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The relevance of style to writing
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I learned a lot about writing and reading from Steven Pinker’s book The Sense of Style. While I picked up a lot of tips about how to write better from the book, there are several that pop out to me that I intend to implement in my writing. One of them is catching, keeping, and directing your reader’s attention. In my opinion, doing this should make your writing understandable and should encourage the reader to stay with it. One of the methods of doing this that Pinker explained was avoiding confusing, unnecessary aspects of writing. This includes the overuse of nominalization, metaconcepts, and similar obstructing language. By limiting those distractions, Pinker says, writers can better direct the reader’s attention. Another tip I learned from
Macrorie has hope that with the steps he provided college students will be more inclined to try and improve their writing. The steps go from “ Writing Freely without a focus” to “ Writing Freely with a focus”. These steps give the audience some assurance that it’s not too difficult to change their writing skills. Writing freely without a focus is the first step, it calls the audience to take sometime out of their busy college lives and free write of ten minutes nonstop. This will help provide voice, by forcing yourself to write nonstop you give yourself no time for Engfish and lies. Macrories reviews a student who attempted ten minutes of free writing this is an excerpt from her writing , “Just one impression was the result, no heat or light or sound- all of them rolled into one impact when the torch set off the fumes.”(Macrorie302). The student accomplished everything Macrorie wanted to, the writer perfectly communicated the effect of an explosion in a short space and it made complete
Does the author use complicated words and intricate examples or does he use common words so the book will appeal to the audience? In Blink, Gladwell utilizes both types of diction; complicated and simple words. Since Gladwell uses both of those types, the tone and diction helps him greatly in conveying his message to his audience. “If we are to learn to improve the quality of the decisions we make, we need to accept the mysterious nature of our snap judgments.” Gladwell says this just after he has given an example of snap judgements in real life. This would be an example of the more serious and complicated diction. This helps Gladwell convey his message because it is backed up by an example which builds on to the main message. Gladwell also uses the rhetorical question very often, this makes the readers think outside of the text and into their own lives. “How is it possible to gather the necessary information for a sophisticated judgement in such a short time?” Gladwell’s use of rhetorical questions throughout the book helps him convey his message because it helps the readers think about what he is saying and apply it to their own
Several people have trouble writing college level essays and believe that they are unable to improve their writing skills. In “the Inspired Writer vs. The Real Writer,” Sarah Allen argues how no one is born naturally good at writing. Sarah Allen also states how even professional writers have trouble with the task of writing. Others, such as Lennie Irvin, agree. In Irvin’s article “What is ‘Academic’ Writing?” states how there are misconceptions about writing. Furthermore, Mike Bunn’s article “How to Read Like a Writer” shows ways on how one can improve their writing skills. Allen, Bunn, and Irvin are correct to say how no one is born naturally good writers. Now that we know this, we should find ways to help improve our writing skills, and
I strongly agree with Stephen King’s excerpt of “What Writing Is”. The fact that he mentions telepathy and it being possible, then he shows you it’s possible. That’s pretty great. You can see similar examples in modern times such as say the media casting bad vibes to the people. Everything’s either crime, racism, or sexism these days. Further dividing us a nation.
In William Zinnser’s essay “Simplicity” he states that “clear thinking becomes clear writing; one can’t exist without the other.” He believes that people speak more complexly then they have to and that the key to good writing and speaking is simplicity. In his argument he goes on to say that often writers are not careful enough. They know what they are trying to say but do not know how to put it down on paper. They assume that the reader will understand what they are thinking even though their writing is not obvious to others. He does make several suggestions for improvement. Very easily one could make their writing easier to understand by simple corrections.
On the same note, “The Elements of Style” also entails rules, guidelines, and examples for the purpose of the writer’s improvement. However, the approach is entirely different. This little book entails several important topics including rules of usage, missed used words and expressions, principles of composition, and approaches to style. The advice in “Elements of Style” is simple, clear, and straight to the point. Rules are short, and boldface so they are easy to quickly look up if the writer is in need of a quick on the spot tutorial. Following the boldface rule are a few statements or paragraphs with an explanation. Examples are only found for some of the rules but the ones given are not as elaborate as in “Style.” This book allows for a quick read and refreshing of rules and guidelines that have been encountered throughout an individuals writing career.
According to the reading, Writing as a Mode of Learning by Janet Emig, knowledge is described as “an act of knowing that enters as a passionate contribution of the person to know what is being known, which is a coefficient that is no mere imperfection but a vital component of a person’s knowledge.” Essentially, knowledge is composed of what a person, association or discourse community knows about what is already known in their area of expertise or fully know what could occur in a certain situation, similar to how a rhetor must prepare and know what rhetorical situations might occur at any moment during their speech or writing. Knowledge is created to prepare for various outcomes and situations as goals are being constructed in a discourse community.
