Category Archives: Writing Style

Sentence Unity

Before you start this lesson, you might want to review this basic lesson on sentences. I’m building on those basics here.

Sentence unity refers to several concepts: noun-pronoun agreement, subject-verb agreement, tense agreement, and using one idea per sentence.

It’s that last idea that we’ll look at here.

Multi-Idea Problems

In the lesson on sentences, I said that a sentence is a complete thought. Notice that “thought” is singular. Introducing multiple ideas into a sentence is a guaranteed method of confusing readers.

Identifying what counts as single or multiple ideas is an art, not a science. It’s also subjective.

I’ve got some tips below, but examining your sentences for possible confusion is the best way to improve your sentence unity.

The Good and Bad of Non-Restrictive Clauses

We know that non-restrictive clauses are non-essential, but not necessarily unimportant, ideas. Both of the following sentences contain non-restrictive clauses. Can you spot an important difference between them?

Example: My laptop, which is three-months-old, is broken.

Example: The office, which used to have a daycare and cafeteria, is located in the center of downtown.

We could rewrite the first sentence as: My laptop is broken. This sentence makes sense; it’s not essential to know that the laptop is three-months-old, but that information is relevant to the sentence (Three-month-old laptops aren’t usually broken).

So, in this sentence, the non-restrictive clause is non-essential (like all non-restrictive clauses), but it is important.

In the second example, the non-restrictive clause is neither essential nor important. It’s an irrelevant idea that comes out of nowhere.

When you’re describing the location of an office, it’s completely irrelevant what small features it used to have. We need to rewrite this sentence.

Re-write: The office is located in the center of downtown. It used to have a daycare and cafeteria.

Now we’ve got two logical sentences, each containing their own idea.

And on and on and on

Conjunctions, especially “and”, frequently sneak extra ideas into sentences.

Example: Cedric has red hair and freckles, and he plays soccer every Saturday, but he doesn’t like any other sports except hockey.

This sentence tries to describe Cedric’s appearance, what he does, and his interests, which is more than one sentence can handle.

His appearance is completely separate from the other two ideas, so it definitely gets its own sentence.

Break it up: Cedric has red hair and freckles.

Since what Cedric does is related to his interests, we can combine those ideas into one sentence.

Re-write: He plays soccer every Saturday, but he doesn’t like any other sports except hockey.

While the ideas are now fine, the wording makes this sentence clunky. Changing the second half makes it easier to understand.

Re-write: He plays soccer every Saturday, and the only other sport he likes is hockey.

If you’re using a comma and a conjunction, you can always use a period instead, so check how closely your ideas relate to decide which option is better.

See Spot Run

After all this talk of sticking to one and only one idea per sentence, you might be thinking, “So should I write only Dick and Jane sentences?”

No.

There are plenty of lengthy sentences that stick to one idea, while exploring that idea in multiple clauses.

If you’ve got a string of short sentences, look for related thoughts so that you can combine them.

Example: I am a writer. I write online. I mostly write blogs. Sometimes I write product descriptions. I am having lasagna for dinner.

Except for the last sentence, these sentences all relate to online writing. Here are several options for combining them.

Option 1: I am an online writer who mostly writes blogs and occasional product descriptions.

Option 2: As an online writer, I mostly write blogs, and sometimes write product descriptions.

Option 3: I am an online writer. I mostly write blogs and sometimes write product descriptions.

These sentences don’t say anything about lasagna, so they’re all fine.

Learn More:

• Odyssey Writing Workshops: Sentence Unity
• Prezi: Sentence Unity

Active Voice

Most English sentences are active, meaning they have a subject that is doing the action. In contrast, a passive sentence has a subject that has the action done to it.

Active: Eli is serving dinner.

Passive: Dinner is being served by Eli.

As these examples show, when you change an active sentence into a passive one, the direct object becomes the subject.

Stay Active

Just like proponents of healthy lifestyles, writing instructors generally encourage (or even require) being active: choosing active verbs instead of passive ones.

Passive sentences are often clunky, and they can be ambiguous if you don’t indicate the agent (the thing that’s doing the action).

Clunky: My mother was visited by me.

No agent: Mistakes were made.

These sentences should definitely be revised (I visited my mother. We made mistakes.), but not all passive sentences are so terrible.

Consider Importance

Sometimes the doer (the subject in an active sentence) is not the most important person around.

If you want to emphasize the object, or if the subject is irrelevant or unknown, using the passive voice is better.

Passive: My brother was diagnosed with cancer.

