The author seems to be writing for another era. Back in the day, only editors and columnists had the privilege of signing their articles in newspapers. The tradition of impersonal writing remains...
The author seems to be writing for another era. Back in the day, only editors and columnists had the privilege of signing their articles in newspapers. The tradition of impersonal writing remains in many websites and news organizations, especially those with a long tradition in print. You can certainly have too many intensifiers, but the categorical statements and the use of demoralizing terms ("cheating") for intensifiers made me less inclined to take the article seriously.
It makes a lot of sense to avoid intensifiers when you're being graded, in academics, in technical writing, or when someone is paying for you to write in that way. In such contexts, it is good to avoid subjectivity. However, in 2022, that is not most of our writing. Intensifiers are not "weasel" words, and they are useful even if imprecise. "Very", "pretty much", "actually", etc, communicate our own sentiments and attitudes towards whatever we are affirming. That is essential for 99% of what we write today: messages, emails, blog posts, articles on personal websites or for non-traditional organizations, Tweets, Facebook updates, forum threads and comments, etc. And what about fiction?
Ironically, had the author used some forbidden words, I might be more inclined to empathize with his perspective.
And who in the name of God would use words he suggests as alternatives on a day-to-day basis, such as "despondent", "ravenous", or "herculean"? If I used those words, I might as well get myself a deerstalker and a pipe!
That may be great advice if you're employed by Random House, The Washington Post, or The New York Times, but I will defiantly just keep putting "very" before things.
I think it'd be bad advice to use overly complicated language in those places too. Often using too big a word reveals that someone is just trying too hard rather than actually writing better. We...
That may be great advice if you're employed by Random House, The Washington Post, or The New York Times, but I will defiantly just keep putting "very" before things.
I think it'd be bad advice to use overly complicated language in those places too. Often using too big a word reveals that someone is just trying too hard rather than actually writing better.
We should use the right words. "Herculean" is rarely the right word. Another phrase is almost always better. Especially if your audience won't catch the nuance anyway. You'd need a very special crowd for "morose" to be the right way to describe a colleague's mood.
What makes a good writer is having words like "herculean" and "ravenous" and thousands of others in one's active vocabulary so you can use them in the rare occasions when they are the right word. Although each word is rarely right, together all these words that we don't use often will appear regularly in the best prose.
George Orwell's Politics and the English Language gives six rules for better writing. 75 years on they're still good and it's obvious why many still share the essay around:
Use short, everyday words more often than not. Write in an active voice. Use fresh imagery and cut unneeded words. Famously: "Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous."
Brevity is indeed the soul of wit; nailing a good punchline can convey a message more strongly than anything else. Clarity and precision, however, are required for setting up every good linguistic hit. And every other piece of communication that isn't setting up a punchline.
I agree with many of the points expressed here, though I'd like to add some context. We're working in a cultural paradigm in which "good writing" is almost necessarily defined as "efficient...
I agree with many of the points expressed here, though I'd like to add some context.
We're working in a cultural paradigm in which "good writing" is almost necessarily defined as "efficient writing," excepting for some restrained artistic color. Contemporary lifestyles are inherently capitalistic and work-oriented, emphasizing the need to maximize a particular output (gain) for a given input (effort) in all facets of being, even across intangible metrics like "happiness." We presume that the passage of time is rapid and place implicit value on learning, experiencing, and accomplishing the most "stuff" in a given timeframe.
This "economic" paradigm is baked into the superstructure of our culture; it is ideological. It seeps into art, especially writing, and imposes itself well beyond just "technical writing."
I'm not necessarily critiquing efficiency as a concept—I certainly read and write "economically" when appropriate, which is most of the time—but I am pointing out that it is just one philosophy we can use to evaluate literature. This internet comment, in an attempt to efficiently persuade, has an explicitly economic structure of argumentation, even if it's long and kind of technical. But I could write in an altogether different dimension: a purpose of self-expression, not economic rhetoric; an audience whose evaluation of a text's "meaning" is intertwined with or equivalent to its "form"; a mutually held attitude more spiritual or holistic than strictly mechanical.
The metrics we need to use to evaluate writing in such an unfamiliar paradigm are utterly foreign to most of us, but they do exist. Recognizing the distinction between these worldviews teaches us to evaluate writing with a unique level of self-awareness, humility, and respect for the author.
I agree with what you're saying here. It adds a lot of nuance. To make an attempt at rephrasing your idea somewhat to focus on different aspects of the same trend: For me best communication...
Exemplary
I agree with what you're saying here. It adds a lot of nuance.
To make an attempt at rephrasing your idea somewhat to focus on different aspects of the same trend:
We're working in a cultural paradigm in which "good writing" is almost necessarily defined as "efficient writing,"
For me best communication (written or otherwise) will always be the most efficient.
What I dislike is the continual push to simplify the arguments and thoughts into single issues, that every argument or thought makes an attempt of reaching only one main conclusion and getting there as fast as possible. The other valid, and sometimes important, "sub-conclusions" or reasoning that adds depth to an argument or passage is omitted.
Those omittances means we're conveying simpler thoughts efficiently, but the thoughts themselves have been simplified.
What happens with this simplified prose is that the simplified thoughts often boil down to explanations where complex patterns or conclusions are presented with only the most important cause, the other contributing factors left unmentioned.
