a base clause. What we call it, though, is less important than
learning to sense its presence in every sentence we build.
Activities
4.1 Some word groups listed below contain a subject and predicate and are therefore
complete sentences. Others do not and can therefore be considered fragments or parts of
sentences. If the word group is a sentence, put an S in the corresponding space. If it is a
fragment, put an Fr in the space.
a. __ Beyond the big river.
b. __ Huge waves lapped the prow.
c. __ More than enough money.
d. __ Sitting down together for Sunday breakfast.
e. __ Her wound healed.
f. __ Earlier and earlier each night.
g.__ The sun slipped below the horizon.
h. __ Steeping the neighborhood in shadow
i. __ Calling us in from our play.
j. __ Our mother was cooking supper.
4.2 The following word groups are all simple sentences. Label the subject, the verb, and the
complement by writing the appropriate letter above each.
a. Morning dawned gray and heavy.
b. That basket broke the old record.
c. You are not alone.
d. Storm warnings don't scare me.
e. The students attended the concert.
f. The chimpanzee learned sign language.
g. The new proposal deserves serious consideration.
Expanding the Basic Pattern
Writing made up of only such little sentences would quickly grow monotonous and
would also sound like it had been written by someone without much language
experience. Fortunately, the basic S V/C pattern allows for easy expansion in almost
unlimited ways.

Fortunately, the basic S V/C pattern allows for easy expansion in almost
unlimited ways.

You already use the following methods of expansion, though perhaps without
knowing their names. After reading about them, you'll understand some terms
linguists use to describe how you build sentences, and you'll see how you can use
these methods to write more effective sentences. If you're interested in some more
advanced sentence strategies, see Designing Effective Sentences.

Expanding the Basic Pattern - Modification and

Subordination
Modification and Subordination
The easiest and most common way of developing the S V/C pattern is by adding
a modifier. To modify means to change or alter. A modifier, therefore, is a word or
word group that changes the meaning of another word or word group that is more
basic to the sentence.
S V/C
Luis eats/apples.
By adding a modifier to the complement, we can alter the meaning of "apples."
S V/C
Luis eats/green apples.
We can also modify the subject.
S V/C
Little Luis eats/green apples.
And even the verb.
S V/C
Little Luis never eats/green apples.
Notice how the basic S V/C pattern remains even after several modifiers have been
added. This is because modifiers cluster around base elements like iron filings around
a magnet.
The principle that describes this relationship between modifiers and more basic
sentence elements is subordination. Subordination means taking a position of lesser
importance or rank. In the Army, for example, a private is subordinate to a captain
and a captain to a general. Likewise, when we say a modifier is subordinate to the
base element, we mean it has less importance and is dependent upon that more basic
element for its claim to a place in the sentence. We can see this by looking at our last
example.
Little Luis never eats green apples.
When we drop all the modifiers, we still have a sentence that feels complete.
Luis eats apples.
But when we drop the base words that the modifiers depend on, we are left with
something entirely different.
Little never green.
The result is nonsense. Our minds want to process the data as a sentence, but it won't
fit. We have modifiers, but we don't know what is being modified. The base elements
are missing.
We've seen how these two principles, modification and subordination, join individual
words in clusters. It's also worth noting how they join word groups together. Just as
individual words cluster around more important ones, so the clusters they form
attach themselves to more important elements. Notice how this happens in the
following example.
S V/C
The river was/cold.
Adding a little modification, we get this:
S V/C
The recently thawed river was/icy cold.
"Recently" modifies "thawed," while the two words join together to modify "river," the
base word of the cluster.
Whole sentences can be joined in this way:
Although the recently thawed river was icy cold, we dove right in.
Now the former sentence, which was also an independent clause, has become a part
of a larger whole. It is now subordinate to "we dove right in," which becomes the new
base clause of the sentence. Without our base clause we would be left with a
subordinate element that had no independent element to depend on, like an orphan..
Modification and subordination can help you in two ways: first, they can help you
understand how your sentence elements relate to each other and to the sentence as a
whole; second, they're important tools for combining those elements into more
complex and sophisticated sentences.

Expanding the Basic Pattern - Coordination

Coordination
The basic S V/C pattern can also be expanded by coordination. Whereas
subordination ranks one element as more important than the other, coordination
places elements on an equal footing. If the relationship of subordination is that of
child to parent, the relationship of coordination is that of spouse to spouse. In a
sentence it works like this:
Esther types/letters.
The subject can be expanded by adding a coordinate element:
S V/C
Lois and Esther type/letters.
And coordination can also be used to expand the complement.
S V/C
Lois and Esther type/letters and memos.
Or the verb.
Lois and Esther type letters and memos but write-out short notes and signatures.
Now each element has been compounded with a resulting structure that might be
represented as follows:

S V/C

Lois and Esther type/letters and memos

but

write-out/short notes and signatures.

This sentence has a compound subject, a compound verb, and two compound
complements. In every case the compound elements are coordinate to each other and
therefore, because they are of equal importance, may be said to balance.
And just as we can subordinate either individual words or whole groups of words, the
same is true of coordination. In the previous example we compounded the various
parts of a single independent clause, but we could also coordinate two separate
clauses.

S V/C S V/C

Esther types/letters, but Lois types/memos.

Now our sentence has two independent clauses, each of which could stand alone as a
complete sentence.

Expanding the Basic Pattern - Substitution

Substitution
A third way of expanding the basic pattern is substitution, which means replacing a
single word with a word group. Again, an example will help.
S V/C
I saved/my meager wages.
By substituting, we can expand the complement to read:
S V/C
I saved/what I earned, which wasn't much.
"My wages" has been expanded to "what I earned" and "meager" to "which wasn't
much." As you can see, this adds more words without adding much meaning and so
could be objected to as uneconomical. Still it's a perfectly grammatical way of
expanding sentences, and there may be times when it will suit your needs exactly,
either to give emphasis or to improve sound and rhythm.
Sometimes, as in the example below, you can use substitution to clarify or summarize
your thoughts:
Change: Harold and Arthur earn more than I do. This makes me furious.

to: Getting paid less than my male coworkers makes me furious.

Expanding the Basic Pattern - Summary

Summary

English sentences are built upon the foundation of an independent base clause
consisting of two parts, a subject and a predicate. This simple pattern may be
expanded in three ways. First, subordinate modifiers may be added to one of the
main elements or to the base clause as a whole. Second, words or phrases may be
coordinated with existing elements. Third, you may sometimes want to substitute a
word group for an individual word. Finally, you can often use subordination,
coordination, and substitution together to expand a single base clause.
Activities
4.3 Write five simple sentences (S V/C) without modifiers. Exchange and compare
them.
4.4 Add modifiers to the base elements of the sentences you received in Activity 4.3,
return the sentences, and discuss them again.
4.5 Underline and label (S, V, or C) the main word clusters in each of the following
sentences.
a. The maturing tadpole slowly grows legs.
b. Slow dancing is much more fun.
c. An elderly woman picked out a bright red hat.
d. The freshly lit match touched the pile of dry woodchips.
e. The clear water cooled her cheeks and forehead.
f. Small aspen leaves flickered and danced in the bright morning air.
g. Most team members brought their own gloves.
h. The swirling dust almost obscured the distant horizon. i. Some old cars get pretty
good mileage.
j. That wily old carp wouldn't even consider my shiny new spinner.
4.6 Use modification, coordination, or substitution to expand each of the following
sentences.
a. Donnie devoured his waffles.
b. The teachers played football.
c. Rain flooded my basement.
d. Those boys won the trophy.
e. Doris is a mechanic.
f. The horses ate hay.
g. Clouds spilled their rain.
h. The semi snapped a stop sign. i. Cowboys love horses.
j. The cheerleaders did handsprings.
4.7 Rewrite any three of the sentences you expanded for Activity 4.6, this time
expanding them even further.

Expanding the Basic Pattern - Two Kinds of Connectors

Two Kinds of Connectors
Besides the uses already described, coordination and subordination are two basic
ways of linking clauses. Sometimes we don't have much choice about how to make the
connection, but often, if we see the options, we do.
These trees lose their leaves every winter, but they don't die.
The clauses in the example above are joined by coordination, but could as easily have
been joined by subordination.
Although these trees lose their leaves every winter, they don't die.
Now, the first clause is subordinate to the second. The two words that make the
difference are called conjunctions, or joining words. "But" belongs to a group of
conjunctions that coordinate. "Although" belongs to a group that subordinates.
Learning to recognize these two groups of conjunctions will not only help you with
your sentence structure, but also with your punctuation.
Coordinating Conjunctions
Not too much needs to said about them. They are few in
number: and, or, but, for, nor, yet, so, and they can always be found at the point
where the two coordinate structures are joined together, as in the example above.
Subordinating Conjunctions
These are used to subordinate one clause to another. They are placed at the beginning
of the clause you want to subordinate, which may or may not be where the two
clauses actually meet on the page. Some common subordinating conjunctions
are if, although, as, when, because, since, though, whenever, after, unless, while, wh
ereas, even though. When one of these words is attached to the beginning of an
independent clause, that clause is weakened. It becomes dependent. It can no longer
stand alone as a complete sentence.
Independent clause (complete sentence):
The streets were covered with snow.
Dependent clause (fragment):
Because the streets were covered with snow.
Dependent clause attached to a base clause (complete sentence):
Because the streets were covered with snow, we could ski to school.
Activities
4.8 Italicize the base clause in each of the following sentences. Boldface the
subordinating conjunction.
Example: Because Lisa was my best friend, I let her borrow my dress for the party.
a. Alan scores a point whenever we need one.
b. Since we changed the air cleaner, we've been getting better mileage.
c. They canceled the picnic because it was raining.
d. When I got home, my landlord was there waiting.
e. Stand here if you want to get wet.
f. Whenever the ponds freeze, I sharpen my skates.
4.9 Join five of the following pairs of sentences by using coordination and five by
using subordination.
a. My new watch was very expensive. It doesn't work.
b. We were new in town. Everyone made us feel welcome.
c. I studied long and hard. I passed the course.
d. These tires are bald. You should replace them.
e. I get home from class. I collapse on the couch.
f. The mail is here. Your magazine didn't arrive.
g. My heart pumps faster. My legs are tired.
h. The warm weather comes. My dog starts to shed.
i. You eat too many sweets. You will get cavities.
j. The subway was crowded. We found two seats.
4.10 Rewrite the sentences you did for Activity 4.9. This time use coordination where
you used subordination before and vice-versa. Which sentences are improved by the
change? Which would be better left alone? Why?

Six Problem Areas

The following guidelines are easier for some to follow than for others, but they can, with a
little work, be learned by almost anyone. Once learned, they'll become part of your permanent
knowledge base like the multiplication tables or your best friend's phone number. You won't
have to learn them twice.
Take time then, even it you're fairly confident about your grammar, to see if you need to work
on any of these six areas. If you do, try to understand the logic of the rule, what its purpose is.

... see if you need to work on any of these six areas.

Study the examples until you see how the rule is violated and how it can be set right. Work
the activities until you've mastered the rule. Notice which areas are most problematic for you
personally. Finally, make the carryover into your own writing. When you do that, you can
consider the rule learned.

Six Problem Areas - Subject/Verb Agreement

Subject/Verb Agreement
This rule comes first because understanding it can help you understand some of the others. In
most sentences you follow it
naturally, but it can cause trouble. The rule is as follows: The subject and verb of each clause
must agree in number.

The subject and verb of each clause must agree in number.

If you have a singular subject, you need a singular verb. If you have a plural subject, you
need a plural verb. Singular and plural tell how many. Singular means one. Plural means more
than one. Both your subject and verb must give the same signal as to how many you are
talking about.
Read the following sentences and see if you can find any problems with subject/verb
agreement.
1. The cat come home tired.
2. The cat comes home tired.
3. The cats come home tired.
4. The cats comes home tired.
Can you explain the problem in sentences one and four? If not, consider that with most nouns,
our language forms the plural by adding an s, but with verbs, an s is added only in the third
person singular.
Person/Number Chart
Singular Plural

1st person
I come we come
2nd person
you come you come

3rd person* he, she, it, this, or that comes they, these, or those come
the cat* comes the cats* come
*All nouns—words such as table, cat or frog—should be considered 3rd person.
Mastering Subject/Verb Agreement
1. Force yourself to listen for s sounds as you write. In speaking, we sometimes drop these
sounds as we fade one word into another. Because of this, we may forget the sounds are even
there. Thus, we fail to make our subjects and verbs agree. Listening for those s sounds is the
real key to getting rid of most agreement problems.
2. Don't be misled by false subjects. Be sure the word you make your verb agree with is
actually the subject of the clause, not just another noun.

Change: Those tomatoes from my brother looks juicy.

to: Those tomatoes from my brother look juicy.

The first sentence gives mixed signals because the verb has been made to agree with the false
subject "brother" rather than the true subject, "tomatoes." Here's another example of the false
subject.
Change: Forgetting your tickets cause problems.

to: Forgetting your tickets causes problems.

At first glance "tickets" may look like the subject, but a moment's reflection tells us that
"forgetting your tickets" causes problems, not the tickets themselves. Whenever such a verb
phrase serves as the subject, consider it singular.
3. Treat collectives as singulars. Collective nouns identify a group: a team, a platoon, a
class, a congregation, a family. Treat broadly inclusive nouns such as "nobody," "everybody,"
"anyone," "each," and "everyone" as singular also.
Change: My family like to go to church together.

to: My family likes to go to church together.

Even if the family has eight or nine people, it is still only one thing; therefore, it is considered
singular.
4. Watch out for compound subjects. When the parts of a compound subject are joined by
"and," treat the subject as plural, even if the individual parts are singular.
Change: Danny and Rolando gets their share of rebounds.

to: Danny and Rolando get their share of rebounds.

When the parts are joined by "or" or "nor," let the part nearest the verb determines the verb's
number.
Change: Either the head table or the chairs needs realigning.

to: Either the head table or the chairs need realigning.

Change: Neither the chairs nor the head table need realigning.

to: Neither the chairs nor the head table needs realigning.

Activities
4.11 Edit the following sentences for subject/verb agreement.
a. The gloves I got for Christmas is too small.
b. My knee look like it is starting to heal.
c. Breakfast and lunch always tastes great.
d. Opening the cans spoil the meat.
e. Our team don't get discouraged when we lose.
f. The bus always get me here on time.
g. The corner and the edge shows the rust first.
h. These bandages works great.
i. Neither the judge nor the jury are responsible for this.
j. Our staff and equipment is ready to serve you.
4.12 Read the following sentences and tell whether the subject and verb agree in number. Be
prepared to explain and justify your answer.
a. A big tree with all the trimmings make the holidays special.
b. Anyone wearing muddy boots are to stand over there.
c. The houses by the river are the oldest.
d. The old man in the corner booth looks tired.
e. Our selection of tomatoes top them all.
f. At the foot of the dunes a small boy plays by the shore.
g. Flags of many nations flutters in the chilly breeze.
h. The shocks in my Mustang is shot.
i. The tie with the orange stripes looks bold.
j. Too many onions spoils the stew.

Six Problem Areas - Pronoun/antecedent Agreement

Pronoun/Antecedent Agreement

Just as subjects and verbs must agree, pronouns must agree with their
antecedents.

Just as subjects and verbs must agree, pronouns must agree with their antecedents. A pronoun
is a word that substitutes for a previously mentioned noun. If that noun (called the antecedent)
is plural, the pronoun standing-in for it must also be plural. If the antecedent is singular, so
must the pronoun be.
Change: My club is having a bake sale. These should help our finances.

to: My club is having a bake sale. This should help our finances.

In the first example, "these" refers back to the antecedent "bake sale," but because "these" is
plural and its antecedent is singular, an agreement problem results. Making both pronoun and
antecedent singular solves the problem.
The person/number chart below will help you determine whether a pronoun is singular or
plural.
Person/Number Chart
Singular Plural

1st
I, me we, us
person

2nd
you you
person

he; him; she; her; it; this; that; or any they; them; these; those; or any noun
3rd
noun representing ONE person, place, or representing MORE THAN ONE person, place,
person*
thing, as: a table. or thing, as: some tables.

*All nouns—words such as table, cat or frog—should be considered 3rd person.

Activity
4.13 Edit the following sentences for pronoun/antecedent agreement.
a. If the people want unsafe cars, they will get it.
b. When a person needs advice, they can go to a psychologist.
(HINT: Make the antecedent plural to avoid gender problems.)
c. After the streets had been swept, it looked very clean.
d. I don't like tacos. It's too spicy.
e. The director organizes the play. They make sure everyone knows what to do.
f. Some students pick this up quickly. This person can go on to the next section.
g. Good friends, food, and a roof over your head-this is the only necessities.
h. Playing a musical instrument is a valuable experience for a child. They teach them
many important things.

Six Problem Areas - Pronoun Reference

Pronoun Reference
Faulty pronoun reference means the antecedent of your pronoun is not totally and
immediately clear. There is no single rule for making pronoun reference clear in all
cases. Most often a reader will try to connect the pronoun with the subject of a
previous clause or sentence:

Your reader should connect your pronoun with its antecedent at once.

When Andre cut his finger, he screamed out in pain.

But not always, sometimes the reader will connect it with the closest noun:
When Andre cut his finger, it started to bleed.
In both cases the meaning is clear, and so there is no problem. Problems occur,
though, when two words compete as antecedents and the meaning blurs:
Finally, he wrapped his finger in a bandage, and it stopped bleeding.
Or when the antecedent is not named explicitly:
The danger of creosote build-up has not been properly publicized by the makers of
wood burning stoves. This should be looked into thoroughly.
Or when a pronoun seems to refer back to a single word but is intended to refer to a
whole clause:
My brother caught my cold which made me feel bad.
Because "which" seems to refer to both "cold" and the entire base clause, the meaning
is slightly out of focus. Careful writers keep the meaning focused by making
pronoun/antecedent relationships totally and immediately clear. It isn't enough to
say readers who want to understand your meaning will if they work hard enough.
Your reader should connect your pronoun with its antecedent at once.
To make the reference clear you could change the wording slightly:
The danger of creosote build-up has not been properly publicized by the makers of
wood burning stoves. This lack of publicity should be looked into thoroughly.
You may want to re-word the entire sentence and eliminate the pronoun:
I felt bad that my brother caught my cold.
First, notice the problem, and having seen it, eliminate any ambiguity.
Activity
4.14 Edit the following sentences for clear pronoun reference.
a. This car has a small dent. It shouldn't be much of a problem.
b. The car drove slowly along the back road. It was quite muddy.
c. I got home late from my date, which was okay.
d. The foothills were covered with flowers. They were many different varieties.
e. The beach was littered with broken glass. I think the park service should look into
it.
f. I like his ideas about fall gardens. They just make sense.
g. Whenever the ladies made gingerbread men for the children, they looked delighted.
h. Miss Waldman said if I worked hard I could still get an A or a B, but it didn't
happen.
i. The sun was hot, and although the water was polluted, it made me want to dive in
anyhow
j. The faster I walked, the more water spilled out of the bucket, and it became a real
nuisance.

