Writing Emphatic Sentences

1. Writing Emphatic Sentences

2. Writing Emphatic Sentences DAY ONE OBJECTIVES: • Understanding how word order—where you place key ideas—creates emphasis in your writing. • Beginnings • Endings • Experimenting • Completing two short revision exercises utilizing concepts of placement • Revise one paragraph from your paper to create intended emphasis.

3. Writing Emphatic Sentences Conveying Emphasis through Word Order • Readers focus on beginnings and endings of sentences. • Place the most important information in these places. • Begin with Important Ideas • Writing tasks that demand straightforward presentation require the presentation of vital information first and qualifiers later. • EXAMPLE: Hard work will yield good grades if students are willing to commit the necessary time. (Emphasizes hard work, not students) • EXAMPLE: Applying for scholarships can seem like a chore for some students. (Emphasizes applying, not students) • DON’T begin with expletive constructions—”there is/are” and “it is” are empty phrases that weaken the sentence. • WEAK: There is much to be learned from writing a research paper. • BETTER: Writing a research paper teaches students a great deal.

4. Writing Emphatic Sentences • End with Important Ideas • A second means of conveying key elements’ importance • Colons and dashes can add emphasis at the end of the sentence. • Chris could only love one special car: his ancient beast of a Honda. • Close revision is critical to the success of a paper – and your grade on that paper. • Transitional Words and Phrases • Transitions and conjunctive adverbs lose power when placed at the end of sentences. • Early in the sentence, transitional words and phrases link ideas and add emphasis. • POOR: Smokers do have rights; they should not try to impose their habit on others, however. • BETTER: Smokers do have rights; however, they should not try to impose their habit on others.

5. Writing Emphatic Sentences • End w/important ideas (cont’d.) • Use Climactic Word Order. • Arrange series of items from least to most important to place emphasis on the last item in the series. • EXAMPLE: Binge drinking can lead to unwanted pregnancies, car accidents, and even death. (Death is the most serious consequence.)

6. Writing Emphatic Sentences • Experimenting with Word Order • Common arrangement of sentences in English: • Subject / verb / object • Subject / verb / complement • Intentional departure from this order places emphasis on the word, phrase, or clause that’s been relocated. • More modest and less inventive than Turner’s paintings are John Constable’s landscapes. • The complement (More modest and less inventive than Turner’s paintings) comes first in the sentence—inverted word order.

7. Writing Emphatic Sentences DAY TWO OBJECTIVES: • Understand how emphasis is created through sentence structure • Cumulative Sentences • Periodic Sentences • Complete exercises that give you practice in constructing cumulative and periodic sentences • Revise a paragraph from your paper in which you seek to emphasize key ideas through the construction of cumulative and periodic sentences.

8. Writing Emphatic Sentences Conveying Emphasis Through Sentence Structure • Cumulative Sentences • Cumulative Sentences begin with an independent clause, followed by words, phrases, or clauses that expand/develop it. • Most sentences in English are cumulative sentences. • These sentences tend to be clear and straightforward. • EXAMPLE: She holds me in strong arms, arms that have chopped cotton, dismembered trees, scattered corn for chickens, cradled infants, shaken the daylights out of half-grown upstart teenagers.

9. Writing Emphatic Sentences • Periodic Sentences • Periodic Sentences move from supporting details (modifying phrases, dependent clauses) to the sentence’s key idea expressed in an independent clause at the end of the sentence. • EXAMPLE: Unlike World Wars I and II, which ended decisively with the unconditional surrender of the United States’ enemies, the war in Vietnam did not end when American troops withdrew. • NOTE: Sometimes, modifying phrases or dependent clauses interrupt the main clause. • EXAMPLE: Columbus, after several discouraging and unsuccessful voyages, finally reached America.

10. Writing Emphatic Sentences DAY THREE OBJECTIVES • Understand how emphasis is created through: • Parallelism and Balance • Effective Repetition • Use of Active Voice • Complete exercises that give you practice applying this concepts • Revise content from your paper in which you seek to emphasize key ideas through the use of parallelism and balance, effective repetition, and active voice.

11. Writing Emphatic Sentences Conveying Emphasis through Parallelism and Balance • Parallelism reinforces similarity between grammatical elements, allowing you to convey information emphatically. • EXAMPLE: We seek an individual who is a self-starter, who owns a late-model automobile, and who is willing to work evenings. • EXAMPLE: Do not pass go; do not collect $200. • EXAMPLE: The Faust legend is central in Benet’s The Devil and Daniel Webster, in Goethe’s Faust, and in Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus.

12. Writing Emphatic Sentences • Balanced Sentences are neatly divided between two parallel structures. • The symmetry emphasizes similarities or differences between the ideas in the parallel structures. • EXAMPLE: In the 1950s, the electronic miracle was television; in the 1980s, the electronic miracle was the personal computer. • EXAMPLE: Alive, the elephant was worth at least a hundred pounds; dead, he would only be worth the value of his tusks, five pounds each, possibly.

13. Writing Emphatic Sentences Conveying Emphasis Through Repetition • Unnecessary Repetition makes sentences dull, monotonous, and wordy. • EXAMPLE: Caleb has a good pitching arm and also could field well and was also a fast runner. • Effective Repetition emphasizes key words or ideas. • EXAMPLE: They decided to begin again: to begin hoping, to begin trying to change, to begin working toward a goal. • EXAMPLE: During those years when I was just learning to speak, my mother and father addressed me only in Spanish; in Spanish, I learned to reply.

14. Writing Emphatic Sentences Conveying Emphasis through Active Voice • Active voice is generally more emphatic than passive voice. • Passive voice focuses readers’ attention on the action or its recipient. • Passive voice sentences are generally wordier and awkward. • EXAMPLE: The prediction that revisions will prove effective was made by Winkler. • Active voice keeps emphasis where it belongs: on the actor or actors. • Active voice sentences are generally more focused and direct. • EXAMPLE: Winkler predicts that revisions will prove effective.