Active: Doctors diagnosed my brother with cancer.

Passive: The toaster should be cleaned monthly.

Active: You should clean the toaster monthly.

Passive: Dominique’s TV was stolen.

Active: Someone stole Dominique’s TV.

With the possible exception of the middle pair (depending on the context), I prefer the passive versions of these sentences. What about you?

Be Objective

Some writing, such as scientific and judicial writing, places a particularly high value on objectivity. By objectivity I mean not using personal pronouns in a lab report and not speculating about who committed a crime.

You can still write active sentences while following these rules, but you might have to write passive ones too, which is perfectly acceptable.

Instructions are another case where you might want to be formal and use passive sentences, or informal and use personal pronouns.

Check Both Ways

When you write a passive sentence, see if you can change it to an active sentence. If you can easily change it and keep the same meaning and emphasis that it had while passive, make the change.

If changing it results in a clunkier or less accurate sentence, stick with the passive.

Learn More:

• Towson University: Active and Passive Voice
• University of Wisconsin: Active Voice
• Econsultancy: Passive vs Active Voice
• Guide to Grammar: The Passive Voice

Adding Emphasis

Not all thoughts are equal. You don’t expect your readers to remember everything that you write, but you hope that they’ll remember your key ideas.

You can emphasize your main points with formatting and writing techniques.

Inversion

Sentences usually follow a subject-verb-object order. You can add emphasis by using the shock factor of changing up or inverting that order.

Normal: I never expected to be a million dollar blogger.

Inverted: Never did I expect to be a million dollar blogger.

The inverted sentence brings part of the verb “did” before the subject “I”. Writing all your sentences in this style would be ridiculous, but when you do it once per copy, it stands out.

Repetition

No one wants to read repetitive writing. Often, looking for synonyms and varying sentence structure is the best choice, but when you want to emphasize something, repetition can be your best friend.

Example: Made with extra cream and extra cocoa, you’ll love our extra tasty deluxe hot chocolate.

Parallel Structure

Parallel structure is similar to repetition, but focuses on phrases and sentences instead of individual words. Always check your subheaders for parallel structure.

Your subheaders should all start in the same way, whether that’s with verbs, nouns, numbers, or the same letter. In this lesson, my subheaders are all nouns.

If I start the next subheader with a verb, it will stand out awkwardly.

Also check for parallel structure within sentences.

Not parallel: Omar likes reading, writing, and to surf the web.

Parallel: Omar likes reading, writing, and surfing the web.

Parallel: Omar likes to read, write, and surf the web.

See how clunky the non-parallel sentence is compared with the other two? Using the same form of verbs works much better.

Subordination

Subordination is a way to not emphasize something. Dependent clauses are also called subordinate clauses because the ideas in them are less important than those in the independent clause.

You can emphasize your important ideas by putting them in an independent clause and putting less important ideas in a dependent clause.

It’s also best to put your main idea at the end of the sentence.

Less effective: Yuka writes hilarious tweets, although she never got good grades on her essays.

More effective: Although she never got good grades on her essays, Yuka writes hilarious tweets.

Learn More:

• Purdue Owl: Achieving Emphasis
• Purdue Owl: Parallel Structure
• EC San Francisco Language School: Inversion and Emphasis

Cliches

A cliche is a phrase that is so overused that it’s become meaningless. Using cliches makes you seem boring, uncreative, and lazy.

Identifying Cliches

The first step to eliminating cliches is identifying them. If you’re using a phrase that you’ve heard before, it’s likely a cliche. You can also search for a cliche here.

Cliches can be long:

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

The grass is always greener on the other side.

Or short:

Achilles’ heel.

My bad.

Kick ass.

Once upon a time (did you notice that?), these phrases were meaningful, witty, and descriptive. But their popularity has worn away their charm.

Eliminating Cliches

Once you’ve spotted a cliche in your writing, think about what it means and how you can express that meaning in a unique way.

Cliched: Erin used to write by the book, but now she lets freedom ring.

Not cliched: Erin used to fastidiously follow grammar “rules”. Now she embraces the freedom of creative writing: splitting infinitives and starting sentences with conjunctions whenever she wants.

The second sentence is more descriptive;  it specifically explains how Erin’s writing has changed, rather than just giving a vague idea that it’s become more freer.

Using Cliches

Once in a blue moon, such as when you’re writing about cliches, it’s okay to use a cliche. Make sure that your writing is informal, since cliches are worst in formal writing, and then consider why you want to use a cliche.