Six Problem Areas - Shift in Tense

Shift in Tense
The tense of your verb tells when events are taking place—whether in the past, the present, or
the future. Early in your writing process, establish a "base tense" for your paper, and shift
away from it only for good reason. If you're writing about past events, use the past tense as
your base tense. If you're writing about the present or the future, build around one of those
tenses.

Early in your writing process, establish a "base tense" for your paper, and shift

away from it only for good reason.

We went into Bruno's and ordered a pizza. The waitress comes over and brings us our
Change:
drinks. I can see she's going to spill one.

We went into Bruno's and ordered a pizza. As the waitress came back with our drinks, I
to: could see she was going to spill one.

The first example, perhaps effective in casual conversation, isn't precise enough for writing.
We can't tell what happened when. The second version locates the experience in the past. Of
course when, as in the following example, logic insists you change tense—you should.
During high school I lived with my parents, but now I live with a close friend. Someday I will
have a family of my own.
Activity
4.15 Edit the following paragraph for consistency in tense.
The first thing I hear was the terrible scream of somebody's voice blending into the
squeal of rubber as we come hurtling down on the Honda from behind. It's my little
sister, both hands pressed to the sides of her head, while my dad tried to push the
brakes through the floor. Then suddenly we're going sideways, and I see a big church
come floating across the windshield. Then I knew we'll crash.

Six Problem Areas - Shift in Person

Shift in Person
Here again, the goal is to be clear and consistent. This time, however, the aim is to establish a
steady, reliable point of view. Doing so helps the reader understand where the two of you
stand in relation to the subject, and generally helps build a strong writer/reader relationship.
Change: Helga is my best friend. She won't let a person down. You can always count on
her to be there when you need help.

to: Helga is my best friend. She won't let me down. I can always count on her to
be there when I need help.

... the aim is to establish a steady, reliable point of view.

The writer is probably talking about her own relationship with Helga, not the reader's.
Keeping point of view consistent in all three sentences makes that clear.
For our purposes, the main points of view from which to choose correspond to the persons on
the Person/Number Chart. Thus, writing based on the first person singular point of view
uses "I" and "me" as its foundation, while writing based on the third person plural would use
"they" and "them."
First person singular: This point of view is often effective for informal writing, especially for
writing about your personal interests and experiences. It draws attention to the writer, which
may or may not be a good thing.
I have always enjoyed crocheting for the relaxation it provides me.
First person plural: Slightly more formal than first person singular, this point of view can
convey a sense that you and the reader are partners. It takes emphasis away from the writer as
an individual and places emphasis on whatever group is designated by "we."
When we look closely at last month's sales figures, we can see what the future holds for our
company.
Second person singular or plural: Used carefully, this point of view can make readers feel
you are speaking directly to them, are in a sense looking directly at them. Sometimes,
however, the second person is blurred into a weak or ineffective substitute for another, more
appropriate point of view. Like first person singular, it is generally most effective in personal
and informal writing.
strong: You can't imagine how much Helen enjoyed talking with you the other day.
weak: You had to be willing to give a hundred percent whenever you went out on the floor or
Coach Bavasi would bench you.
Third person singular and plural: These points of view distance you from your subject and
your reader. They make your writing less personal and more formal. They are used for much
academic, technical, and scientific writing where tradition or the subject demands an air of
distance and objectivity.
A person who violates any of the following laws can expect to receive prompt and immediate
punishment. (third person singular)
Students who wish to graduate in June should have their transcripts reviewed by their
advisors. (third person plural)
Note: Choosing a dominant point of view doesn't mean you've limited yourself to a single set
of pronouns for your whole paper, only that departures from the dominant point of view
should be logical and effective.
I hope you told them we would be late.
Activity
4.16 Rewrite the following paragraph twice, each time from a different point of view.
At the entrance of the canyon you could see the vegetation change radically. What
struck you most was the sparse, stunted growth of plants otherwise similar to those
you had seen a few miles back where the river, calmer and wider, took you through a
lush, open area covered with huge trees and some of the longest grasses you had ever
seen.

Six Problem Areas - Misrelated Modifier

Misrelated Modifier

The reader shouldn't have to guess what you're trying to say.

All modifiers should connect clearly and immediately with the words you want them
to modify. The reader shouldn't have to guess what you're trying to say.
Change: Louisa saw some strange mushrooms
playing in the park.

to: While playing in the park, Louisa saw some

strange mushrooms.

Probably it wasn't the mushrooms but Louisa playing in the park. By placing the
modifying phrase right next to the word it modifies, we eliminate the confusion.
Sometimes careless modifier placement can create several possible meanings.
Change: All afternoon I reminisced about friends I had known with my sister.

to: All afternoon I reminisced with my sister about friends I had known.

or: All afternoon I reminisced about friends my sister and I had known.

or: All afternoon my sister and I reminisced about friends we had known.

In the first example "with my sister" is confusing because it could modify either
"reminisced" or "had known" or both. The writer has a responsibility to make such
relationships clear.
Activity
4.17 Edit the following sentences for clarity of modification.
a. Rounding the corner too quickly, a light post was sheared-off by the school bus.
b. By not doing my assignments, the course was flunked.
c. After considering all the evidence, the defendant was convicted by a jury of his
peers.
d. I found a ripe apple on the counter, which I ate.
e. We have harder lessons for advanced students with difficult problems.
f. I saw him break the window drinking in the park.

Basic Punctuation
Punctuation need not be mysterious or problematic. The number of punctuation
marks is small, and once mastered, they become tools that help shape your meaning
and vary the rhythms and patterns of your sentences.
Commas, periods, and apostrophes are three basic marks you can't get along without.
Quotation marks, also, are often necessary. First master those four, then move on to
the others.
Although you're probably familiar with these marks, take time to read the brief
discussions in this section. Each discussion begins with an explanation of how the
mark is used, including examples of correct and incorrect use, and ends with some
activities for application and practice.
But don't stop with the activities; carry your new punctuation expertise over into your
writing. That's the real point of it all.

Basic Punctuation - Commas

Commas
The most common and most misunderstood punctuation mark must be the comma,
yet it needn't cause headaches if we keep its basic function in mind. In fact, the
common statement, "I use a comma whenever I want a pause in my sentence," shows
a good understanding of comma use: to identify word groups and mark divisions
within the sentence.
Because we often intuit or "hear" these divisions, we naturally pause for an instant.
An ear for these language rhythms can help, but it isn't enough. Because readers
expect commas to appear at certain points in a sentence, some comma uses must be
learned. When you can apply these four rules and supplement them with your
intuition, you'll know all you need to know about commas.

When you can apply these four rules and supplement them with your intuition,
you'll know all you need to know about commas.

1. Use a comma before a coordinating conjunction that joins independent clauses.

This rule's meaning should be clear from our discussion of Basic Sentence Concepts.
The rule is easy to understand and follow, yet failure to observe it accounts for about
one-third of all comma errors. In a sentence like the following, a comma goes before
the conjunction that marks the important division in thought:
 Change: Nadine hit a high pop-up and the pitcher caught it.

to: Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.
The comma helps readers see the main division of thought, and in doing so keeps
them from momentarily thinking Nadine hit "a high pop-up" and "the pitcher."
Sometimes in a sentence this short, no comma is needed, but as in the sentence
above, a comma can often make the meaning immediately apparent. Notice, this rule
doesn't ask for a comma before every coordinating conjunction, just those that
connect independent clauses.
2. Use a comma to set off introductory elements, especially those that contain a verb
or a verb form.
As this present sentence shows, a writer will sometimes hold back the subject of a
sentence for a moment, leading up to it with an introductory phrase or clause. Putting
a comma at the point where the introductory element ends and the main clause
begins signals your readers that they've come to the start of the base clause and
prevents them from running the two elements together.
Change: When she finally swung Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.

to: When she finally swung, Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.

That slight pause before "Nadine," lets readers see that "Nadine" begins a new
thought unit, the base clause. Even shorter introductory elements should be set off
with commas if they contain a verb or verb form.
Change: Swinging fiercely Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.

to: Swinging fiercely, Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.
"Swinging" is a verb form, a participle. Another verb form commonly found in
introductory elements in the infinitive:
To cap it off, Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.
"To cap" is the infinitive. Always separate these participial and infinitive phrases from
the base clause with a comma.
When the introductory element contains no verb or verb form, use your own
judgment based partly on the length of the introductory element and partly on how
closely you want to connect it with the base clause.
In the last inning Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the pitcher caught it.
In the last inning of the final game of the season, Nadine hit a high pop-up, and the
pitcher caught it.
In the first example above, the introductory phrase is short and contains no verb or
verb form. It could be set off or not, at the writer's preference. The element
introducing the second sentence, however, is longer, and a comma signals the
reader's short-term memory to process the information before going on to the main
clause.
3. Use commas to set an interrupting element off from the rest of the sentence.
Of our four rules, this one, because it covers a variety of grammatical situations, is
hardest to explain. Fortunately, in most situations, as right now, you can pick the
interruption up with your ear, which senses that something has been inserted into the
sentence, breaking the rhythmic flow. A comma helps the reader to sense this
interruption as something separate from, something inserted into, the rest of the
sentence, a kind of supplementary comment.
One common kind of interrupter is a clause, a phrase, or even a single word that adds
incidental information about a more basic sentence element. Usually the interrupter
comes right after the element it modifies.
If, as sometimes happens, you are unsure whether a modifier is restrictive or not,
trust your ear. Listen for a pause.
Does your ear detect the interrupter in the following example?
My uncle Ben who showed me this spot is quite a fisherman.
If you can also recognize that "who showed me this spot" adds information about Ben
without selecting him from a larger group, then you can see why the information is
considered incidental, or non-restrictive, and why the element is considered an
interruption. Now try to hear an interruption in the following sentence:
The man who showed me this spot is quite a fisherman.
The natural pause disappears, and with it the need for commas, because "who showed
me this spot" is no longer incidental information. Now "who showed me this spot"
selects from a large number of possible men the one man being talked about. In other
words, it restricts the meaning of the word it modifies. That's why the pause
disappears and also why no commas are needed to set the expression off.
Single-word modifiers can also be restrictive or non-restrictive and are treated the
same as restrictive and non-restrictive clauses.
Marvin, my brother, plays a wicked sax.
My brother Marvin plays a wicked sax.
In the first sentence, "my brother" adds extra information about Marvin and
therefore needs to be set off. The second sentence doesn't need commas because
"Marvin" selects from all possible brothers the one being talked about and is
therefore restrictive. If, as sometimes happens, you are unsure whether a modifier is
restrictive or not, trust your ear. Listen for a pause.
Other incidental interrupters that should be set off with commas are easy to identify
and seldom cause trouble. The most common are: "yes" and "no":
Yes, I'd love a lemonade.
Names of people spoken to:
I'm afraid, my friend, that it's all gone.
And miscellaneous words and phrases moved out of a more natural word order:
This, for a thirsty pilgrim, was unwelcome news.
4. Use a comma to separate items in a series.
This rule is easy to understand and follow. The series below would be punctuated
correctly by almost everyone:
Plowing, planting, and harvesting were our biggest jobs.
The Yankees finished ahead of the Tigers, the Red Sox, and the Indians last year.
Some you win, some you lose, and some get rained out.
Another simple kind of series is a series of place-names:
Bartlesville, Oklahoma, is where I learned to use chopsticks.
A sequence of dates can also be treated as a series:
Friday, September 29, 1928, was a bad day for investors.
Finally, a series of adjectives modifying a single base word should be separated with
commas unless the words are frequently paired:
That tattered, faded couch had become a good friend.
I found it in a quiet little village by the sea..
A Final Word on Commas
The four rules above will cover almost all situations; however, when a situation isn't
clearly covered by any rule, two more guidelines may help.
1. Use a comma to prevent possible misreadings.
Change: What he had done told more about him than what he said.

to: What he had done, told more about him than what he said.

2. When in doubt, leave it out.

This explains itself. Over-punctuation can cause confusion as easily as under-
punctuation. If you can't think of a good reason to use a comma, you probably
shouldn't.
Activity
4.18 Using the four guidelines you just studied, supply commas wherever needed in
the following sentences. Some sentences may not need to be changed at all. Others
may need to have commas removed.
a. From some of the most remote parts of the country people came to the
inauguration.
b. Many are called but few, are chosen.
c. What will you do with a rusted dilapidated car like that?
d. If you ever get to Boise Idaho give me a call.
e. Dan tried every trick in his bag but the ball wouldn't fall.
f. The big walleyes seem, to go for these bright yellow lures, but the crappies just take
jigs.
g. The town, where I grew up was quiet but the people weren't.
h. When he came home, my father brought a souvenir from Seoul Korea where he was
stationed and one from Honolulu, Hawaii where he stopped on the way back.
i. For people who don't drink this can be a serious problem.
j. Carol had wanted many things, in her life, but she couldn't remember wanting
anything, quite as much as this exciting challenging job.
k. Often we'd lie awake far into the night telling jokes and swapping stories about
friends we'd known back home.
1. Last summer Larry bought a light blue RX 7 which he totaled a week later.

Basic Punctuation - Semicolons

Semicolons
Semicolons have two principal uses:
1. Use a semicolon to join two independent clauses into a single sentence.
Examples:
Senator Petrie is out kissing babies again. This must be an election year.
Senator Petrie is out kissing babies again; this must be an election year.
2. Use a semicolon to separate items in a series when those items contain internal
punctuation.
Example:
I've lived in Hattiesburg, Mississippi; Detroit, Michigan; Manhattan, Kansas; and
Boise, Idaho.
Semicolons help the reader to see the individual items more clearly than would be
possible with commas alone.
Activity
4.19 Re-write the following sentences using semicolons whenever appropriate.
a. By now, Marie Antoinette had totally lost favor with the people. They would believe
nothing she said.
b. In the midst of this confusion, Arnold did his best to keep calm however, he was
unsuccessful.
c. When you purchase a camera, you will want to consider its features, both
convenience and performance related, its lens quality, probably the most important
single factor, and its price.
d. The GNP is not a very sensitive economic indicator, still it tells us the essentials.
e. The place was empty, the lights were out.

Basic Punctuation - Periods

Periods
The period is a terminal mark. That means it marks the end of a sentence. It brings your
reader to a full stop, gives the sentence a chance to sink in, and tells the reader the thought
unit is complete. Effective use of the period requires knowing where your sentences begin and
end.
Change: The room was empty. When we first got there.

to: The room was empty when we first got there.

The first example above is split in two by the period, which separates the base clause from the
dependent clause. The period falsely signals that the thought is complete, but it isn't. As a
result, "When we first got there" is left alone, an orphan, a dependent clause with no base
clause to depend on. It's a fragment punctuated as a complete sentence. Rejoining the
fragment to its base clause solves the problem.

Effective use of the period requires knowing where your sentences begin and
end.
Sometimes the opposite happens. The end of a sentence arrives, but instead of bringing the
reader to a full stop, the writer plunges ahead with no break.
Change: It was a wonderful party we had a marvelous time.

to: It was a wonderful party. We had a marvelous time.

or: It was a wonderful party; we had a wonderful time.

or: It was wonderful party, and we had a marvelous time.

Don't run independent clauses together without punctuation or splice them

together with only a comma.

The first example fuses two base clauses into one sentence, causing a momentary double take.
To make the meaning clear, we need to emphasize the thought divisions by punctuating the
independent clauses as complete sentences, or by joining them with a semicolon, or with a
comma and a coordinating conjunction. A comma alone is not enough.
Change: My legs were starting to weaken, my back was ready to give out.

to: My legs were starting to weaken. My back was ready to give out.

or: My legs were starting to weaken; my back was ready to give out.

or: My legs were starting to weaken, and my back was ready to give out.

Don't run independent clauses together without punctuation or splice them together with only
a comma. Join them solidly with a comma and coordinating conjunction, or separate them
completely with a period. Likewise, don't split dependent elements off from their base clause.
The word "dependent" means they can't stand alone as complete sentences. Essentially, if you
know where every sentence begins and ends, you won't have trouble with periods.
Activity
4.20 Edit the following sentences for periods. In some cases you will find more than one
possible version.
a. My father is a busy man. But a generous one. And a kind one.
b. I like going to the dog races when I get off work they really relax me.
c. If you knew what we had to put up with, you might show a little more sympathy,
you might even try to help us. And not act so smug.
d. Whichever way you go. You will get there in about the same amount of time. A little
more than an hour.
e. Little children must be taught to use caution. Crossing the street or walking out in a
parking lot. They could get killed in a minute. Or maimed for life.
Basic Punctuation - Apostrophes
Apostrophes
Apostrophes have two main uses: to indicate possession and to indicate contractions.
Most difficulties occur with the first use or with using the apostrophe to form regular
plurals.
Change: Janets new car has several energy-saving feature's.

to: Janet's new car has several energy-saving features.

"Janet's" needs an apostrophe to show that the car belongs to her, but since nothing
is possessed by the "feature's," that apostrophe is misleading and should be deleted.
1. Indicating Possession. Strictly speaking, the relationship of possession is the
relationship of ownership. In writing, this relationship is indicated by adding an 's to
show singular possession and to show plural possession when the standard plural
form doesn't end in s. Possessives of plurals that end in s are formed by adding just
the apostrophe.
Singular possessives: the boy's hands, the heart's heat, the dog's fleas, Monday's
paper, the bass's scales, Charles's snowshoes.
Plural possessives: the boys' hands, the dogs' fleas, the basses' scales, the geese's
honking, the women's caucus, the mice's holiday.
Notice that while possession often includes ownership, it sometimes does not. For
example, while Charles clearly owns his snowshoes, it's less clear that the dog owns
its fleas. In fact, the fleas may think they own the dog. Still, granting the absence of
legal ownership, we can say that the dog "has" fleas. But what about Monday's paper?
The paper is not possessed by a day of the week. Yet we consider it to be the "paper of
Monday" just as the fleas are "the fleas of the dog." Somehow they go together. That's
what the apostrophe shows us.
2. Indicating Contractions. The apostrophe can also indicate that letters have been
left out of a word or that numbers have been dropped from a date. Notice that the
apostrophe goes in the place that the letters or numbers have been removed from, not
at the spot where the two contracted words are joined together.
Change: You shouldnt go into that.

or: You should'nt go into that.

to: You shouldn't go into that.

Further examples:
Most members of the class of 2004 can't imagine what it was like to go to school in
the 1930's.
'04 was a good year for me, but I wouldn't want to live it over again.

A Special Case
One word that doesn't conform to the guidelines above is "its." Because the word is
used so frequently, it's worth learning its ways. When "its" is a contraction for "it is,"
it takes an apostrophe. When "its" indicates possession, no apostrophe is used.
Change: Its a shame that it's wings were damaged.

to: It's a shame that its wings were damaged.

The first "its" is a contraction for "it is." The second is a possessive and therefore
needs no apostrophe.

