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| Licata, John "Ringside with Small Modular Nuclear Reactors as Round Two DOE Bell Rings" 3/27/13 via bluephoenixinc.com |
1. Eliminating Distracting Shifts
In section 13 of Clarity, I learned about eliminating distracting shifts. These shifts can come in tense, point of view. I hadn't realized that second person narration was usually used for giving advice or instructing the reader. In this case its a good thing I used this tense since I'm informing the reader on the topic of animal testing. Changes in verb tenses can confuse the reader, however when I went back through my draft, I think I used the shifts effectively. Since this controversy takes place in the past, present, and future, I had to use shifts. However these shifts seem to be easy to follow.
2. Emphasizing Key Ideas
If there is one Clarity technique that I use most often, it is emphasizing key ideas. In my wordy sentences I almost always use conjunctive adverbs. In section 14 the book talks about how coordinating and subordinating ideas actually increases clarity. I had previously thought of it in sort of the opposite way. But the book made me realize that when used effectively, this emphasis in sentences can be quite effective.
For example, in one sentence from my draft, I claim that "The issue is far from resolved, however many new developments bring into question the legitimacy of using animals as a form of product testing." By using "however", I draw equal attention to both ideas. Since they are equally important, this is an effective way of guiding the reader to notice what I want them to notice.
3. Provide Some Variety
I tend to have some difficulty with the different beginnings of my sentences and different sentence structures. I find the structure or beginning I am comfortable with and cling to it until death do us part. However as I well know, section 15 tells me that this get's super repetitive and boring for the reader. I mean like really Bailey, how many more compound-complex sentences can you write??
To try to solve this problem, I went back through and found that I like to use "however" to start my sentences a lot of the time. To try to provide variety, I switched out the "however" in he sentence "However in America, animal testing is maintained as a leading way of testing new products." I changed it to "And yet". I also switched out the "however" in the sentence "However, this method has its drawbacks" to "But". This hopefully broke up some of the monotonous hoards of "howevers".
I also have a tendency to use compound-complex sentences. As I explored in previous posts, this comes from my need to fit as much info as possible into one sentence. It just makes sense to me that way. But I realize that this might be a bit much for the reader to handle (sorry everyone that has to read my writing). In editing my draft, I tried to break my overwhelming sentences into smaller and clearer ones. I also eliminated some adjectives that may have been overwhelming. Through this editing I made it so my writing had more variety in structure.
4. Find the Exact Words
My high school English teacher would adore section 18. When we would get essays back, there would always be at least a scattering of words circled with "W.C." written next to them. This "W.C.", or "word choice" referring to the exact meaning of a word is emphasized extensively in this section. I found it interesting to realize that issues with exact words can show bias. For example in the book, they refer to the difference between "abandon" and "leave", While these have obvious differences in connotation, they also can show how the writer feels about the subject.
I am fairly confident in my unbiased approach to my QRG. But when I went back through my draft, I changed some of my word use to more exactly mean what I meant. I also eliminated some of the bias that may have leaked through a bit by focusing on my connotative word choice. I feel like this evaluation of using exact words helped me to fine tune my draft a bit more.
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