Curt's Style Response 4
From Mizzou Wiki
Chapter seven is about concision. The chapter starts by explaining why concision is important. An example is given of a sentence that follows the rules given in previous chapters, but is hard to understand because of how wordy it is. The next part of the chapter consists of different techniques to make sentences more concise and several examples are given for each. Most of the revisions involve eliminating redundant or useless words. A technique that does not involve redundancy is to change negative phrases into positive ones. This still reduces the number of words, but the main purpose is to make sentences clearer for the reader because several negatives in a sentence can quickly confuse a reader. The second half of the chapter talks about a particular type of redundancy called metadiscourse. Several examples are given to show how to eliminate unneeded metadiscourse. However, the author ends the chapter by stating that some metadiscourse is needed to give a paper good flow and show certainty.
As in the previous chapters, the author gives many good examples for every topic. The examples help explain the topics in an easy to understand way. The common words and phrases that the author says to look for at the end of various principles are very useful. They give me an Idea of what to look for instead of just a concept. The examples given for hedges and intensifiers were the least helpful for me because the author could not give a clear idea of how to use them. Instead, he gives extremes of too many and not enough. Overall the chapter does a good job of presenting each topic and supporting it.
I already knew to avoid simple redundancies, but reading this chapter will make me more aware of them. Some of the more complex concision rules, like replacing a phrase with a word, will be hard to use regularly without some practice. Also, some redundant phrases that I use, if any, may be a habit that is hard to break. Even though I already knew some of the general rules to make sentences more concise, the principles in this chapter will help me write less wordy sentences.
--nice job here.