Activity
4.21 Edit the following sentences for apostrophes.
a. The cookie's Bobs mother made tasted like baking soda.
b. Thats what happen's when she lets the kid's help.
c. The snow's crust had been broken in several place's.
d. If youre looking for Patti, shes down at the Womens Crisis Center.
e. Todays newspaper brought more conflicting reports on the hostages' release.
f. Its not its color that I object to. Its its strange shape.
g. Those boys hand's were caked with clay from the mines entrance.

Basic Punctuation - Question Marks

Question Marks
Question marks show that a statement should be read as a question. Although it
might make more sense, as in Spanish, to put question marks at both the beginning
and end of the question, in English the question mark comes only at the end.
You're twenty-five years old?
When will we get there?
Who ate Rodney's bananas?
Is it really that simple?

Basic Punctuation - Exclamation Marks

Exclamation Marks
Exclamation mark indicate that a statement is extremely important or is spoken in a loud
voice. Use them sparingly. Otherwise, your writing can sound like shouting all the way
through; and when you need to raise your voice, you'll be stuck for a way to do it except with
multiple marks, which is not recommended.
Change: But honestly! I'm not guilty!! I swear it!!!

to: But honestly, I'm not guilty. I swear it!

Just as inflation hits our dollars so that we need two or three to do what one could do in the
past, so it can hit our language. Simply turning down the volume is an effective way to fight
verbal inflation.
Activity
4.22 Punctuate the following sentences. In some cases, the best punctuation will depend on
what you want to make the unpunctuated sentence mean.
a. Isnt that Roberts boat over there by the cove
b. When youve done your best youve got nothing to apologize for. c. I know its easy
for some people but I always have trouble.
d. Ouch thats my foot youre standing on.
e. The Royals the Rangers and the Angels all have a shot at the pennant but none of
them will get past the Pirates.
f. After settling into our pace we knew we could go the distance. g. These shoes which
cost me $60.00 havent worn well at all and theyve never been comfortable.
h. I hate to tell you this Bob but I just sat on your lunch.
i. Natalie my favorite aunt ate supper with us last night we had a wonderful time.
j. All up and down both sides of the block people came rushing outside to watch the
parade pass.
k. When I go to the beach I just like to lie in the sun watch the people and maybe play
a little Frisbee where I go the ocean is much too cold for swimming.
1. That car has more than good mileage I'm thinking about its styling performance
and reliability.
m. Once you find the key which is never in the same place twice the rest is easy.
n. Helicopter pilots who don't have common sense dont live long.
o. If you can do all these correctly which isnt easy you can feel pretty good about your
skill with commas, apostrophes, periods, question marks, and exclamation marks.

Basic Punctuation - Quotation Marks

Quotation Marks
You're probably familiar with these, and you may have used them occasionally. The
following guidelines and activities will help you use them more effectively.
1. Use quotation marks to enclose a direct quotation. This means that whenever you want to
include someone's exact words in a passage of your own writing, you should surround those
words with quotation marks.
As I walked away from the car, the attendant asked, "Did you leave your key in the ignition?"
It was a good thing he asked.
Quotation marks help your reader distinguish your words from those you are quoting. They
also tell the reader that these are the source's exact words, that you have not rephrased or
altered them in any way. If you change them even slightly, do not mislead the reader into
thinking that they are exact. Notice the difference in the following statements.
Indirect quotation: President Kennedy said that we should ask what we can do for our country
rather than what our country can do for us.
Direct quotation: President Kennedy said, "And so my fellow Americans, ask not what your
country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country."
Both examples are satisfactory. The first doesn't give Kennedy's exact words, but it doesn't
claim to; the second does give Kennedy's exact words and signals that fact by putting them in
quotation marks. The following example misuses quotation marks.
Misquotation: President Kennedy said that "we should ask not what our country can do for us
but what we can do for our country."
2. Use quotation marks to enclose the titles of stories, poems, and articles when they appear
in the body of your paper. Do not use them to enclose your own title at the beginning of your
essay. The titles of books, magazines, plays, and motion pictures should be underlined or
italicized.
Example: I haven't yet finished Dubliners, but so far my favorite story is "A Little Cloud."
3. Use quotation marks to enclose words used in an unusual or unexpected way, especially
when the words come from another language context or when they are spoken of as words.
Examples:
My cousin liked a "spot o' tea" as much as I liked a "slug a' whisky."
The word "mob" has an interesting history.
A Final Word on Quotation Marks

At the end of a quotation, periods and commas always go inside quotation

marks. All other marks go inside only if they are part of the quoted material.

Even after you've learned the above rules for using quotation marks, you may encounter
tricky situations, especially when other punctuation marks are used with them. Most
problems, however, can be avoided by learning the following rule:
At the end of a quotation, periods and commas always go inside quotation marks. All other
marks go inside only if they are part of the quoted material.
Examples:
We read a story called "The Egg."
Have you ever read "The Egg"?
Just then Dr. Klein asked, "Who wrote 'The Egg'?"
"Sherwood Anderson wrote 'The Egg,"' I replied.
"Why?" Dr. Klein asked.
Activities
4.23 Some of the following sentences are direct quotations, some are indirect. If the sentence
contains a direct quotation, punctuate it correctly. If it contains an indirect quotation, reword
the sentence to make the quotation direct, adding the necessary punctuation.
a. Tim's father said that the new accounting system was a pain in the neck.
b. Now you've really messed things up Arthur shouted.
c. Who said there's a sucker born every minute?
d. The policeman said that our dog had to be on a leash.
e. How was the Chem test Miranda inquired.
f. Grandma asked us to play You Can't Get to Heaven in a Rocking Chair.
g. Doesn't it seem strange that our money says In God We Trust asked the Reverend
Ike.
h. Dora said that she would pay whatever she had to for that antique clock.
i. You can't get blood from a turnip my mother used to say. j. Patrick Henry said to
give him liberty or give him death.
Basic Punctuation - Brackets and ellipses
Brackets and Ellipses
These two marks are often used in connection with quotations. Brackets are used
when you want to insert something in a quotation, and ellipses are used when you
want to cut something out.
Original statement: "Another mistake there may be in the Picture of our first
Parents, who after the manner of their posterity are both delineated with a Navell." —
Sir Thomas Browne
Quoted version: "Another mistake there may be in the Picture of our first Parents
[Adam and Eve], who ... are both delineated with a Navell." — Sir Thomas Browne
Brackets tell us that "Adam and Eve" do not belong to the original passage but have
been inserted by the person quoting it. Likewise, the ellipsis tells us that between
"who" and "are" some words have been omitted. Otherwise, the quoted version is
scrupulously true to the original, even maintaining Browne's antique spelling and
capitalization.
Notice how the brackets and the ellipsis are indicated. Brackets (sometimes called
square brackets) have distinct corners in contrast with parentheses (sometimes call
curves). An ellipsis consists of three consecutive periods, each preceded and followed
by a space. When the ellipsis comes at the end of a sentence, a fourth dot (the
sentence's period) is added.
Example: Notice how the brackets and the ellipsis are indicated. . . . An ellipsis
consists of three consecutive periods, each preceded and followed by a space.
Activity
4.24 Find three examples of quotations that make use of brackets and three that
make use of ellipses. Look for examples in books or in advertisements for books or
movies. Briefly explain why the marks have or have not been used effectively.

Basic Punctuation - Colons

Colons
The colon provides a formal introduction, especially to a series or to a quotation. Use
it to bring your readers to a complete stop and focus their attention on what follows.
Notice how colons work in the following examples:
Without colon: All campers should have a warm sweater, a swimming suit,
toothbrush and toothpaste, and enough clothing to last for a week.
With colon: All campers should have the following items: a warm sweater, a
swimming suit, toothbrush and toothpaste, and enough clothing to last a week.
Without colon: The law says, "Any person convicted of the possession of more than
one ounce of this substance shall be sentenced to not less than ten nor more than
twenty years in a state correctional institution."
With colon: The law reads as follows: "Any person convicted of the possession of
more than one ounce of this substance shall be sentenced to not less than ten nor
more than twenty years in a state correctional institution."
In both cases the wording has been changed slightly to emphasize the formal
introduction and to bring the rhythm to a full stop. That's important. Don't give
conflicting signals by letting the sentence rhythm suggest continuation and then
inserting a colon, which suggests a complete stop.
Conflicting signals: Sarah participates in: tennis, golf, and gymnastics.
More consistent: Sarah participates in three sports: tennis, golf, and gymnastics.
Activity
4.25 Write five sentences that make use of the colon. When you have finished, rewrite
the sentences without colons.

Basic Punctuation - Dashes

Dashes
Dashes are so easily abused that most discussions of them are sprinkled with warnings and
cautions about overuse. That's because inexperienced writers, learning the dash indicates a
pause or a shift in the direction of thought, sometimes use it in place of commas and even
periods. It's true that the dash should be used sparingly. However, sometimes no other mark
will better capture your intended meaning.
1. Use a dash to introduce a base clause summarizing a series of introductory elements.
Example: Murder, armed robbery, extortion—these are all major felonies.
2. Use a pair of dashes to set off a sentence interrupter that contains internal punctuation.
Example: I noticed that the tulips—dusty, faded, slightly rubbery—were not real.
Used this way, dashes show the interrupter as a whole composed of parts. In doing this, they
also emphasize the interrupter.
3. Use a dash to attach an afterthought to a sentence that already feels complete.
Example: Last week my daughter phoned to say that she had bought a new pet—a trained
armadillo.
Used carefully, the dash can be effective, but use it deliberately. Don't, for example, use a
dash to attach trailers to your base clause in a cumulative sentence. The dash creates the
feeling that what follows it has been tacked on as an afterthought—a surprise.
Activity
4.26 Read the following sentences and comment on the ways in which they do or don't make
effective use of the dash. Change sentences that should be changed, and be ready to explain
your decisions to the rest of the class.
a. Whenever I eat those green apples, I get sick-really sick.
b. Through several generations of interbreeding, these species of trout, the cutthroat,
the rainbow, and the California golden, had become almost indistinguishable.
c. By this time the educational system was already in trouble—the bond issue had
been defeated, soundly thrashed.
d. One of the most important thinkers of our century—Ludwig Wittgenstein is almost
unknown in this country.
e. The eager young fighter out to make his mark; the ambitious, fast-living girlfriend;
the kindhearted trainer-it's a familiar story. f. The local historical society is fighting to
preserve that cabin which-they feel-is an important landmark.
g. General Jackson was waiting for a break in the weather—but he was waiting in
vain.
h. Flatfooted, overweight, dreamy Milton had no business trying—out for
quarterback.
i. The spotted salamander generally makes its home under rotted logs—or among
piles of dead leaves.
j. Many people, old, young, and in between, are beginning to wonder about their
chances for a secure retirement.

Basic Punctuation - Parentheses

Parentheses
Use parentheses to enclose interruptions that are awkward to work into a sentence's
normal punctuation. Parentheses de-emphasize the words they enclose (in contrast
with the dash, which emphasizes), and they allow you to make supplementary
comments about your main ideas. As with the dash, use them sparingly. Too many
parentheses or unusually long parenthetical statements distract readers by setting up
a whispering undercurrent to your main line of thought.
Consider the following examples:
My Military Occupational Specialty (MOS) was helicopter maintenance.
The huge bouquet of roses (imitation, no doubt) sat in a corner of the darkened room.
Volkswagen (the name means "people's car") once built a sales campaign around
being ugly.
For many years the champ worked out at a gym run by the Police Athletic League
(PAL).
Activity
4.27 Write five sentences that illustrate the use of parentheses. Make sure that at least
one of your sentences contains a complete sentence in parentheses, one an
abbreviation in parentheses, and one a parenthetical statement at the end. You may
use the examples above as models for imitation. Then exchange and discuss them
with a partner.

Capitalization
Our language, unlike German and a few others, uses capital letters sparingly; and
usually writers who have trouble with capitalization use too many rather than too few
capital letters. Of the guidelines below, the two general ones are the most important.
The others, while worth studying and learning, can be considered special conventions
because their use is limited to a relatively small number of specialized situations.
General Conventions
1. Capitalize the first letter of the first word of each sentence you write.
Too much ketchup spoils the steak.
Why don't you order a hamburger?
2. Capitalize the first letter of proper names and of adjectives derived them.
I thought Lennie was driving.
I've always wanted to visit Nepal.
The English language is like a spaceship.
You have to hand it to Mr. Park.
Special Conventions
1. Capitalize north, south, east, and west and their compounds only when they
designate an actual place, not when they point in a direction.
I've always loved the beauty and freedom of the Southwest.
The East is heavily industrialized.
Go west two blocks and then head north.
2. Capitalize the first word of a title of a book, magazine, story, essay, or play; and
capitalize all other important words also.
We really enjoyed The Taming of the Shrew.
I want to renew my subscription to Ebony.
Have you ever read "A Good Man Is Hard to Find"?
3. Capitalize the official title of a person when you use it with the person's name.
This award goes to Major Burckhardt.
I voted for Senator Wurgel.
You can get away with it if you're a general.
4. Capitalize the names of months and of days of the week.
I'll be going on Tuesday, November 23.
Activity
4.23 Supply capitalization to the following sentences.
a. this new toyota belongs to uncle myron.
b. our drama club at shoreline college did an excellent performance of the fantasticks.
c. i've always done better in math than in english.
d. last night we saw woman in the dunes.
e. i slipped the note to senator kaufmann.
f. the most beautiful city i've ever seen is San diego.
g. to someone newly up from the south, detroit felt cold and frightening.
h. my sister came back from miss valerie's school of dance with a dream of joining the
pennsylvania ballet.

A Note on Spelling
There's no quick, easy way to overcome spelling problems. This is true partly because our
English spelling system is complex and difficult to explain logically.

Even computer spell-checkers can cause problems for unwary users.

Also, most spelling habits are formed early when we're learning to read. As we grow older,
those habits, good or bad, become almost automatic, and often we spell without thinking
about whether we're right or wrong. Even computer spell-checkers can cause problems for
unwary users.
If you have trouble with spelling, then, you need to do more than learn a few words. You need
to form new spelling habits, and the most important is to make spelling a conscious activity.
This can be frustrating if you interrupt your writing to look up a word, only to find you knew
how to spell it all along. Because spelling improvement is as important as it is difficult,
however, you can't afford to let it slide. The suggestions that follow are intended to help you
develop good spelling habits.
Suggestions for Spelling Improvement
1. Don't look words up while you're composing. Wait until your thought-flow runs its course.
As you write, highlight or mark any words you aren't absolutely sure about. Then later when
editing, your attention will go right to these words and you can look them up all at once
without interrupting and losing track of your thoughts. By looking up words later, you also
can concentrate on learning to spell them correctly so you won't have to look them up again.
You might even consider keeping a list of Target Words to concentrate on.
2. Every time you write a word ask yourself whether you know how to spell it. There are only
two possible answers to this question: yes and no. Maybe, probably, and I think so all count as
no. If the answer is yes, keep on writing, but if the answer is no, mark the word to look up.
Most spelling errors come not on words like "cataclysmic," which you know you need to look
up, but on words like "front," where you think the odds are with you.
3. Notice what part of the word you've spelled wrong. Hardly ever do you spell a whole word
wrong. Usually one or two letters need to be changed. Find the trouble spot by comparing the
dictionary version with the version you've already written down. Sometimes a memory prod
will help you get those letters right next time. For example, you might learn to spell
"environment" by remembering that it has the word "iron" in it.
4. Watch out for words that sound like other ones. Here the problem isn't so much spelling as
using the wrong word, as when someone says, "I don't care weather it rains." Besides
"whether" and "weather," some other frequently confused words are listed below. These
words are especially treacherous because computer spell-checkers won't pick them up.
a — an — and
our — hour — are
accept — except
personal — personnel
cite — site — sight
quiet — quite — quit
cloths — clothes
roll — role
desert — dessert
soul — sole
do — due
than — then
led — lead
there — their — they're
loose — lose
to — too — two
moral — morale
wear — where — were
new — knew
who's — whose
no — know
your — you're
past — passed
Activities
4.24 Use each of the above-listed words correctly in a complete sentence. Use a dictionary to
check the meaning of any word you aren't sure of. Exchange and compare your sentences with
those done by a partner.
4.25 As a partner dictates the following passage, transcribe it onto a sheet of paper. When
you've finished, check back over what you've written to see if all sound-alikes have been used
correctly. Check your writing slowly. Actually touch each word with your pen or pencil.
Examine every part of every word. When you're satisfied, check your version against the
version below. Again, actually touch each word with your pencil or pen. Notice which sound-
alikes give you problems, look them up in a dictionary, and learn to use them correctly.

The Good Old Days

Folks don't always do what they're supposed to do, not like they used to when I was a kid.
Too often these days people think life's just a game, but back then it was more than that. A
person knew where he stood. People were kind to each other and honest, but now we're all
confused about our values. Our values are too superficial. Our standards are too loose. There
aren't many folks around who know their own minds. You're never sure who your friends are
anymore. It just keeps on getting worse.
4.26 Make your own Target List of frequently misspelled words. Keep it on your desk or
with your writing equipment so you can refer to it easily and work on the words. Mark the
part of the word that you tend to spell wrong, focus on that part, and when you've learned the
word, check it off as learned.
Target List
My Spelling Correct Spelling Learned

disastrous disastrous x

paralell parallel

psycology psychology

reciept receipt

predjudice prejudice

Informal Essays
Occasions for Informal Essays
A thoughtful letter to an old friend, a reflection on your education or ethnic heritage, a
childhood reminiscence—these could all be informal essays. In writing, informality depends
less on subject or structure than on the writing context. Informal essays assume a personal
stance. They suggest close connections among writer, reader, and subject.
 It's a kind of writing that helps us learn who we are as people, helps us define our

values and clarify our vision.

Whatever the subject, and it could be almost anything, the writer is part of it, perhaps the
central figure exploring a personal ritual or an Arctic island, maybe attending a concert or a
political demonstration. In any case, we enter the writer's mind. We experience the writer's
emotions. It's a kind of writing that helps us learn who we are as people, helps us define our
values and clarify our vision.
Like fiction and poetry, informal essays are imaginative excursions, and so, are sometimes
called "creative nonfiction." Henry David Thoreau, Virginia Woolf, George Orwell, James
Baldwin, Maxine Hong Kingston, and Barry Lopez are some writers of informal essays whose
work you might know already or enjoy discovering.

Writing a Story
Informal essays are often written as stories that trace a sequence of events from beginning to
end, with occasional intervals of description or analysis.
The overall movement is forward in time, but with chances along the way to pause at points
of interest. Remembering this, you won't feel you're getting sidetracked when folding in some
description or explanation. Once you've finished a passage of analysis or description, you can
return to the time line and continue moving forward to the conclusion.
Sticking to a straightforward time order can also help you sense your paper's overall shape.
This is especially true early on, when you're expanding and exploring possibilities. Later,
however, as you shape and rearrange what you've written, you may find other organizational
strategies that make your story more interesting and effective.