Perhaps the best use of cliches is the ironic cliche. If you’re writing about marketing, you can turn around the cliche “a rose by any other name would smell as sweet” by showing how much brand names matter.

The problem with cliches is that they’re uninteresting. But if you can make them interesting, then you don’t have to avoid them like the plague. Okay, okay, I’ll stop my cliches now.

Learn More:

• University of North Carolina: Cliches
• Richmond University: Cliches

Paragraph Unity

Like sentences, readable paragraphs are unified and coherent. A paragraph is a group of sentences all focused on one idea.

Stick to the Topic

In academic writing, each paragraph has a topic sentence that states the idea for that paragraph.

You might find this style too formal for your online writing, but you should at least know what topic you are covering in each paragraph and make that topic clear to your readers.

Since short paragraphs are best in online writing, it is crucial that you stick to one topic per paragraph.

Is That a Topic?

How do you know if you’re sticking to the topic or heading off on a tangent? Once you’ve chosen your paragraph topic, make sure that each sentence in that paragraph supports the topic.

If your sentences are helping your topic, you’re doing well. If you have a sentence that seems more important than the topic (the topic is supporting the sentence), though, it should probably become a separate paragraph.

I say “probably” because, as with all matters of style, you must use your discretion.

Remain Coherent

It’s not enough to have unified ideas. You must also present your ideas coherently, i.e. in an order that makes sense.

As an example, look what happens if I jumble up the sentences in the “Stick to the Topic” paragraph (above):

“You might find this style too formal for your online writing, but you should at least know what topic you are covering in each paragraph, and make that topic clear to your readers. In academic writing, each paragraph has a topic sentence that states the idea for that paragraph. Since short paragraphs are best in online writing, it is crucial that you stick to one topic per paragraph.”

From the beginning, the reader is confused. What is “this style”? Is this paragraph about online or academic writing?

The writer is obviously talking about topic sentences, but it’s not clear what she’s trying to say about them.

For a coherent paragraph, consider how you want your ideas to flow.

• Chronologically?
• By comparing and contrasting?
• Providing a definition?

Also check how each sentence relates to the sentences immediately before and after it. Do they make sense in that order or should they be moved?

Learn More:

• American University: Paragraph Unity and Coherence
• Purdue Owl: Paragraphs
• Wheaton College: Paragraph Unity, Coherence, and Development

Split Infinitives

If I controlled the English language, we wouldn’t need this lesson because split infinitives should be a non-issue.

Unfortunately, self-appointed know-it-alls are still insisting the split infinitives are wrong, even though they aren’t.

So, what’s the issue?

Split Infinitives: A Problem?

An infinitive is the word “to” plus a verb.

Examples: to conspire, to write, to dance, to laugh

When you put a word, generally an adverb, in between the “to” and the verb, that’s called splitting the infinitive.

Examples: to maliciously conspire, to frantically write, to passionately dance, to awkwardly laugh

The Latin Problem

In the 1800s, scholars loved Latin. As a Latin student myself, I sometimes dream of going back to those good-old-days. But there was a problem.

Some grammarians tried apply Latin rules to English grammar, even though English isn’t Latin. Most Latin infinitives are a single word, so they can’t be split.

Those Latin loving grammarians decided that if Latin infinitives couldn’t be split, neither could English ones.

Of course, the problem is that English infinitives are constructed completely differently from Latin ones, so it doesn’t make sense to follow the same rules.

The Problem Today

Today, there is disagreement about whether or not split infinitives are acceptable. The websites that I looked at all said that split infinitives are allowed, but also said that they would hesitate to use split infinitives because some people still believe that they’re wrong.

What should you do?

If you have a split infinitive, try rewriting it. Most split infinitives don’t need to be split.

Split: Jabari decided to stealthily tiptoe to the cookie tin.

Not split: Jabari decided to tiptoe stealthily to the cookie tin.

Sometimes, though, the meaning of a split infinitive is different when you don’t split it, or the non-split version sounds awkward.

Split: I decided to quickly write the product descriptions.

Not split: I decided to write the product descriptions quickly.

Split: It feels good to really laugh.

Not split: It feels good to laugh really.

If your non-split version doesn’t work as well as your split infinitive, try to ask your client about it.

If you don’t hear back from him or her, I think you’re safe to leave it in, since it can always be edited during the revision process.

Learn More:

• Chicago Manual of Style: Split Infinitives
• Oxford Dictionaries: Split Infinitives
• Grammar Girl: Split Infinitives