Cutting Clutter: The Way to Better Writing

Big Words vs. Plain, Direct Speech High school: the more SAT words the better! Jenny’s class: the best writing uses the fewest words and most direct phrasing! That doesn’t mean using all short sentences. You want “sentence variety” (sentences of different shapes and lengths). But you don’t want CLUTER.

On Writing Well by William Zinsser: The Clutter Cutter’s Bible 1942 government blackout order memo: “Such preparations shall be made as will completely obscure all Federal buildings and non-Federal buildings occupied by the Federal government during an air raid for any period of time from visibility by reason of internal or external illumination.” FDR’s edit: “Tell them that in buildings where they have to keep the work going to put something across the windows.”

Key Strategies for Cutting Clutter in Your Writing: 1.Cut out wordy phrases like these— at the current time (say “now”) due to the fact that (say “because” or “since...”) for the reason that (“because”) on the occasion of (“when”) it is important that there is a need for (“must”) it is possible that (“may” or “could”)

Example— Regardless of the fact that both marijuana and hemp are varieties of cannabis sativa, one has a high concentration of delta 9 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), while the other has low concentration in THC. Although both marijuana and hemp are varieties of cannabis sativa, one...

2. Avoid passive constructions. Active voice means the subject carries out the action: “Jenny read the slide.” With passive voice, the subject is acted upon: “The slide was read by Jenny.” (BTW, The most overused passive sentence ever is: “Mistakes were made.”)

Tip-offs that you’ve got a passive construction you can make active: “It is” “There are” “To be” verbs generally Example: I was surprised how many different factors may cause a person to become radicalized. The many different factors that cause radicalization surprised me.

A strategy for eliminating passive constructions: turn independent clauses into modifiers— I was intrigued and outraged by the tragic rape and murder of New Delhi medical student Jyoti Singh and decided to focus my initial question on on the 2012 case. Intrigued and outraged by the tragic rape and murder of New Delhi medical student Jyoti Singh, I decided to focus my initial question on the 2012 case.

3. Look for unneeded clauses you can cut out of your sentences. I was instructed that by adding this asterisk the results I would be provided with would be directed more towards what I wanted to find for my research, and more applicable to my research question.” Adding an asterisk to my search term helped me find more articles directly related to my research.”

4. Look for opportunities to combine sentences. DNA testing has demonstrated that some of those sentenced to the death penalty are innocent. This is what is causing Americans’ views on the question of the death penalty to grow more divided. As DNA testing has demonstrated the innocence of some sentenced to the death penalty, Americans have grown more divided on the question of the death penalty.

5. Simplify your verbs. Switching to Proquest, I started to get more articles about my topic. Switching to Proquest, I got more articles about my topic. While marijuana is being used for medicinal purposes, hemp fiber is being used for textile industries. While marijuana is used for medicinal purposes, hemp fiber is used for textiles.

6. Just say no—to any unnecessary words!