The overall movement is forward in time, but with chances along the way to
pause at points of interest.

Activity

5.1 Spend twenty minutes sketching out the rough shape of a story. Write quickly to get down
the overall flow of events. Follow events through from beginning to end in a time order.
Avoid mentioning concepts and emotions. Concentrate on people, places, and unfolding
incidents. Write on one of the following topics, or pick one of your own: a time you took a
risk, a time your plans backfired, a time you learned something important about your family, a
time you made a major change in lifestyle, a time you acquired a new skill, a time you gave a
gift.

Writing a Story - A Strategy of Disclosure

A Strategy of Disclosure
Whenever you write, you're presenting or disclosing information. Besides asking how
much information the reader wants or needs, you should consider the sequence in
which to present it. These, then, are two major considerations:
1. How much information will I disclose about a particular subject, an injury for
instance, during the course of my story? At what points in my story will I divulge this?
2. These two questions combine to produce a third: How much information do I want
my reader to have at each point in the story?
By the end, the reader will hear the doctor say that my injury was not serious and I
would recover quickly, but first I'll describe the blood running over my lips and into
my mouth. Then I'll tell about the slow, throbbing pain as I sat in the hospital
emergency room filling out forms. That way the reader will wonder, as I did, whether
my nose was broken.
The intent is to shape and control how information flows to your readers. While the
straight time line is a good starting point, most stories can be improved by
experimenting with disclosure strategies like those that follow.

Writing a Story - Compression and Expansion

Compression and Expansion
Compression and expansion can help you control your essay's pacing and tempo.
Actually, they aren't separate techniques so much as parts of a single technique for
controlling the time flow.

This inner-time—fluid, variable, personal—can be simulated in writing by

focusing on key scenes and developing them in detail, while other, longer
periods can be passed over in a few words

Even in real life, where the clock moves with strict regularity, minutes can seem to
drag on for hours while whole weeks vanish in an instant. This inner time—fluid,
variable, personal—can be simulated in writing by focusing on key scenes and
developing them in detail, while other, longer periods can be passedover in a few
words.
When I stood to leave, my father continued looking down at his desk, apparently lost
in memory. He shuffled a few sheets of paper, then carefully rearranged them in an
order that seemed more satisfying. When he finally looked up, I saw deep sadness in
his eyes, as though they were trying to tell me what he couldn't speak of. The
following spring, I came home again.
Here, a brief but important moment is expanded in the first three sentences, while
the last sentence compresses several months into a few words.

Writing a Story - Beginning in the Middle

Beginning in the Middle and Flashing Back
This time-tested technique goes back at least as far as ancient Greece, where Aristotle
praised it as a way of opening stories up fast and getting readers involved. We've seen
how the reader's sense of time can be compressed or expanded. Besides compressing
and expanding time, however, writers can move time around. 1945 can come before
1939. Christmas morning can come before Christmas Eve. Spring break can arrive
before midterm exams. Of course, too much disruption of normal time order, or
disruptions that are pointless or hard to follow, can only weaken your organization
and confuse readers.
The key to success lies in knowing what you're doing, and why. Imagine lifting an
incident from one point in your story and placing it somewhere else:

Now we move the middle.

Beginning in the middle allows you to hook your readers' interest by bringing them
into the story at a crucial point. Then, once you have them hooked, you can flash back
to the beginning and fill in background information before moving forward again to
the end. When using this technique, be sure to signal readers when you move forward
or backward in time.

Writing a Story – Foreshadowing

Foreshadowing and Withholding Information
Experienced storytellers, whether professional writers or old-timers around a pot-
bellied stove, know suspense keeps attention levels high. Creating and controlling
anticipation, while never simple, depends on a few basic concepts. As a writer, you
create expectations in your readers. Then you can satisfy those expectations, in which
case the suspense disappears, or delay satisfaction until the last possible moment,
thereby intensifying and prolonging the suspense.
It's the atmosphere of the weeks before Christmas. Television, newspapers, schools,
friends, and relatives all create an expectation that something important is about to
happen—a holiday, presents, festivities, celebration. Along with the expectation
comes uncertainty. Will grandma like the present I bought her? Will I get everything I
asked for? Will it snow?
 Creating and controlling suspense, while never simple, becomes easier if you
remember a few basic concepts.

This air of anticipation colored with uncertainty is the essence of suspense. To create
suspense, you hint at, but hide, what will come. Foreshadowing is the hinting.
Withholding Information is the hiding.
Who hasn't seen this scene or some variation on television? The Simpson family is
about to go camping in the mountains, but at the last minute Homer can't fit all the
equipment and the dog into the family station wagon. While he goes inside to tell
Marge, Bart experiments with a new packing arrangement, in the process removing
the spare tire and leaning it against the garage wall. When Marge comes out, she sees
some space left and slips in the few remaining items. "Just needed a mother's know-
how,"' she says as they hop in and take off, the dog playfully hanging its head out the
window. Then, as the car pulls away, we get a quick shot of the spare tire leaning
against the garage wall.
Fortunately, not all foreshadowing is this obvious and corny, but even when it is, it
often works. Every time the car goes around a curve or over a rocky road, the camera
zooms in on a tire.
So much for the foreshadowing. Where's the withholding? Don't we know the family
will get a flat tire at some crucial point? Probably so, although writers often set up
false leads along with good ones, making readers guess which are important. And
even in a situation like the one above, several unanswered questions remain. How
will it happen? When and where will it happen?

Writing a Story - Thickening the Plot

Thickening the Plot
Imagine, if you can, that while Homer is outside loading the station wagon, Marge is
inside talking with Lisa, who doesn't want to go camping at all because she has a
saxophone concert on Sunday afternoon. "Don't worry," Marge assures her, "we'll be
back in plenty of time." Now we have two stories, in a sense separate, yet intertwined
like braided strands of rope.

Every individual story is made up of other stories that overlap and

interconnect. And while this example is fictional, real life works that way, too.
Every individual story is made up of other stories that overlap and interconnect in
interesting ways.
If you notice these strands and see how they relate, you can use them to add texture
to your essay. You can shift focus like a movie camera from one story to another,
letting the reader see how the stories entwine.
Writing a Story - Tension and Opposition
Using Tension and Opposition
Wait a minute, you may be thinking. Who needs tension? Tension causes headaches
and ulcers. Why create more of that? These are good questions and deserve answers.
Writers use tension and opposition to explore the texture of experience. Most
experience contains opposition, which often produces tension, and not all tension is
bad, and not all opposition is conflict. In fact, the poet William Blake went so far as to
say, "Opposition is true Friendship." He meant that opposition produces energy and
excitement, sometimes even harmony.

Learn to recognize tension, to build it, to control and release it according to your

purposes. What would a tennis match or a horse race be without opposition? An

election? A romance? Even a guitar string isn't much good until it's put under tension
by being pulled in opposite directions. But when it's taut, the slightest touch can
produce marvelous sounds. Likewise, using opposition to control your essay's
dynamic tension can add energy and vigor.
Tension in writing takes many forms and serves many purposes. It can grow from
opposition between people, between people and their surroundings, between hopes
and realities, between tradition and change. A single essay can use several sources of
tension, exploring their interrelationships. As a writer, you should learn to recognize
tension, to build it, to control and release it according to your purposes.
Look at something you've already written to see where you've used oppositions, or
where you could increase dynamic ten- sion by developing oppositions more fully.
Ask questions like the following:
Does this go against what a person would normally expect?
Example: Forrest is terrible in math, but he's getting an 'A' in algebra.
Does this seem out of place in these surroundings?
Example: I noticed that the beautician kept scratching her scalp.
Does there appear to be an internal contradiction?
Example: In order to find yourself you have to lose yourself.
Is this part of a pair of natural opposites?
Example: The grapefruit juice was bitter after the platter of syrupy pancakes.
Is this a challenge or a struggle?
Example: Grandpa announced that he would catch the pig bare-handed.
Is this part of a contest?
Example: Pujols and A-rod shook hands in front of the dugout.
Does the language itself suggest opposition?
Example: Do you mean to suggest that the honorable senator from the great state of
Texas is a filthy crook?
Is an important change being made or contemplated?
Example: After January 15th, all of us who couldn't do twenty-five pushups would
have to wear yellow gym shorts.
This is just a partial list of possible oppositions, but it should get you going.
Is something funny going on at the same time as something sad?
Is something trivial going on at the same time as something important?
Opposition and tension add energy and force to your writing. The better you get at
exploring, extending, and interrelating oppositions, the more engaging your writing
will become.
Activity
5.2 Read back over the story sketch you wrote for Activity 5.1. Look for ways to
experiment with the information flow to your readers. Some techniques you can use
are Compression and Expansion, Beginning in the Middle and Flashing Back,
Foreshadowing and Withholding Information, Thickening the Plot, Using Tension
and Opposition. Use them alone or in combination to shape your narrative so that it
achieves your purposes and satisfies your readers. Write yourself a note describing at
least two changes, you could make in your first draft. Tell how you could incorporate
these changes and how they might alter the story's overall effect.

Writing a Story - People and Places

People and Places

Stories introduce us to people we've never met, take us to places we've never
been. They show us how events change people and how people change events.

A good story is made of more than events.Stories introduce us to people we've never
met, take us to places we've never been. They show how events change people and
how people change events. They lift us, however briefly, out of our own world and let
us experience another, the world of the story, complete with uncles, cats, blizzards,
draperies, bananas— whatever the writer chooses to include.
If you have a sense of your story's overall event flow, you may see places where you
can pause to add details about the people involved and the place where the story
happens. If you're not sure what to write, use The Journalist's
Questions or Dramatism to spark ideas.
Activity
5.3 Freewrite for 10 minutes on one of the people and for another 10 minutes on one
of the places involved in the story sketch you drafted for Activity 5.1 When you finish
writing, look back over the draft for spots where you could fold in some of this
freewriting.

Writing a Story - Telling and Showing

Telling and Showing

When you show the people, places, and happenings in your story, you invite
your reader to feel, see, hear, hear, taste, and smell how it was to be present.

You can tell your reader that your uncle was a careful and methodical person, or you
can show your uncle in coveralls, goggles, and work gloves at his smitre saw. You can
tell your reader thatof your new apartment looked cold and sterile, or you can show
the bare white walls and recently shampooed carpet, the uncurtained windows that
looked out on a snow-crusted parking lot.
"The action speaks for itself," we sometimes say, meaning no explanation is needed.
We know explanations are useful, but we know, too, that events themselves are often
more dramatic and revealing. When you show the people, places, and events in your
story, you invite readers into the texture of experience, to feel, see, hear, hear, taste,
and smell that experience.
Often a single, well-chosen detail—close-bitten fingernails or a half-buttoned, black
silk shirt—will show more than a full paragraph of explanation can tell, and will also
be more convincing and memorable.
Activity
5.4 Look back over the story sketch you wrote for Activity 6.1 and note any places
you've used telling rather than showing to get your point across. In each case, try to
recall the concrete details of the scene itself. Write them down, paying special
attention to any details that caused you to think or feel as you did about the situation.

Writing a Story - Summary

Summary
Most stories can follow a time order. This time order gives a good sense of direction
during the early stages of writing. This storyline also serves as a departure point when
you fold in some description or explanation.
Writers often depart from this strict time order, determining the kinds and amounts
of information to give readers at each point in the story.
As you shape your story, then, remember this point: you control the flow of
information to readers.
Activity
5.5 Write a second draft of the story you began for Activity 6.1. Again, write quickly,
but this time include any changes you've been considering. When you finish, get some
response to your draft and write another.

Constructing a Montage
A quilt maker looks at scraps of cast-off fabric strewn about the attic floor and sees a design.
Something—some juxtaposition of red beside lavender, some connection of past and present,
facts and memories—triggers an impulse, starts an intuitive process. The quilt is both many
and one—many individual pieces and one single object.
An artist looks at a shoelace, a matchbook, a speeding ticket, and sees a collage, connections
that ask to be made, a statement that wants to emerge.

Seemingly disconnected thoughts and images, can be juxtaposed, lifted out of

their original contexts and reassembled into a new whole—a single statement.
In writing, a similar process can happen. Seemingly disconnected thoughts and images, facts
and memories, can be juxtaposed, lifted out of their original contexts and reassembled into a
new whole—a single statement. Ezra Pound wrote poetry this way. He called his Cantos a
"ragbag" stuffed with bits and scraps of whatever he found that seemed to belong there. The
final effect is a sort of verbal montage—slow fade, voiceover, wide pan, jump cut, close up.
You might begin with a series of quick freewrites, collect notes and quotations at random,
then save them under different filenames, print them out, scatter them around the floor, cut
them up and tape them back together. You could look for tension and contrast in language,
recurring themes, emerging patterns of meaning. Then you could merge it all back into a
single document and continue to cut, paste, and move. There's no "right" way to do it, no list
of steps to follow.
If you want to push your essays beyond rational, linear thinking, you may want to assemble a
montage. The process is intuitive and holistic. It requires imagination, improvisation, and a
willingness to experiment.
Activity

5.6 Assemble a one-page montage containing at least four of the following: A snatch of
overheard conversation A quote from the daily newspaper A fact from The World Almanac
Some of your own freewriting An advertising slogan A few lines from a song Experiment
with different sequences and juxtapositions until you see a pattern emerging. Then work with
the pattern, cutting and pasting, adding and deleting, until you're satisfied with the result.

Following a Metaphor
A metaphor makes a comparison, and in doing so shapes our perception. If we say, "Time is a
river," we're noting a certain similarity between the two. Yet we know they aren't identical.
We may mean that time is fluid, has currents and eddies, empties into some vast ocean, but
not that it's composed of water. If we say, "Time is a stone," we may mean it's silent, still,
indifferent, but not that it's a mineral.
A metaphor has two parts: a tenor and a vehicle. The tenor ("time" in the example above) is
the subject of the comparison, and the vehicle ("a river," "a stone") is the image to which the
subject is being compared. And though we know the metaphor's two parts aren't identical, so
close is their association that something of the vehicle rubs off and influences our perception
of the tenor. For instance, instead of merely starting a new computer program, merely starting
a we can now click a mouse on a hot spot and open a window.

. . . instead of merely starting a new computer program, we can now click a

mouse on a hot spot and open a window.

Because of this power to shape perception, metaphors are important to writers. While novice
writers on a hotspot and may see metaphors as ornamental or decorative, more open a
window. experienced writers use them structurally, sometimes extending and exploring a
single metaphor throughout an entire work. Occasionally such an extended metaphor will be
submerged. That is, the vehicle will be only partially visible beneath the surface of the
writing. For instance, notice how, in the two previous sentences, writing (the tenor) is
compared to a lake or pool (the submerged vehicle).
You might use metaphor to clarify central concepts or to connect parts of an essay. You might
also think metaphorically about your essay's overall planning and design. For instance:
This essay will be a thunderstorm: first a sunny sky with a few light clouds and some stirring
of leaves, then a sudden drop in air pressure as the clouds join and build into thunderheads
(driving rain, thunderclaps, lightning), brief but intense and frightening until the storm blows
off east and leaves behind a few broken tree limbs, water flowing down the streets, the grass
green and vibrant, the air moist and cool.
Activity

5.7 Write up an extended metaphor like the example above, describing an essay you'd like to
write or are currently working on. Try submerging the extended metaphor in the essay itself
by incorporating specific images and details whenever appropriate.

Creative Rambling
As writers, we're often advised to "stick to the topic" and "get to the point." This is usually
good advice, but not always. Sometimes it leads to writing that's shallow and one-
dimensional, as though the writer had prematurely closed down the process of inquiry, just to
produce something neat and tidy with no madwoman in the attic.
One antidote to this obsession with order and purpose is Freewriting, which is almost by
definition chaotic and open-ended. When freewriting, you follow your language and thinking
wherever they lead without regard for the consequences. You may get so lost in the act

of writing that you're almost in a trance, a meditative state, a place where the

words write you.

If you've had good results with freewriting, you may want to carry the process even further by
freewriting around the subject, or by writing off the subject . You may get so lost in the
writing that you're almost in a trance, a meditative state, a place where the words write you.
Sound mystical? Maybe so, but poets, for centuries, have spoken of "the muse," the voice of
poetic inspiration that speaks to and through them in their work.
Follow the stream of your consciousness, tap into your internal language. If a voice leaps up
and says, "No!" engage that voice. Challenge it. Enter it. Let the subject find you.
Will you revise this later? Almost certainly. You'll move or expand some parts, cut others.
Almost all writing needs revision, and this free-ranging approach may need more than other,
more formulaic and pragmatic approaches, but it can also yield richer, more satisfying results.
Activity

5.8 Freewrite for ten minutes, allowing yourself to range freely over whatever images and
subjects offer themselves. When you finish, go back over your freewrite and highlight four
key words or images. Now do four more ten-minute freewrites, using the highlighted words
and images as springboards. Again, let the writing go where it will. When you finish, read
back over all five drafts. Try cutting and pasting them together into a single short essay.

Opening and Closing

Beginnings serve two important purposes. The first is to get you started writing. The second is
to get your readers started reading. Early in your writing you're concerned more with the first
purpose: getting off to a good start, maybe with enough push to carry you into the heart of the
essay. Yet the beginning that gets you going won't always be best for getting readers
involved. That's okay. You can take care of that later, after you've seen how the essay is
taking shape.
The important thing at first is to start writing. Remember, those first words you write may
never be seen by anyone but you. Any starting point can be an entry into your writing process.
Just like entering a lake for a swim, there's no best way to begin. Some people test the water
and wade in slowly. Others just plunge right in and start splashing away. Either way, you get
wet.
A particular word or phrase—"sheepeater" or "dead as a fritter"—may give you the nudge you
need to get going, then become a center of exploration.
Maybe a powerful image—your cousin bursting with pride after winning the high jump in the
Special Olympics—will spur you to start. You may find that the first sense a design or
organizational pattern that you paragraph of the want to complete. Whatever offers itself
generally turns out to be just what you needed.

It isn't unusual to find that the first draft of an informal essay can be lopped off
completely with nothing much lost.

At the start, don't be too critical of whatever gets you going. Later, as you revise, you'll look
critically and suspiciously at your opening. Sometimes the first paragraph of the first draft of
an informal essay can be lopped off completely with nothing much lost. Cruel and unfeeling
as it may seem, the best way to a good opening is often to take one last long look at your
original beginning and chop it.
Such radical surgery isn't always the answer, however. The essential requirement is to open
smoothly and quickly, to draw your readers into the essay itself, not into an explanation of
why you're writing or of what the essay might prove.
If you still don't feel sure about the opening, one final suggestion may help. The seed of a
good beginning is often contained in the ending. Think of your ending as a goal, a destination,
a place you've been working toward. Ask what it is that makes you want to end there rather
than somewhere else. Now read back over the essay as a whole and look for a possible
starting point, some word, image, or incident that connects with, anticipates, the ending.
Sooner or later, you need to ask: what makes all these ideas and images belong in a single
essay? You won't know when you begin writing. But as the essay takes shape, you should
start to see what you're working toward, what you're really writing about, what point you need
to make before the essay's promise is fulfilled.
Having reached that point, look back over your writing and find the beginning. If you can do
that, your readers, on reaching the end, should feel satisfaction and closure. The purpose
should be clear, the cycle complete. Nothing should remain to be said.
Activity

5.9 Read the opening and closing of your most recent draft of an informal essay. Does your
opening contain unnecessary explanation that could be deleted or replaced by vivid, concrete
imagery? Does your ending introduce a new topic or try too hard to drive home a point that
you've already made? What reader expectations does your opening set up? Have these
expectations been satisfied by the closing? Rework the opening and closing of your essay and
then write a draft that's ready for final editing.

