Week 6 -Tuesday
Writing style is much harder to teach than grammar Style is subjective, dependent on audience and medium, and borders on art rather than science While the basic unit of grammar is the sentence, Strunk and White say that the basic unit of composition should be the paragraph One paragraph for each topic As a rule, begin the paragraph with a topic sentence
Most of you got comments that your thesis statement could be stronger Make a point with your thesis statement! Say something no one else has ever said Argue that your paper's subject created a field of CS or that something that we now depend on wouldn't exist without them or something else impressive Do not list a series of facts Do not call a person the "mother" or "father" or something, since that label is meaningless Tell a story!
Every writer has a tendency to use too many words Students become verbose in order to meet a word count or to sound more intelligent General rule: If a word can be removed from a sentence without changing its meaning, the word should be removed Shorter sentences are clearer and more forceful Reduce your preposition usage
that somehow just absolutely only basically really actually slightly sort of almost kind of seemed a little perhaps very maybe simply
In addition to the listed filler words, every adverb should be examined Adverbs are long and add little meaning Most adverbs end in – ly , but "very" is an exception If you need an adverb to boost the power of your verb, consider using a stronger verb Effective writing depends on the strength of nouns and verbs, not adjectives and adverbs
Passive voice makes the object of an action into the subject of a sentence Passive: My head was struck by a rocket. Active: A rocket struck my head. Ways to recognize the passive voice: Form of the verb "to be" combined with past participle of a verb: "was struck" Passive voice sentences will often end with "…by the something ."
The passive voice reduces clarity: A new age of computer science was ushered in. Who ushered in the new age of computer science? The passive voice removes credit and blame: Mistakes were made. The addition of a "to be" verb makes the sentence longer
There are some cases when passive voice is reasonable If you want to emphasize the object rather than the subject: 100 votes are required to pass the bill. If the subject is unknown: A tremendous amount of graffiti was painted on the wall.
Perhaps the best known (though often criticized) book on style in English composition is Strunk and White's The Elements of Style : https://www.amazon.com/Elements-Style-William-Strunk-Jr/dp/194564401X Short and cheap! Good because it talks about how to write well, not just to follow rules Also useful is the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association : https://www.amazon.com/Publication-Manual-American-Psychological- Association/dp/1433805618/ And the MLA Handbook : https://www.amazon.com/Handbook-Modern-Language-Association- America/dp/1603292624/
Project 2, the design document, is due Friday Assignment 3, the rough draft, is due the Friday after that
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