Writing 150 has been a truly enjoyable course for me. While I have always loved language and literature, this class gave me a fresh, new perspective on what it means to be a writer. From the very first class, I was redefining what writing means to me and how I could use it in my life, even if my career path isn’t centered around writing. As the semester comes to a close, I want to share with you which paper was my favorite from this course, how my identity as a writer has changed, and how I will approach future writing tasks with a new and improved writing process.
While there are people who love to read and write, there are others that do not. When a student is required to read a book for a class and that student does not enjoy reading, there are very few things they would rather do less. And when that book’s topic is about learning how to write that is the worst of it. When I was assigned to read Writing with Style by John R. Trimble, my immediate thought was that this book and assignment was going to be a struggle to get through. To my pleasant surprise, I couldn’t have been more wrong. Writing with Style provides the reader with a wide range of writing tips while being written in a fun, conversational style. This book provides easy to find writing tools that can be understood by people of varying
From my past experiences, I have grown to prefer reading over writing. When I am reading, I can visualize the text in any way that I see fit. It is almost as if I am rewriting the novel using the illusions that I feel express the words in a passage. For example, in the current independent novel I am reading, it portrays a woman of high stature who is able to lure ...
The Elements of Style written by William Strunk and E.B. White, and Style: Toward Clarity and Grace written by Jospeh Williams both offer suggestions for establishing the comprehensive application of literary techniques and style. Each book, constructed differently, focuses on various areas of writing through comprehensive basic rules and guidelines. These books specifically identify the basic foundation for writing rules of usage, principle composition and offer suggestions for different types of style approach. The information provided also compels the average writer toward the necessary elements of the writing process through various methods of grammar, punctuation, and style implications. Though they are presented completely different, some of the basic style suggestions found in Strunk and White are somewhat similar to those in Williams. Both books propose that good writing style must consist of: clarity, precision, length, revision, cohesion, and reader sensitivity_all with the application of basic writing rules and guidelines. Although each book can be very helpful to the average writer, the intense amount of instruction may, at first, seem overwhelming.
Contrary to popular conceptions of the term ‘style’, I have found that in the context of this class, as well as in the context of the books “Style Toward Clarity and Grace” by Joseph M. Williams and “The Elements of Style” by Strunk and White, that ‘style’ is not style in the sense that it is the way I write (in such as way as ‘everyone has their own unique style’). Style encompasses many elements to writing a cohesive, clear paper. However, I feel that in order to write a clear cohesive essay or paper, I must write in my own way, a way that I am familiar with. This may seem like it goes against something that would be in “The Elements of Style,” but it is not. Strunk and White clearly say in their book, “Write in a way that comes naturally.” (Strunk and White, 70).
For a writer to better understand style, multitudes of books and helpful guides have been published. Many are written as lists of rules about word choice, constructions to avoid, common stylistic traps, and other such things. One of these is The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White. Another type are the books that go into more detail that further explain why some things work in writing and some things don’t. Style Toward Clarity and Grace by Joseph M. Williams would fall into this category. Although written in a different manner they share the same goal; to present some of the most important rules in writing and style.
Nicholas Sparks is considered to be one of the greatest American authors of today. He provides love, romance, passion, drama, tragedy, comedy, triumph, and mystery in all of his novels. His stories are heartwarming and inspiring. Nicholas Sparks does not have a specific writing style. His writing style is flexible and liberal, and can be described as romantic, imaginative and engaging, and varies depending on the theme of the novel. The theme of the novel is the main thing that affects his writing style. Even though the themes of each novel mostly deal with love, each novel takes on different perspectives of love. His novels can be described as romantic, compassionate beach reads with real, relatable characters.
I think that one of the best ways to create a clear voice while writing is to pretend that you are talking to a friend, and having a conversation about what happened in one of your most hated classes. For me this is an easy way to create a voice that isn't to dull, and with any luck will hold the attention of the reader all the way to the end of my work. This type of voice isn't all that hard to create, but using it at the right time might be a little tricky. According to what Morgan said in class the last time we met, voice isn't used all that often in technical writing. This would explain why some of the texts that we are forced to read are so boring. The authors of these books aren't looking to entertain, they are looking to educate, and get a point across to the reader. This is true foe the most part, but wouldn't it be nice if we could pick up a text, or a manual for a new computer, and understand what is being said? I think that in the near future many of the books, and manuals that will be coming out will have a new voice of their own. I think that in general people find it easier to understand what is being said if the writing or instructions that they are reading seem to make sense, and don't sound like the author is trying to make them feel like an idiot.