Explaining
Thesis/Support Essays
Occasions for Thesis/Support Essays
Thesis/support essays convey a central idea clearly and succinctly. Because thesis/support
essays open up and expand upon a single main point, they're suited to short reports, position
papers, and critical analyses. Because they can, with practice, be written quickly, they're also
handy for essay exams and letters of application or recommendation. As you become familiar
with them, you'll no doubt see other uses.

The basic thesis/support pattern promotes clear, systematic thinking on a single

subject and can therefore be helpful whenever you want to set forth ideas and
facts in an efficient, orderly way.

You may notice that the form presented here channels your thinking and writing into a single
direction. This channeling effect is both a limitation and a strength of thesis/support essays.
It's a limitation because it prevents you from ranging widely over a field of interest, as in an
informal essay. The channeling effect is a strength because you won't wander from your
subject, and because your main idea will always be supported by well-organized details.
The basic thesis/support pattern promotes clear, systematic thinking on a single subject and
can therefore be helpful whenever you want to set forth ideas and facts in an efficient, orderly
way.

Subject to Thesis
Often your subject will be determined by your teacher, your employer, or the writing context
itself. Other times you may be free to choose your own subject. Either way, the subject itself
is only a starting point, which won't make or break your paper.
Many unreadable papers have been written on exciting and important subjects, and many
valuable papers have been done on subjects that at first glance look dull and insignificant.
Whether you're given a subject or choose your own, whether you like your subject or not,
your job is to turn that subject into a solid, well-organized paper, and the following process
can help. How you handle your subject counts most.

... the subject itself is only a starting point, which won't make or break your
paper.

Think of your subject as pointing you in a direction, providing boundaries you should stay
within, telling you in a general way where you're going, and at the same time where you're not
going. If your subject is California, you may or may not get to San Francisco, but you
definitely won't get to the Statue of Liberty.
Similarly, if you're asked to write a report on the waste treatment facilities at your workplace,
you've been given a subject that points you in one direction of thinking and eliminates others-
customer relations, employee pension plans-from consideration for the time being. They're
outside the boundaries of your subject and are therefore irrelevant. Such focusing of attention
is vital, to provide a more definite sense of direction and purpose than the broad subject can
offer.
Doing that, narrowing your subject's boundaries, often makes the difference between a
strikingly effective paper and a bland, ineffective one. Look for ways to restrict the territory
you'll be covering. Limit your broad subject to a smaller and more manageable topic.

Look for ways to restrict the territory you'll be covering. Limit your broad subject
to a smaller and more manageable topic.

A topic, as we're using the term here, is an area much like a subject but more definite, more
specific. Usually the topic will be some particular aspect of the subject that you're most
interested in or know the most about, the part your knowledge, experience, and interests make
you feel closest to. The subject of California, for instance, might be narrowed to the topic of
San Francisco or Monterey.

The topic of San Francisco might then be narrowed even further to the San Francisco
earthquake of 1895.

Each narrowing tightens your focus and increases the chance for a unified, coherent essay.
Activity

6.1 Write freely for ten or fifteen minutes. Stick with one general subject, but allow yourself
to wander freely within those limits. Jot down what ever you already know about the subject
or what you'd like to know. Write out your immediate personal reactions to the subject, your
thoughts and feelings. Don't write what you think you're expected to feel, but what you do
feel. Try to establish an authentic personal relationship to the subject. Try to get at whatever
you find exciting, troubling, offensive, or useful.
When you finish, read back over your freewrite and complete the following sentence:
What most interests me about this subject is ...

Do Some Investigation
Your investigation could take many forms. Some topics may require little. Your existing
knowledge and experience may be adequate for a paper on "what makes a successful high
school basketball coach." Maybe you've known and played for a few successful coaches and
are currently preparing to become one. If so, you can draw upon your existing knowledge.

Your investigation may involve some note-taking and library work, but still not
assume the discipline and scope of a formal research paper.

On the other hand, maybe the process of narrowing your subject has led you to an area where
you don't feel well informed. If you're going to write about this topic, you'll need to do some
reading, maybe even some phone calling and interviewing. If you aren't sure where to begin,
check the suggestions in Outside Sources.
Your investigation may involve some note-taking and library work, but still not assume the
discipline and scope of a formal research paper. Investigating the current condition of your
city's bus system might require taking a bus ride and talking to some regular passengers and
drivers. It might involve checking routes and timetables to look for areas of the city that are
over or under served. You could ask the same question--Why does only one bus cover the
whole north side of town?--to three or four different people. Certainly you'd want to learn
something about the buses themselves: How old are they? How much does it cost to service
them? How often are they replaced? Much of this information can be obtained from informal
discussions, interviews, and direct observation.
Activity

6.2 Write a short paragraph explaining how you'd investigate each of the following topics:
a. Your county's use of alternative sentencing for non-violent criminals.
b. The present condition of the job market for college graduates with degrees in graphic
design, or in your major field.
c. How recycling has affected waste management in your community during the past five
years.
When you finish, exchange your paragraphs with a partner and discuss the similarities and
differences in your approaches.
6.3 Narrow each of the following subject areas into a more definite topic. When you finish,
select one topic and investigate it.
a. credit buying
b. physical fitness
c. babies
d. substance abuse
e. airplanes

Stating Your Thesis

A thesis is a one sentence statement about your topic. It's an assertion about your topic,
something you claim to be true. Notice that a topic alone makes no such claim; it merely
defines an area to be covered.
The topic is seldom stated as a complete sentence with a subject and predicate. To make your
topic into a thesis statement, you need to make a claim about it, make it into a sentence.

To make your topic into a thesis statement, you need to make a claim about it.

Look back over your materials-branching charts, free writings, investigative notes-and think
about what you believe to be true. Think about what your readers want or need to know. Then
write a sentence, preferably at this point, a simple one, stating what will be the controlling
idea of your paper. The result should look something like this:
Original Subject: an important issue in my major field
Focused Topic: drug education for college physical education majors
Thesis: Drug education deserves a more prominent place in this university's Physical
Education program.
Or if your investigations led you to a different belief:
Thesis: Physical Education majors at this university receive a solid background in drug
education.
It's always good to have a thesis you can believe in.
Notice, though, that a sentence stating an obvious and indisputable truth won't work as a
thesis:
Thesis: This university has a Physical Education major.
That's a complete sentence, and it asserts something to be true, but as a thesis it's a dead end.
It's a statement of fact, pure and simple, and requires to have little or nothing added. A good
thesis asks to have more said about it. It demands some proof. Your job is to show your reader
that your thesis is true, so that in end the reader will say, "Ah yes, now that it's been
explained, I can see that the Physical Education Department really isn't doing enough with
drug education."
Activity

6.4 Turn two of the topics you generated in Activity 7.3 into thesis statements. Exchange
them with a partner and discuss their relative strengths and weaknesses. Be sure to cover the
following points:
1. Is this a complete sentence?
2. Is every word clear and unambiguous in meaning?
3. Is the sentence a dead end, or does it call for additional information and explanation?
4. Does the statement make such a large claim that you believe the writer has no hope of
proving it to be true in the space of 500 to 700 words?
5. What evidence will you need to see before you will believe that the thesis is true?

Supporting Your Thesis

Think of your thesis as a statement that remains to be proved. It commits you to showing your
reader that it's founded upon good evidence and sound reasoning. That is, you want to show
that you know what you're talking about, that you've investigated the matter thoroughly, have
considered the implications of your findings, and are offering in your thesis not mere opinion,
but a carefully thought-out conclusion. This job of uncovering and displaying your reasoning
is the next step in writing a thesis/support essay.

Supporting Your Thesis - Getting Inside an Idea

Getting Inside an Idea
It isn't unusual to hear people say they can't write any more because they've run out
of ideas, as though every sentence had to present a new thought. Most experienced
writers understand, though, that a whole essay, a whole book, can be built from a
single idea that is fully explored and developed.
The writer's job is not simply to list ideas, which could be seen as mere personal
opinions, but to probe and test a single worthwhile thought, to take the reader inside
that idea rather than pass quickly over its surface.
To begin doing this, look carefully at your thesis. Try asking:
Why do I believe this statement is true?
What have I seen or done or read or heard that caused me to make this statement?
At this point, look less for specific details than for "good reasons." Maybe you've
heard the expression, "Give me three good reasons why I should believe you." If you
can do that, give at least three good reasons why a reasonable person should believe
your thesis, you're well on your way. For example, the thesis, "Drug education
deserves a more prominent place in this university's Physical Education program,"
could be supported as follows:

... a whole essay, a whole book, can be built from a single idea that is fully
explored and developed.

Original Subject: an important issue in my major field Focused Topic: drug

education for college physical education majors
Thesis: Drug education deserves a more prominent place in this university's Physical
Education program.
Reason 1: Athletes are especially likely to be victims of drug abuse.
Reason 2: The university presently offers very little instruction in this area.
Reason 3: As coaches and health education teachers our graduates will be in a good
position to pass the knowl edge along to their team members and students.
Activities
6.6 For each thesis statement you wrote in Activity 7.3, list at least three good reasons
you can offer in support. Be sure each reason is stated as a complete sentence. Next
write out each Thesis/Support group in the format shown above and exchange with a
partner. Discuss them. Which Thesis/Support groups are most promising? Which are
least promising? Why?
6.7 Of the four groups of sentences (two for you and two for your partner) select one
group to share and discuss with the whole class. This need not be your best group. It
could be one that puzzles you, one you and your partner disagree about, or one you
just can't get straightened out.
6.8 Study the following groups of sentences. Which ones offer promise for further
development? Which don't? Pay special attention to the quality of the thesis sentence.
Also note whether the supporting reasons really do support the main idea.
a. Thesis: Boa Constrictors can be very educational pets.
Reason one: They teach responsibility.
Reason two: They come from South America.
Reason three: Their owners will learn many facts about reptiles.
b. Thesis: Taco Pronto restaurants sacrifice individuality for efficiency.
Reason one: Different restaurants within the chain are almost identical in layout and
design.
Reason two: Individuality is valued very highly by most Americans.
Reason three: Menus are planned with an eye toward standardization and uniformity.
c. Thesis: Elementary school is very important.
Reason one: Almost every neighborhood in the United States has an elementary
school.
Reason two: Without an elementary school education you would have trouble in
junior high.
Reason three: Elementary school teaches children many important social lessons.
d. Thesis: Spring is the greatest season of the year.
Reason one: Baseball season starts.
Reason two: Everything turns green.
Reason three: The whole world is in love.

Supporting Your Thesis - A Skeleton Essay

A Skeleton Essay
You may see that each "good reason," each support sentence, is like a miniature thesis
statement. It, too, is a claim that requires support to be convincing. And the next step
is to develop each "good reason" into a solid, detailed paragraph.
Look back over your notes, scour your memory, and squeeze your imagination to
discover what facts, details, examples, and illustration can help your reader
understand your ideas and see the reasoning they are based on. Consider your
support sentences one at a time and show reader the specifics that have led you to
make these claims.
In your essay, each "good reason" will become the topic sentence of a paragraph. And
each topic sentence can be opened and developed much like a thesis statement.
Consider the following example:
Skeleton Essay: An Example
Thesis: Lucille Kooch is an outstanding high school biology teacher.

Reason 2: Her course

Reason 1: She knows the Reason 3: She motivates her
covers a large amount of
material well. students to learn.
material.

Reason 1.1: She seldom needs Reason 2.1: She covers Reason 3.1: She is
notes to lecture. ecology. entertaining.

Details: Details: Details:

Reason 1.2: She gives

Reason 2.2: She covers Reason 3.2: She is demanding
thorough, in-depth answers to
taxonomy. but fair.
all questions.

Details: Details: Details:

Reason 3.3: She stresses

Reason 1.3: She has a Reason 2.3: She covers
practical application of the
doctorate in biology. microbiology.
material.

Details: Details: Details:

While these thirteen sentences alone don't fully develop the central idea, they do
provide a framework for that development. They are a "skeleton essay" which allows
you to see how the various parts of your paper relate to your thesis. Much like an
outline, they can help you move ahead in your writing with the security and assurance
that come from having an overall plan. While these thirteen sentences alone don't

fully develop the central idea, they do provide a framework for that development.
You don't need to list three or four sentences under each topic sentence, but since
these sentences will guide you in developing your paragraphs, you'll want as many as
seem reasonable. If you can't come up with at least one or two such guide sentences
in support of a topic sentence, you should question whether you'll be able to write a
solid paragraph on the idea. You might need to rethink and reword the topic sentence
so that it offers more room for expansion.
Activity
6.9 Take the best thesis statement you've generated so far and write out a skeleton
essay that contains topic sentences and guide sentences for each paragraph.
Exchange this skeleton essay with a partner and discuss your progress. As you discuss
the papers, pay special attention to whether you can imagine a clear, fully developed
essay growing out of what you see. What points need further clarification and
support? What points are starting to look especially strong and convincing?

Develop Your Paragraphs

Your topic sentences indicate the major support areas for your thesis, and the guide sentences
show how you can develop each paragraph. Still, your paper is far from complete. While
you've opened up your main idea to expose its parts, you have yet to get down to giving the
specifics, the precise details that will help your reader feel the full weight of your thought.
You must show the foundation of specific evidence that your general ideas are built upon. The
following suggestions for paragraph development will help you coax forth details that will
make your writing solid and substantial.

Develop Your Paragraphs - Give an Example

Give an Example

Examples allow readers to see, touch, hear, taste, and feel the actual stuff your

thoughts are made of. Notice how often a paragraph will say, in the second or third
sentence, "for instance" or "for example." This is how writers introduce an actual
incident or object to prove or illustrate the point under discussion. The example may
be a brief physical description:
I can still remember her imitation of a frog. Puffing out her cheeks and hopping
around the room, she seemed almost amphibian as she croaked out a mating call.
Or even a story:
Once I'd been suspended from school for a minor infraction, which I won't go into
here, and she still wanted me to turn in my tree project, but would give me no credit
for it. Even so, I turned it in, doing an extra good job, and she somehow managed to
give me a B for that grading period.
Either way, examples get readers involved. Examples allow readers to see, touch,
hear, taste, and feel the actual stuff your thoughts are made of.
Examples are also easy to fold into your paper. You can often slip a brief example in
between two guide sentences in your skeleton essay, or you can might use one or two
extended examples to develop a whole paragraph.
Activities
6.10 Illustrate each of the following statements with a fictional narrative or
descriptive example.
a. Dan tends to be messy.
b. The furniture was quite uncomfortable.
c. My street needs to be repaved.
d. The food looks unappetizing.
e. The trees were diseased.
6.11 Fold a brief example between two of the guide sentences in your skeleton essay.
Example:
Reason 3.2: She is demanding but fair.
Details: Once I had been suspended from school for a minor infraction, which I won't
go into here, and she still wanted me to turn in my tree project, but would give me no
credit for it. Even so, I turned it in, doing an extra good job, and she somehow
managed to give me a B for that period.
Reason 3.3: She stresses practical application of the material.
Offer an Explanation

This kind of development offers refinement of your general principles.

Sometimes a point made in your thesis sentence, a topic sentence, or a guide sentence
needs elaboration and clarification.
That is, the reader may pick up the general outline of what you're saying, but a second
sentence or two may be needed before the full meaning comes across. The first two
sentences of this paragraph work like that. The second one explains the first, and the
next two (including this one) carry the process even further. Each sentence, after
looking back at the previous one to see if it tells the whole story with perfect clarity,
goes on to fill in the gaps and make the meaning more precise.
This kind of development offers refinement of your general principles. It's not
unusual, therefore, to see a topic sentence followed by a brief explanation, followed
by an example or illustration:
She covers taxonomy. We studied Thomas Linnaeus and his system of binomial
nomenclature, learning the reasons for the system as well as the basic principles of
operation, and we learned how to classify specific species by careful observation of
their identifying characteristics.
Not every topic sentence or guide sentence needs further explanation, but if you've
used any words that readers might have trouble with, or if readers might get only a
rough idea of your real point, you could probably use a sentence or two of
clarification and elaboration.
Activities
6.12 Add a brief explanatory comment to make the meaning of each of the following
sentences more clear.
a. Shelley is an easy person to be with.
b. Our house can get cold in the winter.
c. This watch is quite valuable.
d. The park is dangerous at night.
e. The new prices were more reasonable.
6.13 Find a sentence in your skeleton essay that could use some clarification. Add to it
a sentence or two of explanation. If possible, follow the explanation with an example.

Develop Your Paragraphs - Compare or Contrast

Compare or Contrast

The thoroughness of the comparison depends upon our purpose in making it.

Seeing an object or idea alongside similar one directs our attention to points of
likeness and difference. This gives us a better idea of
their distinctive and shared features. Thus, we can give a more exact understanding
of what an elk is like by showing how it differs from a deer or a moose than by simply
describing the elk in isolation. The thoroughness of the comparison depends upon
our purpose in making it. Sometimes just a passing reference will be enough: Ice
slabs floated on the river like scattered pieces of a child's jigsaw puzzle.
Other times you may want to be more thorough, devoting a full paragraph to the
comparison. Either way, look for definite points of correspondence and difference.
These are the foundation of your comparison. In an extended comparison, you can
use these points as a basis of organization (point by point structure), moving back
and forth from one item to another. Or you can discuss one item fully and then
discuss the second (item by item structure), being careful to cover the same points for
each. These two patterns are illustrated below:
Point by Point Structure Item by Item Structure

Point 1: item A, item B Item A: point 1, point 2, point 3, point 4

Point 2: item A, item B Item B: point 1, point 2, point 3, point 4

Point 3: item A, item B

Point 4: item A, item B

Either pattern will work although their effects are different. Point by point
emphasizes specific features. Item by item emphasizes the items as wholes.
Whichever pattern you select, be sure to keep your attention, and your reader's, on
specific features that provide a basis for comparison.
Activity
6.14 Use comparison or contrast to develop two of the following sentences. Use point
by point organization for one and item by item for the other.
a. Snowshoeing and cross country skiing have much the same appeal.
b. My own vegetable soup is not at all like the canned variety.
c. Bicycles and motorcycles are not so different as you might think.
d. Ants and humans have more in common than most people realize.
e. Seeing a movie in a theatre is totally different from seeing it on television.
6.15 Look over the skeleton essay you've been working on and see if you can find a
spot where you could use comparison to develop your ideas.

Develop Your Paragraphs - Present the Facts

Present the Facts
Facts, like examples, show readers the concrete particulars your ideas are built on. If
readers know your thoughts are drawn from careful and detailed observation, they'll
take those thoughts more seriously than they would mere opinion. Two valuable
kinds of details are facts and statistics. If you're in doubt about whether informal or

formal documentation is best, ask your teacher.

When you use facts and statistics, be sure they're accurate and that your reader can
verify them by consulting your sources or other independent sources. Nothing
destroys credibility faster than a reader's belief that you're intentionally or
unintentionally distorting facts.
For a fuller discussion of when and how to document, see Documenting Your
Sources. Often, as in the following example, an informal reference that clearly
identifies your source of information will be adequate:
According to Bob Hull, the city's new recycling coordinator, 70% of all homes are
participating in the new campaign, and this has resulted in a 30% reduction in the
volume of waste received at the landfill.
If you're in doubt about whether informal or formal documentation is best, ask your
teacher.

Revising your Thesis

One major purpose of the thesis is to predict what will follow. It does this for both writer and
reader. It provides the writer with purpose and direction throughout the composing process.
For the reader it creates expectations about the form and content of what's to come, and the
reader's satisfaction with the final essay will depend largely upon whether these expectations
have been satisfied.
Still, while we want the thesis to set up expectations for the total paper, few of us are
prophets. Because we don't know what we want to say until we discover it by writing, the
original thesis is often only a hunch or hypothesis about where the paper will go. It isn't
unusual for the sentence that started the paper growing to make a commitment the paper
doesn't fully honor.

While writing, you may have grown to a new awareness of your subject, so that

your original thesis now seems imprecise or misleading. While writing, you may
have grown to a new awareness of your subject, so that your original thesis now seems
imprecise or misleading. If so, you need to re-state your thesis to take your new understanding
into account.
Your revised thesis becomes a distillation of your entire paper, and because by now you've
seen not just the general outline, but the main divisions and even the supporting details, you
may want to include some of this in your thesis. For instance, "The major responsibility for
preventing dental problems lies within you," might be revised as follows: "Learning a few
basic skills and practicing them in a daily routine will help keep your dental problems to a
minimum." The second thesis not only states the main idea more precisely but also forecasts
the paper's main divisions and the order of discussion.
If you can write a single sentence that clearly indicates the relationship between the various
parts of your paper, those parts probably fit together well. Seeing this, your reader will
perceive your paper to be clear, unified, and well-organized.
Activity

6.16 Look back at one of the papers you have been working on to see if you can revise the
thesis to more accurately reflect your paper's content and structure.

Introductions and Conclusions

The beginning and end of your essay are positions of high emphasis. They deserve careful
attention. Keep them short and purposeful. Use them to create and satisfy expectations. Get
into the habit of reading your introduction and conclusion together, with an eye toward
revision, as one of the last stages in your writing process.
If you sometimes have trouble with introductions and conclusions, you may find the
following suggestions useful.
Introductions
First impressions are often lasting impressions. This is true in life, and especially in writing.
Your readers' first judgments, even if mistaken, about the value of the topic, your skill as a
writer, and your character as a person have a strong impact on their total response to your
work.

Here you take the first steps toward building a strong relationship, one that will
last at least for the rest of the paper.

If you get off to a good start, readers may stick with you through the rough spots, forgiving an
occasional error or concentrating extra hard when you explain a complex idea. On the other
hand, if readers don't think your topic's important or do think you're uninformed, overly
sentimental, or sarcastic, they'll keep those impressions until you show them false. Your paper
may even be set aside, unread.
It might be helpful, therefore, to think of your introduction as a first meeting with your
readers. Here you take the first steps toward building a strong relationship, one that will last at
least for the rest of the paper.
If you see your introduction this way, you'll see also that no single pattern or format can meet
the demands of every writing situation. Therefore, regard the suggestions below as exactly
that-suggestions. In some situations they may not be helpful, but in others, for a particular
purpose or reader, they may offer exactly the right approach.
Focus Your Reader's Attention

... reach beyond your personal perspective for the common ground you share.

Just because readers are people, they have individual interests, viewpoints, preoccupations,
and needs. Your memo on staff reorganization may come across your supervisor's desk just
before an important luncheon meeting when she's hungry and a bit edgy. She may not have
been thinking much about the change you proposed last week, and what she has been thinking
may not have been in line with your ideas. In such a situation, you need to try seeing things
from her point of view. You must reach beyond your personal perspective for the common
ground you share. Having shown that you're sensitive to, and perhaps even share, the reader's
needs, you'll be well poised to state your ideas.
Because this type of introduction gradually moves from a broad concern with general issues
to a narrower range of interest stated in a thesis sentence, it's often referred to as a "funnel."
Notice how the following introduction focuses attention on the thesis:
During the past year our sales have grown well beyond the level projected in last April's
report, A Regional Marketing and Sales Strategy. This success demonstrates that we have a
good product, a strong marketing plan, and an effective sales force in the field. Now, as
planning for the coming year begins, it's time to consider how we can implement this strategy
on a national level.
Begin with a Fact or Example

By now, you understand the importance of concrete, specific details in your paper's body.
Details can also be strong ways of opening and closing, as they give your reader a concrete,
specific connection to the subject.
Last July, Duke, a four year old Labrador retriever, was dragged behind a pickup truck on a
rope and left to die on the desert. Fortunately, he was found and taken to the Humane Society
where his wounds were treated and he was gradually nursed back to health. Eventually, he
was adopted by Bill and Linda, a young couple who say they couldn't imagine finding a better
pet. Not all stories of animal abuse end as happily as Duke's, but the Humane Society works
hard to help all animals in distress, and it deserves your support.
Note a Common Misconception

If your readers were fully informed on your subject, they wouldn't be need to read your essay.
So, whether their misconceptions are due to lack of information, failure to draw valid
conclusions from factual information, or some other reason, it's often helpful to acknowledge
misunderstandings at the start. In doing so, you show you're aware of other views, and also
show why your paper is important: to correct these mistaken ideas, to bring about better
understanding.
When I first tell people that I grew up without a father, they often express sympathy. It's true
that I never had a dad to play catch with or teach me to fish, but I played catch with friends
and learned to fish on my own. Actually, I found that growing up in a single parent family has
several advantages.
The sense of opposition generated by this type of introduction creates tension, and in doing
so, sharpens and dramatizes your ideas.
Raise a Question

Explanations often begin when we try to answer a question or solve a problem, and a thesis
statement, especially in the early stages of writing, is often a tentative answer to a question
that you want to explore. Why not share the question with your readers and invite them to join
the search for an answer?
Like many people my age, I limit my cholesterol intake, but recently I've learned that some
cholesterol can actually be healthy for me. What exactly is cholesterol, and what does it do?
How can I tell whether the cholesterol in a salmon steak is good or bad for me? To maintain a
healthy blood cholesterol level, we should all understand what this chemical compound is and
how it works in the human body.
Make a Bold Assertion

Another way to say this might be: Go out on a limb. Take a risk. Of course, this approach can
be overdone and can lead to exhibitionism and sensationalism, especially if you're writing in a
context that demands restraint and moderation. In those situations, this "Look, ma! No
Hands!" approach could be a disaster.
The new fall television lineups are out, and they look like the same old trash: more violence,
more insipid sitcoms, more hackneyed plots and one-dimensional characters. This is mind
pollution, pure and simple. The American people deserve better programming from the major
networks.
Activity

6.17 Write three different introductory paragraphs for one of your essays. Exchange and
discuss them with a partner. What are the strengths and weakness of each introduction?
Conclusions
Although some writers find them difficult, conclusions need not be a problem, especially if
you've been working toward a goal throughout your essay. As you near the end of your paper,
you might ask a few basic questions. So what? What does all this finally have to do with
anything, anyway? What do I most want my readers to take away from this essay? What do I
hope they'll do now that they've read this? What last thoughts do I want to imprint on their
minds before we part company?

If you remember that your conclusion should provide finality and closure, you
won't open up a new subject and leave your reader hanging.

Often your instincts will tell you what needs to be said, worked through, made clear, at the
end. If you remember that your conclusion should provide finality and closure, you won't
open a new subject and leave readers hanging. If you recall that endings are always positions
of great emphasis, you won't leave your reader with a mere supporting fact from one of your
sub-points.
Keeping such principles in mind and also being careful not to repeat what you've already
discussed, you should sense how best to end, and your reader should agree.
Activity

6.17 Write a short paragraph discussing the conclusion of one of your essays. Why did you
end in this way? In what other ways did you consider ending? Why did you reject them? How
do you feel about the ending you finally wound up with? Exchange your paragraph and the
corresponding essay with a partner and discuss them.

Summary
The thesis/support pattern refines and systematizes natural thought patterns. Besides offering
an organizational framework for your writing, the thesis/support pattern can also serve as an
aid to invention. It can help you probe your subject and uncover your thoughts about it. It can
also help you see the reasons, experiences, observations, and judgments that underlie those
thoughts.
The following process can help you produce effective expository essays on a wide variety of
subjects assigned by another or chosen by yourself.
First: Restrict the scope of your subject by focusing on the particular part of it (your topic)
that you know the most about and are most interested in.
Second: Make a clear, precisely worded, one sentence statement about your topic. This thesis
statement should make an assertion that is not obviously true, but which you believe you can
show to be true.
Third: State at least three or four "good reasons" for believing your thesis. These reasons will
serve as the topic sentences for each paragraph in the body of your essay.
Fourth: Give two or three "good reasons" for believing each of your topic sentences. These
sentences, which we have been calling guide sentences, will help you see a general direction
of development for each paragraph.
Fifth: Develop your guide sentences with illustrative and supportive detail. Try using one or
more of these traditional means of development: 1. Give an example. 2. Offer an explanation.
3. Make a comparison. 4. Supply the details.
After you've used the process a few times, it won't feel so stiff and mechanical as it might at
first. As you get more comfortable, you'll modify the process to suit your own purposes and
your composing style. That's good. But take your time. Don't shortcut or re-arrange the
process until you're certain you know what you're doing and why.

Argumentative Essays
Occasions for Argumentative Essays
Argumentation is everywhere—in congress and courtrooms, in corporate board rooms, at
garden club meetings, and in millions of essays, reports, theses, and dissertations written at
colleges and universities throughout the world.
It shouldn't be surprising to learn that modern argumentation theory has roots in Greek and
Roman thinking. After all, we trace our democratic form of government to these cultures,
known also for their genius in philosophy, the fine arts, and science. The Greco-Romans saw
argument as a way to settle disputes and discover truth. The goal of argument is to gain

your reader's assent to your central proposition, despite active opposition.

Even wise, honest, caring people don't always agree on what is true or is fair. That's why
argument is important in academic writing, where students try to convince professors and
classmates to accept their ideas, where professors argue with students and with each other.
We argue not because we're angry, but because arguing causes us to examine our own and
others' ideas carefully. It causes us to weigh conflicting claims; to make judgments about the
nature of evidence and the methods of investigation; to state our thoughts clearly, accurately,
and honestly; to consider, respectfully and critically, the ideas of others.

Arguing in Context
Like other types of writing, arguments respond to specific situations: a need is not being met,
a person is being treated unfairly, an important concept is misunderstood, an outdated policy
needs to be reexamined. Strong arguments respond effectively to such writing contexts.
A situation statement helps bring the writing context into focus early.

Focus on the interplay of writer, reader, and purpose. A situation statement needn't be
complicated. Instead, keep it simple and concise. Focus on the interplay of writer, reader, and
purpose. Notice how the following situation statement clarifies the writer's objectives as it
identifies key issues and concerns:
SITUATION STATEMENT
Purpose: I work as a medical transcriptionist (typist), and some of the people in my office can
type quite a bit more than some of the other people. Since we all get paid the same, some
employees won't work at full capacity. We feel that we should be paid more for typing more.
And since we don't get paid more, we don't push ourselves to type more. This is a big problem
with a couple of employees. It has been going on for about two years. I want to argue in favor
of setting up an incentive program to reward transcriptionists who type over nine hundred
lines a day.
Writer: I know quite a bit about the problem since I am involved. I am one of the employees
who won't work as hard as I can. My stake in the outcome would be that I could make more
money.
Reader: My reader is my boss at work. She is director of the Medical Records department.
She is forty-three years of age and has had at least two years of college to get her Accredited
Records Technician (A.R.T.) degree. She was once a sergeant in the Marine Corps, so
sometimes she is rough. She is a very moody person. I have worked for Pat for four years. She
sees me as dependable and hard working. Pat's stake in the issue would possibly be to find a
better or fairer way to pay her employees.
This isn't thorough or exhaustive. Since it precedes the first draft, the writer doesn't yet know
what the paper will turn into. Still, the very act of writing a situation statement helps her
envision the task ahead.
Activities

8.1 Think about situations in your own life that could give rise to an argumentative essay.
You may find it helpful to write freely while you think. In any case, your goal is to discover
three actual situations in your life that could serve as the basis for an argumentative paper. For
each situation, write a brief paragraph like the one below, telling what point you want to make
and for whom you are writing.
Now that I'm going to school full time, I don't always have time to cook fancy meals, keep my
family's clothes washed and ironed, or take care of household expenses as I used to. This
bothers my husband and son. They think I should cut back on school. I want to convince them
that they should take on more household responsibilities so that I can continue my education.
8.2 Write a Situation Statement for each argumentative context you discovered in Activity
8.1. The following questions may help you think of what to say. Don't answer questions that
aren't relevant to the situation, but do supply any relevant information you think of, even if it
isn't covered by one of the questions.
Purpose: What do I hope to accomplish? Why is it important? What benefits would be
realized? What problems would be elimi nated? What questions would be answered? How
would other people be affected? What obstacles must be overcome?
Writer: What are my qualifications for discussing this issue? What is my knowledge of the
subject? What are the limits of my knowl edge? How can I learn more? What is my personal
stake in the argument's outcome? What is my relationship to the reader?
Reader: How well do my reader and I know each other? What is my reader's age, educational
background, occupation, marital sta tus, political preference? Why have I chosen to address
my argu ment to this particular person or group? What stake does my reader have in the
argument's outcome? What might the reader stand to gain or lose? What is the reader's
impression of me, espe cially of my integrity, knowledge, and reliability? How well does the
reader understand the situation?

Stating your Proposition

Sensing your argument's overall scope and direction, you can consider stating your
main point. As you do, however, remember that your writing process has barely
begun. You don't yet need a final proposition statement for your finished paper, but
one to point you forward and help focus your efforts.
In this way an argumentative proposition is like a thesis statement. Besides stating
your main point, both help you direct, develop, and monitor your thinking while
writing. Like a thesis statement, an argumentative proposition should be scrutinized
and, when necessary, modified throughout your writing process. At first, both a thesis
and a proposition are often hunches or good guesses about what you will finally
claim.

At first, both a thesis statement and a proposition are often hunches or good
guesses about what you will finally claim.

As your paper develops, you may find your first hunch was off-target. If so, revise
your proposition to show your new understanding. Make a trial statement early and
watch for possible improvements to assure a strong proposition in your final paper.
Even at this point, however, your proposition should define your argument's scope
and make a debatable assertion. A statement like "Some people ruin things for
everyone," is weak because it doesn't make clear what the writer has in mind. It's a
vague generalization that provides no direction for writer or reader. If pressed to be
precise, the writer might say, "A small group of thoughtless fans is jeopardizing the
school's whole soccer program." Now we know what we're talking about.

Besides defining the argument's scope, your proposition should make a claim
that is open to debate.

Like a thesis, your proposition shouldn't be self-evidently true (asparagus is a

vegetable) or claim something that's purely a matter of opinion (asparagus tastes
great). It should have some uncertainty, yet make a claim that your readers will
assent to in the end: "Our county agricultural agent should encourage valley farmers
to plant more asparagus."
Activities
8.3 Rate the following sentences as proposition statements on a scale of 1 (lowest) to
5 (highest). Be prepared to explain why you gave your rating..
a. Money is the root of all evil.
b. The grading system in Biology 101 doesn't accurately reflect the students'
intellectual achievements.
c. In these modern times in which we live, corruption in its various forms has a broad
impact of major concern.
d. William McKinley was president of the United States from 1897-1901.
e. There's too much government interference and red tape for the average citizen to
feel free.
f. Unless the Zoning Appeals Board shows greater flexibility in granting variances, we
can expect businesses to locate elsewhere.
g. Nothing beats the fresh taste of milk.
h. With all the litter and debris that people leave there, the alley behind my house is a
mess.
i. Someone needs to do something about the situation with regard to housing on this
campus.
j. All tips should be placed in a large bowl and divided equally among the waiters who
work each shift.
8.4 Write a trial proposition statement to go with each of the three argumentative
situations you've been working on. Exchange them with a partner, and discuss their
strengths and weaknesses.

Anticipating Opposition
One essential characteristic of argument is your sense of an adversary. You aren't simply
explaining a concept to someone who will hear you out and accept or reject your idea on its
merit. Argument assumes active opposition to your proposition. To win acceptance, then, you
must not only explain and support your proposition, but also anticipate and overcome
objections that the opposition might raise.

Argument assumes active opposition to your proposition.

In anticipating your opposition, consider questions like the following:

How strong is the opposition?
What arguments might it use against my proposition?
How can I refute these arguments?
Will I have to concede any points?
Which of my arguments might the opposition try to discredit?
How closely does my reader identify with the opposition?
Can I see any weak links in the opposition's thinking?
To firm up your impressions and get an overview of the opposition's case relative to your
own, make a chart like the one below.
Pro and Con Chart
Proposition: The Medical Records department should set up an incentive program that pays all
transcriptionists a bonus of ten cents a line for all lines typed over nine hundred a day.

For (Pro) Against (Con)

1. Typists would not do other duties, such as

1. Faster typists would produce more lines.
paper work.

2. Faster typists would make more money. 2. Typists would try to type the easier reports.

3. One less transcriptionist would be needed. 3. Typists would do a poorer quality of work.

4. One less word processing machine would be

4. Slower typists would be mad.
needed.

5. Less office space would be needed. 5. Typists could make more money than the boss.

6. One less benefit package would be needed. 6. Other people in the department would be mad.

7. Less overtime would be required.

8. Less sick time would be paid.

Plotting your argument like this provides a balanced view of the issues. It allows you to see
whether you have a chance of making your case and helps you to anticipate crucial points that
may determine your success or failure.

... see the issue through your opponents' eyes, and draw out the most telling
arguments they could use against you.

Don't try to look good by mentioning only weaker opposition arguments. When you work on
the con side of the chart, see the issue through your opponents' eyes, and draw out the most
telling arguments they could use against you. Then, when you've finished your Pro and Con
Chart, look back to see if your proposition needs revision. You might also begin considering
how to refute the opposition's arguments.
Activity

8.5 Make a Pro and Con Chart for each of the three arguments you've been developing.
Exchange and discuss these with a partner. Which of your three propositions has the best
chance of becoming a successful argumentative essay? Which points look most important?

Expanding Your Argument

For now, don't worry about your essay's final structure, but consider expanding and
developing the points listed on your Pro and Con Chart. Think in terms of paragraphs, and
consider developing each point as though you planned to build a paragraph around it.
Some points may require extensive development and support, perhaps in a series of closely
related paragraphs. Other points may be easy to grasp and so self-evidently true that they
could be grouped together in a single paragraph.

Think in terms of paragraphs, and develop each point as though you planned to
build a paragraph around it.

This is a good time to use the discovery methods mentioned in Discovering What to Write.
You might also review the methods of paragraph development — examples, explanation,
comparison and contrast, facts — discussed in Thesis/Support Essays.
You may already sense that developing paragraphs in support of your proposition will be
different from developing paragraphs in opposition to it. That's because when you develop
arguments for your proposition, you are confirming; when you develop arguments against
your proposition, you are refuting. Both kinds of development are essential. You must show
that your own ideas are clear, reasonable, and solid. You must also show how your
opposition's case is weak. You must show that your own ideas are clear, reasonable,

and solid. You must also show how your your opposition's case is weak.
Writing paragraphs that confirm or support your proposition is similar to what you've done in
the past. Most often you'll state the paragraph's main point in a topic sentence and go on to
explain or define key terms, then give specific details that support the topic sentence.
Paragraphs refuting the opposition, however, are usually concerned with exploring another
person's thinking, especially with pointing out errors of logic and failures of insight. If you
can show that your case is strong and the opposition's is weak, chances are excellent that the
reader will be on your side at the end-and that's the goal.

Three Argumentative Appeals

While there's no infallible formula for winning over every reader in every
circumstance, you should learn how and when to use three fundamental
argumentative appeals. According to Aristotle, a person who wants to convince
another may appeal to that person's reason (logos), ethics (ethos), or emotion
(pathos).

The writer's job is to weave the various appeals into a single convincing
argument.

If we think of these three appeals as independent and of the writer as choosing just
one, however, we miss the point. The writer's job is to weave the various appeals into
a single convincing argument. As you continue to expand and develop your ideas,
look for ways of combining the three appeals to create a sound, balanced argument.

Three Argumentative Appeals - Reason

Reason

Briefly, informal reasoning requires clearly linking your general claims with

concrete, specific data. Much of the clear thinking we do in our everyday lives
follows logical principles, but in a less formal and systematic way than the thinking of
a research scientist. And for most occasions this informal reasoning is adequate.
Aristotle points out that it would be just as much a mistake to expect certain proofs in
argument as to expect only probable proofs in mathematics. That's not to say your
argument can be illogical, only that you shouldn't confuse formal logic with clear
thinking or good sense, the essential qualities your argument should display. Briefly,
informal reasoning requires clearly linking your general claims with concrete, specific
data.

When our thinking begins with specifics and moves toward a generalization, we
are moving inductively.

When our thinking begins with specifics and moves toward a generalization, we are
moving inductively. That is, if you were to taste several hard, green apples and then
draw the general conclusion that all hard, green apples are sour, you would be using
inductive reasoning. And, of course, the more apples tasted and the greater the
variation in the times and conditions of tasting, the greater the likelihood that your
general conclusion would be valid.
In your writing, then, when you reason inductively, ask whether you've examined the
evidence carefully, whether it justifies your general conclusion, and whether you've
given readers enough specific evidence to persuade them that your thinking is sound
and your general conclusion is true.
 Reasoning that moves in the opposite direction (from general to specific) is
called deductive reasoning.

Reasoning that moves in the opposite direction (from general to specific) is called
deductive reasoning. Here, you take a general principle that you know to be true and
use it to understand a specific situation. For instance, you may know from experience
that as a general rule bad weather reduces business at the golf course. You may also
learn that today's weather will be cold and rainy. From these two pieces of knowledge,
you can produce a third, more specific piece: Business at the golf course will be slow
today. In writing, deductive reasoning most often appears in a shortened version
(called an enthymeme) that may be hard to recognize. That's because one or more
links in the chain of reason have not been stated directly but only implied. Consider
the following example:
Bill never turns in his assignments, so he'll fail the course.
What is not directly stated but only implied is the general principle that students who
don't turn in their assignments will fail the course.
Such shortened forms are perfectly acceptable, but only if the underlying links and
claims are sound. An opponent may want to refute you by challenging some
underlying assumptions in your thinking; likewise, you'll want to look for faulty
reasoning when you refute your opposition.
Activity
8.6 Read the following statements and comment on their use of informal reasoning.
What details would you need to see in order to be convinced? Can you find any
unstated assumptions that need to be examined?
a. Coach Ratcliffe should be fired because a coach's job is to win ballgames.
b. I know he's popular because he drives a Corvette.
c. The president hasn't done anything about welfare reform, so he has no sympathy
for the poor.
d. The Sun Belt continues to be the fastest-growing part of the country.
e. Too much smoking ruins a person's health, so you know Louisa's in bad shape.
f. Today's prisons are practically like country clubs.
g. Because several new schools have been built in the past few years, Chicago has an
outstanding school system.
h. Imported cars are higher in quality than American cars.
i. Mr. Price got the contract, so you know he paid a few people off.
j. Arthur Jensen should be elected to the city council because he is a successful real
estate developer.
8.7 Look over the following examples, fill in any missing links in the reasoning chain,
and comment on the uses of informal logic:
Claim: Coach Ratcliffe should be fired.
Link: A coach's job is to win ballgames.
Data: The team had a 4 and 6 record this year. They had a 3 and 7 record last year.
They had a 1 and 9 record the previous year.
Claim: Arthur Jensen Should be elected to the City Council.
Link: The best person is the most experienced.
Data: Arthur has served two terms on the council. His opponent has never been on
the council. Arthur is a successful real estate developer.
Claim: Omaha has an outstanding school system.
Link:
Data: The buildings are well-maintained. Most schools have computers. Several new
schools have been built in the past few years.
Claim:
Link: Fair grading policies give every student an equal opportunity to succeed.
Data: Pop quizzes in H240 discriminate against students who prefer to cram for
tests. Attendance policies in H240 discriminate against students who must work
during class times. Writing assignments in H240 favor students with access to word
processors.

Three Argumentative Appeals - Ethics

Ethics
No matter how solid your reasoning, readers may not accept your argument unless
they're also convinced that you're a person of wisdom, honesty, and good will. If you
misrepresent the evidence, misunderstand the implications of your own value
structure, or seek to hurt some individual or group, you can expect to alienate your
readers.

The appeal to character is often subtle, affecting readers almost unconsciously,

yet often decisively.

If you misrepresent the evidence, misunderstand the implications of your own value
structure, or seek to hurt some individual or group, you can expect to alienate your
readers.
"Ah, I see. This writer pretends to be a friend of Mexican-Americans, but her word
choice shows that she understands almost nothing of our culture. And her proposal
would undermine our whole way of life. Of course, she'd get to build her apartments,
and it's obvious that's all she really cares about."
If you realize that readers are likely to analyze your character and intentions this way,
you'll see that the best way to put ethical appeal in your writing is to build a strong,
healthy relationship with your readers. Convince them that they can trust you to be
fair, honest, well-informed, and wellintentioned. Then, having established that trust,
don't betray it.
Activity
8.8 Letting 10 represent the highest and 1 the lowest, rate the following public figures
for their appeal to character. Of course, you'll be considering more than just writing,
but the activity should still give you some insight into what ethos is and how it affects
credibility. When you've finished, compare your ratings with those of a partner.
Discuss the reasons for your scoring.
a. Abraham Lincoln
b. Adolf Hitler
c. Oprah Winfrey
d. Mel Gibson
e. William J. Clinton
f. Bill Gates
g. Andy Rooney
h. Jay Leno
i. Brittney Spears
j. George W. Bush

Three Argumentative Appeals - Emotion

Emotion
Many people believe that emotional appeals by their very nature subvert reason and
are therefore better left to TV hucksters than to writers who want their ideas taken
seriously. Because this common view has some validity, emotional appeals must be
used with restraint and discretion, or they may prove counterproductive.
Nevertheless, while an argument founded mostly on feelings and emotions may be
superficial and biased, an argument that is carefully reasoned and honestly presented
probably won't be hurt by a bit of pathos. In fact, it may be helped.

... emotional appeals must be used with restraint and discretion, or they may
prove counterproductive.

One way to build pathos is to illustrate or dramatize an idea. This may involve little
more than folding short descriptive and narrative examples into the argument. Are
you arguing that your city needs to take stiffer measures against drunk drivers? Why
not find a place to include a description of the face of a child who was injured in an
accident caused by drinking? Or you might want to tell the story of a driver who
caused several accidents because the individual's license was never revoked.
Including such narrative and descriptive passages can help readers feel the urgency of
your proposition so that it gets beyond the level of abstract intellectual speculation
and becomes a matter of immediate human concern.
Careful word choice also influences an argument's emotional appeal. With this in
mind, you might review the discussion of The Best Word in Revising Your Writing.
The point here is that the overall emotional texture of your argument is the result of
many individual choices about which word to use.
Should I speak of "drunk" or "intoxicated" drivers?
Should I call them a "menace" or a "concern"?
Should they be "thrown into jail" or "incarcerated"?
Do we need to "teach them a lesson" or "make them aware of the consequences of
their actions"?
Such choices, even though they must be made one at a time, can't be seen as
independent of each other. Their force is cumulative. They communicate how you
feel-and by implication think the reader ought to feelabout your subject. If you want
the reader to identify with you emotionally, you'll choose words carefully, making
sure they're appropriate for you as a writer, for your readers, and for your overall
purpose in writing.
Activity
8.9 Read the following speech by Mark Anthony from William Shakespeare's play,
Jubus Caesar. Do you think Mark Anthony is appealing to the emotions of his
audience? If so, what is his purpose in doing so? What parts of the speech seem
especially designed to appeal to the audience's feelings? Does the speech contain any
appeal to reason? To character? Are the various appeals balanced and harmonious or
unbalanced and contradictory?
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious;
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest--
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men--
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

Form: Tradition and Innovation

By now, you've probably amassed many notes and ideas for your argument, but you may be
wondering how to sort and organize this material into an essay. The following pattern, which
gives the traditional Latin names for each section, may help. Like the thesis/support pattern, it
offers a basic structural framework that can be modified for various writing contexts. The
essential parts include the Introduction, Statement of the Case, Proposition, Refutation,
Confirmation, and Conclusion.
Introduction
(Exordium)--Draw your reader into the argument. Build common ground. Establish your tone
and style. Establish your credentials. Clarify why the issue is important. Build ethos. See also
the suggestions for Introductions and Conclusions in Thesis/Support Essays.
Statement of the Case

(Narratio)--Tell the story behind the argument. Give any necessary background information.
Illuminate the situational context. Clarify the issue. Characterize and define the issue in terms
that are favorable to your point of view.
Proposition Statement

(Propositio)--State your central proposition. Present it carefully, much as you would

the Thesis in a Thesis/Support Essay. You may also want to set up your readers' expectations
by forecasting important sub points (Divisio) that will be considered.
Refutation

(Refutatio)--Examine and refute opposition arguments. Wherever possible expose faulty

reasoning. The following questions will help you spot some frequent ways in which people
violate the basic principles of clear thinking.

1. Does the evidence truly warrant the general conclusions that the opposition has drawn?

2. Has all the evidence been considered or only evidence that favors the opposition's position?

3. Has the opposition considered all the alternatives or oversimplified and reduced them to two or
three?

5. Are conclusions ever drawn from questionable generalizations?

6. Are words always used clearly, accurately, and honestly?

7. Does the argument depend on emotionally charged language?

8. Does the argument ever suggest that ideas or policies are good or bad simply because they are
associated with certain individuals or groups?

9. Does the opposition ever argue by comparing one thing to another? If so, is the comparison fair
and reasonable?

10. Does the opposition try to sweet-talk and flatter the reader?

11. Does the argument suggest that an idea or course of action is good just because everyone else
believes or is doing it?
If you apply these questions to the opposition's case, you'll get a good idea of where the
reasoning is vulnerable. In refuting, first show that you understand the opposing argument by
summarizing or paraphrasing it in neutral language, then show how the argument is weak.
If necessary, make concessions, but try to offer counter-arguments:
True, no direct correlation has been shown between higher school funding and increased
scores on standardized achievement tests, but these tests are only one measure of educational
progress. Moreover, they are not designed to measure the achievement of school systems, but
of individual students.
Confirmation

(Confirmatio)--Develop and support your own case, much in the manner of a traditional
Thesis/Support Essay. Use examples, facts, and statistics to back up your claims. Avoid
logical fallacies. Argue from authority, definition, analogy, cause/effect, value, and purpose.
Base your appeal primarily on logos.
Once you have a clear vision of the confirmation's main points and supporting details, you can
consider a strategy of disclosure. Which point should come first? Which next? Which last?
One effective way of ordering the supporting points is to rank them in order of importance
and then arrange them as follows:

1. Second most important point

2. Point of lesser importance

3. Point of lesser importance

4. Most important point

Such an arrangement offers two advantages. It places your strongest points in positions of
emphasis at the beginning and end of your confirmation. Also, your strongest point coming
last, tends to anchor your argument, almost like the anchor person in a tug of war. If you were
to lead off with your best point and then run through the rest, you might give the impression
of weakness. The reader might feel you were gradually running out of ideas, becoming more
and more desperate. However, if your readers are familiar with the subject, they'll see that you
have something in reserve, that you've been scoring points steadily and consistently without
even going to your real strength. Coming in the last position, that major point will have great
emphasis--like the knock-out punch in a boxing match or the ace of trump in a game of
bridge.
Digression

(Digressio)--If you choose, this is a good time to appear to stray briefly from the main issue
into a touching or entertaining anecdote designed to appeal to ethos or pathos.
Conclusion

(Peroration)--Whatever you do, end strongly. Finish with conviction. After all, if you aren't
convinced, why should your reader be? You might end with an amplification (ringing
conclusion), a review of your main points, a reference to something in your introduction, or a
plea for action. You might also invite and facilitate defections from the opposition. Review
the suggestions for Introductions and Conclusions in Thesis/Support Essays.

Adapting the Argumentative Pattern

Except for the fact that an introduction by definition demands the first spot and a conclusion
the last, other sections can be moved around in a variety of effective ways. If the traditional
order--introduction, statement of case, refutation, confirmation, conclusion--doesn't suit your
needs, try an alternative.

1. Open with the introduction.

2. Refute the strongest opposition point.

3. State the case.

4. Confirm your proposition.

5. Refute the weaker opposition points.

6. End with the conclusion.

1. Open with the introduction.

2. Offer your proposition as an open question.

3. State the case.

4. Examine and refute the opposition.

5. Examine and confirm your proposition.

6. Conclude that your proposition should be accepted.

1. Open with the introduction.

2. Offer a rival proposition.

3. Offer your own proposition.

4. Confirm your proposition.

5. Refute the opposition.

6. End with the conclusion.

Activity
8.10 Write a short paragraph telling how you might use the above ideas to structure the essay
you are working on. Share and discuss your paragraph with a partner or in a small group.

Arguing for Consensus

This type of argument, as developed by Maxine Hairston, draws upon the communication
theories of psychologist, Carl Rogers. Unlike traditional argument, it's not based on an
adversarial model and doesn't seek to "win" in the traditional sense, though it might be argued
that if the argument is successful, everyone wins.

Carl Rogers's Basic Principles

Unlike traditional argument, it's not based on an adversarial model and doesn't
seek to "win"in the traditional sense ...

1. Threat hinders communication. People who feel threatened, tend to shut off communication
and stop listening.
2. Strong statements of belief encourage strong opposition from the audience.
3. Threat can be reduced by using neutral, objective language whenever possible.
4. Threat can be reduced by demonstrating an understanding of the reader's point of view.
5. An atmosphere of trust improves the chances for successful communication.

Elements of Rogerian Argument

1. A brief and objectively phrased statement that defines the issue.
2. A complete and neutrally worded analysis of the other side's position. This should
demonstrate that you understand their position and their reasons for holding it.
3. A complete and neutrally worded analysis of the position you hold. You should carefully
avoid any suggestion that you are more moral or sensitive than your audience.
4. An analysis of what your positions have in common and what goals and values you share.
5. A proposal for resolving the issue in a way that recognizes the interests of both parties.
As Rogers says, "If you really understand another person in this way, if you are willing to
enter his private world and see the way life appears to him, without any attempt to make
evaluative judgments, you run the risk of being changed yourself."
Adapted from:
Hairston, Maxine. A Contemporary Rhetoric. 3rd ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1982.
Activity

8.11 Write a short paragraph telling you might apply the Rogerian model to the essay you are
working on. Share and discuss your paragraph with a partner or in a small group.
Exploratory Essays
Occasions for Exploratory Essays
The exact nature of an exploratory essay can't be known in advance. It emerges gradually
from decisions and discoveries made along the way. Individual writers go in different
directions, depending on their interests and their specific writing contexts.
However you proceed, the strategies presented here will help you use your writing process to
explore unfamiliar, perhaps intimidating subject areas.
The end result should be something very much like a research paper, but with the primary
emphasis on your learning process rather than your sources of information. The idea is to use
your writing process to learn and discover.
As you become familiar with this problem-posing strategy, you'll start to see it fairly often,
especially in places like The New Yorker or Atlantic Monthly, and it also works well for much
academic writing.

... the strategies presented here will help you use your writing process to
explore unfamiliar, perhaps intimidating subject areas.

Consider two views of writing. The first sees writing as transcribing existing information,
thereby giving it order and permanence so it can be examined and understood by others. In the
second, writing is a way of coming to know what's unfamiliar and of participating in an
evolving conversation with readers, a conversation that constantly reshapes and redefines
human experience.
The first view applies best to simple, straightforward tasks such as writing down a recipe or
writing a letter of recommendation for a former employee. Yet even these offer room for
discovery, innovation, growth. And the discovery factor increases exponentially as writing
contexts grow more complex. In a sense, then, all writing is partly exploratory.
The following activities will help you ease into your writing process and use your uncertainty
for inspiration and motivation in the ongoing process of making meaning through writing.
For clarity, the process is presented in stages, but these stages don't have clear-cut beginnings
and endings. Sometimes they overlap and blend into each other. Also, in practice, they don't
always proceed in a neat linear fashion. As you explore, feel free to "leap ahead" to a later
stage or "circle back" to an earlier one.

Immersion and Interaction

At the start, you need to get authentically and personally involved with your subject. You
need to get inside the subject and get the subject inside of you. Let go of preconceived notions
about proper or expected ways to respond. Instead, connect the subject with your own world
of experience and understanding. Identify issues you care about.
This is a good time to freewrite. If you've been reading about your subject, you might pick a
notable paragraph or sentence, and write to the author, telling how the passage affects you.
Try out some subjective personal responses such as "This reminds me of . . ." or "This makes
me feel. . ." or "I don't understand how. . .."
 Let go of preconceived notions about proper or expected ways to respond.
Instead, connect the subject with your own world of experience and
understanding.

If your subject isn't drawn from readings, try other ways of getting involved. For instance, you
could write a detailed description of a scene from a film and then react to it. You could write
to the film's director or to one of the characters.
If your subject is drawn from personal experience, you might recount a memorable event, or
describe or write to some of the people involved. You might brainstorm a list of questions.
Your goal now is not to understand the subject or even to focus on a specific topic. You need
to immerse yourself in a way that has personal meaning-to possess the subject, and let the
subject possess you.
The result may be quite chaotic. Sometimes a dominant pattern appears, but more often
multiple perspectives emerge, suggesting several opportunities for further investigation and
exploration.
Activities

7.1 List five possible areas you could use as subjects for an exploratory essay. For now, these
can be broad and unfocused. Look for issues, questions, and problems that spark your
curiosity and interest. If possible discuss these topics with a partner.
7.2 Choose one of the subjects you listed in Activity 8.1 and probe it using the techniques in
the discussion above or the discovery aids discussed in Discovering What to Write. Try out a
few techniques. For instance, you might use the Journalist's Questions to compose a
questioning letter to the director of a film you've recently seen. Then you could freewrite a
letter about the film to a friend. After that, you might imagine you are one of the film's
characters and write a letter explaining your actions. You'll be looking at the subject from a
variety of perspectives and trying to locate your sources of interest. You may or may not see
any dominant pattern at this point.

Focus and Commitment

Precisely because the immersion stage may produce a jumble of ideas and impressions, it
becomes necessary to sort things out. Look for patterns in your early responses. Separate
major concerns from minor ones, central issues from peripheral ones. Consider which of the
many points you've raised call for more examination and discussion.
You could sort your ideas into groups and then rank each group according to its level of
interest. You're not looking for answers so much as questions, not solutions but problems.
You're far from needing a thesis. In fact, this early, a thesis may be more hindrance than help,
as it can create a false sense of certainty and prematurely shut down further inquiry.

Look for patterns in your early responses. Separate major concerns from minor
ones, central issues from peripheral ones.

If you don't see an emerging focus, ask some leading questions:

Why do I want to write on gender bias?
Where would I find information on this?
Am I more concerned with the causes or the effects of this issue?
What related issues would I have to consider in order to examine the matter thoroughly?
Finally, you need to focus your exploration and make a commitment to pursue your topic as
the writing project evolves.
Activity

7.3 Write a short, one paragraph description of the central issue, question, or problem you
want to explore. Include any subpoints or related issues that you think might be included in
your final paper. If you want, tell why this issue is important to you. Share your paragraph
with a partner.

Trying Out Ideas

By now, your project should be well underway. You've got a subject that genuinely interests
you, and you've found a focus to guide your explorations. Now you need to begin
systematically probing and exploring.
The discovery techniques discussed in Discovering What to Write should be helpful at this
point. If you need some basic structure, see the suggestions in Organizing Your Writing. Find
a comfortable balance between generating new ideas and fitting those ideas into an overall
pattern. Branching trees and cluster maps can be help you spot major divisions and see how
parts relate to the whole and to each other.

Find a comfortable balance between generating new ideas and fitting those
ideas into an overall pattern.

If you need more information, you may want to research topic in the library or conduct some
interviews or surveys. This is also a good time for more freewriting, focused now on specific
subtopics identified in your organizational plan.
Imagine yourself exploring the problem of unconscious sexism in your workplace. You may
be asking where these attitudes come from, who holds them, how the expression of sexism
has changed over time, how this sexism manifests itself now, how it affects men, women, the
overall atmosphere at work, the quality of work produced, how these attitudes can be exposed
and overcome. You may be freewriting about your own experiences, interviewing co-workers
and supervisors, researching literature on the causes and effects of discrimination.
You'll almost certainly sense a need for order and system to your inquiry. You may need to do
some further clustering, make an informal outline, or simply list important sub points.
Probably also, you'll be looking for some sort of closure, some destination, some end to your
exploring. You may not be ready to formulate this into a clear thesis, but will likely be
moving in that direction.
Rather than choosing a thesis immediately, you might try out a few possibilities so their
strengths and weaknesses can be examined.

 Do you believe these sexist attitudes are so deeply ingrained by cultural conditioning and the
structure of the work environment that you couldn't hope to counteract them?
 Rather than choosing a thesis immediately, you might try out a few possibilities
so their strengths and weaknesses can be examined.

 Do you feel that increased social awareness of gender bias may have created a climate in which
concerned people can hope to change the status quo?
 What have you discovered in your inquiry that would lead you to favor one solution over
another?

As such questions are answered, you should feel an emerging sense of certainty and
satisfaction, a tentative recognition of closure.
To be sure, much work remains ahead, but if you shuttle back and forth between exploring
and structuring, you should start to see a thesis emerging, and your should begin to see how
that thesis can serve as an organizational and conceptual center for your essay.
Activity

7.6 During these probing and drafting stages, share your work to date with a partner. What
you share will be rough and unfinished. You may have to do more than show your work; you
may have to explain what you're trying to do and how you're going about it.

A Learning Cycle
As you begin to identify key issues and problems for further exploration, you may wish to
consider the learning cycle model below. It is based on the work of the French learning
theorist, Jean Piaget.
Equilibrium refers to the state of being intellectually satisfied, at ease, com fortable with one's
understanding. Newly posed questions, issues, and prob lems disturb that equilibrium,
creating cognitive dissonance, as we sense that our existing world view no longer works. In
order to eliminate the dissonance and re-establish equilibrium, we begin problem-solving
activities.

Through assimilation, for instance, we may be able to show that the problem is only apparent,
a misperception, and that the new information, seen correctly, need not trouble us. Or, the
problem may be more fundamental, as when discovery that the Sun does not revolve around
the Earth, caused Renaissance scholars to re-examine and even discard closely held beliefs in
order to recover intellectual equilibrium. This is the way of accommodation. Old ideas are
discarded, new hypotheses proposed and tested, until eventually equilibrium is re-established
and we are again intellectually at ease. Once the discord is resolved, the result is a more
comprehensive and secure level of understanding-at least temporarily.
The exploratory journey undertaken here asks you to use your native problem-solving and
learning processes to spot areas of cognitive dissonance, to explore the sources of that
dissonance, and to engage in a conversation (partly written and partly oral) about ways of
resolving your uncertainty.
Once the discord is resolved, the result is a more comprehensive and secure level of
understanding—at least temporarily.

Revising for Readers

Up to this point, most of your writing has been informal, maybe somewhat personal. If you've
produced a draft at all, it's probably quite rough and will need revision on both global and
local levels.
As you produce a working draft, clusters, scratch outlines, pyramid charts, and other
organizational aids can help suggest major divisions and even where to place sub points
within those divisions, but unless you've identified an audience from the start, you may not
have thought much about how readers will react to your writing.

Have you looked closely at the whole writing context and considered the
amounts and kinds of information your readers want or need?

Have you looked closely at the whole writing context and considered the amounts and kinds
of information your readers want or need? Have you thought about how to arrange your major
points, including your thesis? Should it come at the beginning or the end? Should it be
directly stated or implied? Have you established a consistent style in terms of tone, voice, and
degree of formality. This is where cutting and pasting, substituting and rewriting, begins in
earnest.
Activities

7.7 Once you've produced a working draft, exchange it with a partner or with members of
your discussion group. Role playing can be helpful here. Other group members, or even the
writer, if the paper is being read aloud by someone else, can anticipate possible audience
responses, reacting to both style and substance.
Does one idea flow naturally into another?
Is the writer telling me what I already know?
Are examples and illustrations relevant and convincing?
Is the voice authentic?
Is the style too formal or too chummy or just right?
7.8 Consider the following model as a pattern for working through and organizing an
exploratory essay. Then answer the questions that follow.
Freewrite on the following questions. First do Question 1 and discuss it with a partner. Then
do Question 2.
1. Does this chart make any sense to you? Can you see how you could use any of this in your
present essay or in future papers? Would you need to modify it? How? Does it at all resemble
ways you've previously thought about organizing your writing?
2. Write a brief summary of the structural design of your current essay. What are the main
parts? How are they related? Why are they presented in the order you have chosen? What is
your writing goal for each part of the essay? How does the overall conceptual flow relate to
your reader's perspective?

Documenting Sources
Documenting in Context
Writers traditionally identify the source of words or ideas that they quote, paraphrase, or
summarize from outside sources. In informal writing—personal narratives, for instance, or
humorous pieces—sources are best identified in the text itself, keeping the reference brief yet
clear.
As writing contexts grow more formal—academic papers or legal documents, for instance—
readers increasingly expect more care and precision about revealing sources. In such
situations, formal reference notes are handled with strict adherence to established convention.
Yet here also, clarity and simplicity are essential.
Like simplicity and clarity, the following guidelines apply in a broad range of writing
contexts:

 Cite a source to give

As writing contexts grow more formal, readers increasingly expect more care
and precision about revealing sources.

credit where credit is due. This is partly a matter of common courtesy. If someone has spent time
and effort on an important study and you use that information, a reference note is your way of
saying thanks, and of letting readers know about your source's contribution. Beyond
considerations of courtesy, however, come considerations of honesty. It's dishonest to take
credit for another person's original words or ideas. To do so would be an act of plagiarism. Don't
be guilty, even unintentionally, of plagiarism. Always give appropriate credit to those whose
original words and ideas appear in your own writings.

 Cite a source to give readers a first-hand look at materials you've used to develop and support
your ideas. A doubting reader may question your statistics or your mention of a scientific study.
A reference note allows that reader to check up on you, to find the same book or article you
used. Skeptical readers can make sure, for instance, that the study was conducted responsibly
and that you've presented the results fairly and accurately. Even sympathetic readers may want
to access your sources. If they have a genuine interest in your subject, they'll want to learn more.
By following up on your sources, they can access your information trail.

What to Document
Keeping the above purposes of documentation in mind will help you decide whether you need
a reference note or not. Consider, also, these more specific guidelines:
1. Use a reference citation to identify the source of all material that has been directly quoted.
Strong writers keep direct quotations to a minimum. Include as few direct quotations from
outside sources as possible, and keep them as short as possible. As a general rule, quote
directly only when the exact wording of your source is vital to understanding the point under
discussion or when your source has said something especially eloquent or memorable.
Otherwise, paraphrase the ideas, or in the case of a long passage, summarize the relevant
points.
When you use a direct quotation, as when you paraphrase or summarize, introduce it with a
running acknowledgment, as in the following example:
This view is clarified by Fritjof Capra, who points out that "once it is seen to be a form of
energy, mass is no longer required to be indestructible, but can be transformed into other
forms of energy" (187).
Here, the writer considered Capra's exact wording to be crucial, and so decided to quote the
passage exactly.
2. Use a reference citation to identify the source of material that has been paraphrased or
summarized.
Even when you don't quote directly but change your source's wording and restate the ideas in
your own language, you should document your source. You should also document your brief
summary of the main points of someone else's longer discussion.
Again, as with direct quotation, introduce summarized or paraphrased material with a running
acknowledgment.
Jung believes that one of religion's major functions is to present humanity with a source of
allegiance that transcends any individual social or political system. Belief systems that do not
reach beyond their immediate sociopolitical contexts, he refers to as mere creeds (29-31).
According to Erich Fromm, it is through the act of giving that we experience our fullest
strength and potency (19).
The first example summarizes the relevant points of a two-page discussion in a few sentences.
The second rephrases the main idea from a brief passage and blends it smoothly into the
writer's own style. Both examples, however, acknowledge the sources of their concepts.
3. Use a reference citation to direct your reader to important background information.
If a full appreciation of the point you're making depends on familiarity with another person's
work, use a note to direct your readers to that material. Let them see the intellectual
foundation on which your essay is built.
One persuasive argument supporting this view of Satan has been offered by C. S. Lewis
(203).
Here, the writer wants readers to know there is authoritative support for the writer's
viewpoint. While the writer doesn't have time to go into this support, the note tells readers
where to find it.
4. Do not use a reference citation to document information that is common knowledge, even
though you found that information in a specific source.
That is, if a piece of information is generally known and acknowledged to be true, you don't
need to provide documentation, even though the information is new to you:
When Queen Elizabeth died in 1603, King James VI of Scotland became King James I of
England.
You may have uncovered this information in your research, and you may be able to point out
the exact source, but why bother? The information is common knowledge to anyone
interested in the period and can be found in any good encyclopedia or British history book.
There's no need to document it, anymore than there would be to document the fact that
George Washington was the first president of the United States.
How to Document
Unfortunately, there is no universally accepted form of documentation. Different fields of
study, different institutions, and even different instructors have their own preferences. The
form presented here is that of the Modern Language Association (MLA).
It's widely used in universities and professional publications throughout the United States and
Canada, and most professors will accept it readily. If you're uncertain, simply ask your
instructor if MLA format is acceptable. MLA encourages parenthetical documentation. This
method is much more convenient than the old systems of footnoting or end noting. The new
system does require you to make a bibliography (MLA calls it a Works Cited), but that can be
done quickly.

Another frequently used documentation style is that of the American Psychological

Association (APA). An excellent source of information on both APA and MLA formats, as
well as documentation of electronic sources is the Purdue University Online Writing Lab
(OWL).

Using Parenthetical Citations

When you cite a source, your note should be placed in parentheses at the end of the material
you're documenting.
Inside the parentheses, place the page number(s) you're referring to and the author's last name,
unless you mentioned the name in your running acknowledgment. If more than one work by
an author was used, include a shortened title of the work you're citing. For example, if you
had used more than one book by Erich Fromm, your note would read as follows:
According to Erich Fromm, it is through the act of giving that we experience our fullest
strength and potency (Loving 19).
If you had not mentioned Fromm's name in the running acknowledgment, the entry would
look like this:
One psychologist believes that through the act of giving we experience our fullest strength
and potency (Fromm, Loving 19).
As you can see, this isn't difficult. Do remember, though, that the parenthetical note shouldn't
repeat information from your running acknowledgment.

Making a Works Cited

A Works Cited page gives full publication information for the works cited in your
parenthetical notes. A reader who wants to follow up on your references to Erich Fromm, for
instance, would find an entry like this:
Fromm, Erich. The Art of Loving. New York: Harper & Row, 1956.
This lets the reader see everything necessary to locate the book.
The most convenient online aid aid to making a Works Cited page is probably the Landmark
Citation Machine. It's also fun to use.
Of course, a full Works Cited would usually include more than one entry. Some entries might
refer to books, others to magazines or professional journals. These entries are arranged in
alphabetical order by the author's last name, and multi-line entries are set with hanging
indents of one half inch. The sample Works Cited below illustrates the basic form to follow:
 Works Cited
Capra, Fritjof. The Tao of Physics. New York: Bantam Books, 1976.
Fromm, Erich. The Art of Loving. New York: Harper & Row, 1956.
_________. The Sane Society. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1955.
Hackett, George. "The Longest Jump." Newsweek 15 Aug. 1983: 48.
Jung, C. G. The Undiscovered Self. Boston: Little Brown, 1957.
Lewis, C. S. "Satan." Milton: Modern Essays in Criticism. Ed. Arthur E. Barker. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1965. 196-204.
"Log Cabin Literary Center." 19 Mar. 1999. <http://www.logcablit.org> (21 Apr. 1997).
Sledd, James. "In Defense of the Students' Right." College English (Nov. 1983): 667-75.
"Steel Bargaining: The Last Chance." Business Week 17 Jan. 1983: 94-97.

And again, when in doubt, try the Landmark Citation Machine.

Ten Templates
The following examples illustrate some common Works Cited entries. To use them, find the
entry that matches your source, then select that entry with your mouse and copy it to the
appropriate place in your own Works Cited. Next, substitute the relevant information in your
own source for that in the template entry, being careful to leave the punctuation,
capitalization, and spacing unchanged.
And again, when in doubt, try the Landmark Citation Machine.
1. A book with a single author:
Fromm, Erich. The Art of Loving. New York: Harper & Row, 1956. 2. An edition other
than the first:
Williams, Joseph. Style: Ten Lessons in Clarity & Grace. 2nd ed. Glenview, IL: Scott
Foresman, 1985.
3. A selection in an anthology:
Lewis, C. S. "Satan." Milton: Modern Essays in Criticism. Ed. Arthur E. Barker. Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 1965. 196-204.
4. A WWW page (Note: The first date is the page date, if given. The second is the access
date):
"Log Cabin Literary Center." 19 Mar. 2004. < http://www.logcablit.org> (21 Apr. 2005).
5. A newspaper article:
"When Good Dogs Go Bad." Plainview Herald 1 Aug. 2007: 1B.
6. An article in a magazine:
Hackett, George. "The Longest Jump." Newsweek 15 Aug. 1983: 48.
7. An article in a journal paginated by volume:
Harris, James R. "Rhetoric of Science." College English 53 (1991): 282-307.
8. An article in a journal paginated by issue:
Matthews, William. "Miss Bishop." The Gettysburg Review 5:1 (1992): 71-72.
9. A personal interview:
Nutley, Delbert. Personal Interview. 1 Apr. 2005.
10. An article in a dictionary or encyclopedia:
"Goblin." The Oxford English Dictionary. 1971 ed.
Activities

9.1 Read the following three passages and the publication information for each one. Imagine
that you are using the passages as sources in an essay. Show briefly how you would
incorporate them into your own writing with a running acknowledgment and parenthetical
documentation.
a. Quote all or part of this one:
"Students of chaos theory, which is grounded in mathematics, believe that their emerging
discipline is revealing patterns of order deeply embedded in the chaos that seethes all around."
This comes from page 142 of an essay called "Chaos: The Ultimate Asymmetry" by Arthur
Fisher. It was published in the anthology, Best Science Writing: Readings and Insights,
published by Oryx Press in 1991 in Phoenix. The anthology was edited by Robert Gannon.
The essay is on pages 138-157.
b. Paraphrase this one:
"It now seems that Asthma is puzzling in part because it's actually many different ailments
posing as one. And that revelation could open the door to many of the 16 million Americans
who need treatment. There's no better time, too, because the number of sufferers appears to be
rising about 4 percent each year."
This comes from an article called "Clearing the Air" by Eric Steinmehl. It was published in
January/February 2005 in Health magazine. The quoted passage is on page 52. The article is
on pages 52-55.
c. Summarize this one:
"Try different tones: chatty, authoritative, ironic. Try different ways of organizing: starting
with the conclusion, building up to it last. Persuade with reasoning, with anecdote. Hide the
weak arguments, admit them openly. Try to write it in half the length. Try different formats
on the page such as lists or pictures or diagrams."
This comes from page 123 of Writing With Power. Techniques for Mastering the Writing
Process. The book was published in New York in 1981 by Oxford University Press and was
written by Peter Elbow.
9.2 Make a Works Cited page that gives complete publication information for each passage
you worked with in Activity 9.1.