The language trend you point out changes how we think and how we know. It also changes our framing of how we believe the world works. When most things, even extremely complicated systems where a ton of different things interact, we're often left subconsciously looking for the one most important contributing factor or cause, because that's what we encounter most places.
That's a problem when things aren't explained by one factor, but can only be explained by looking at many different factors interacting.
Consequently, the language trend of simplicity pushes the thinking trend to one of simplicity. It makes sense because language itself is a powerful way of knowing, but the "economic" or rationalized way of presenting arguments often lend reasoned arguments the impression of being unavoidable, necessary lines o thinking. They become presented as somehow objective, and consequently the framing, where we point our attention, and the whole process of focusing on something necessarily excluding other things we could be focusing on, is often forgotten.
This leads to the exactly same conclusion you put well:
The metrics we need to use to evaluate writing in such an unfamiliar paradigm are utterly foreign to most of us, but they do exist. Recognizing the distinction between these worldviews teaches us to evaluate writing with a unique level of self-awareness, humility, and respect for the author.
The whole thrust of how people read a text critically or listen critically often focuses only on the wrong thing, only the rational or economical line of argumentation. We don't look at the premises, the implications of the arguments and where they lead us.
Many are extremely efficient at finding fallacies or deficiencies with minor details. These are often complete dead ends, totally irrelevant to the main conclusion: The whole is often larger than the sum of its parts and has many sub-conclusions necessary to see a fuller image.
I should note that efficiency is in relation to goal, and many acts of communication have salient emotional goals as well as propositional ones. Strategies for the achievement of emotional goals...
For me best communication (written or otherwise) will always be the most efficient
I should note that efficiency is in relation to goal, and many acts of communication have salient emotional goals as well as propositional ones. Strategies for the achievement of emotional goals are often labeled as "noise" by those who fail to appreciate the emotional aspects of communication.
A syllable is a single sound pronounced as a unit. It quickly gets tricky: Syll-a-ble has three Sin-gle has two Sound is all in one Strength has either one or two depending on pronunciation:...
A syllable is a single sound pronounced as a unit.
It quickly gets tricky:
Syll-a-ble has three
Sin-gle has two
Sound is all in one
Strength has either one or two depending on pronunciation: streng-th (I can't think of a word where a g followed by th can be pronounced as a single syllable, but that doesn't mean there isn't one) or strenth (for example in many British dialects where the g isn't pronounced at all)
(Edit: Make is all one sound, where an imaginary make (pronounced mah-keh would rhyme with the drink sake and have two syllables just the same: sa-ke)
English has a lot of diphthongs (two vowels as a unit) and you can put loads of consonants at the front and end of syllables. I'm gonna write a little IPA to show where all the sounds are, and...
English has a lot of diphthongs (two vowels as a unit) and you can put loads of consonants at the front and end of syllables.
I'm gonna write a little IPA to show where all the sounds are, and I'll put the vowels in bold. Each of these words has one syllable:
may — /meɪ/
make — /meɪk/
makes — /meɪks/
eye — /aɪ/
rye — /ɹaɪ/
ride — /ɹaɪd/
tried — /tɹaɪd/
stride — /stɹaɪd/
strides — /stɹaɪdz/
strengths — /stɹɛŋθs/
Really, if you want to count English syllables, your best bet is to look at the vowels. Consonants usually don't make another syllable.
It just kinda is that way? I dunno. I think syllables are one of the things many native English-speakers also struggle with a lot. All the Germanic languages I know work and count the same way. I...
It just kinda is that way? I dunno. I think syllables are one of the things many native English-speakers also struggle with a lot.
All the Germanic languages I know work and count the same way. I know some Asian languages (and probably many others) count syllables completely differently.
If you say it fast that might help?
"make make make make make make make make" is just as fast to say as "me me me me me me me me" where "really really really really really really really really" takes twice as long because it has two syllables.
You can say "make make make make make make make make me me me me me me me me" in exactly the same time it takes to say "really really really really really really really really" because they're equally many syllables (16).
Say a word like manageable pronounced man-age-a-ble is four, but for those who say "mang-a-ble" (like many Americans) it's three. The rhythm becomes totally different.
I think because the concept of syllables works that way in English it was possible for someone to write an article with one-syllable words because in reality the word "make" clearly has two...
I think because the concept of syllables works that way in English it was possible for someone to write an article with one-syllable words because in reality the word "make" clearly has two sounds, but one of those sounds is not considered a syllable. You probably wouldn't be able to do that in most romance languages, since you would be literally restricted to words with a single sound.
I wonder if it's the ejective k sound at the end that is tripping you up? It's not really considered a separate sound as it's not (typically) voiced, it's more like a stop at the end of the /meɪ/...
I wonder if it's the ejective k sound at the end that is tripping you up? It's not really considered a separate sound as it's not (typically) voiced, it's more like a stop at the end of the /meɪ/ sound at the beginning of the word. So it's pronounced /meɪk/ or /meɪk'/ all in one syllable, the k isn't separate.
English orthography (representing spoken sounds using symbols/letters) is a huge mess though, it's hard even for native speakers to sort out stress and syllables for unfamiliar words sometimes. I can't imagine coming to it as a non-native speaker/reader.
Ah. My original definition was wrong. That's what you get for not looking things up, but just writing something yourself. Sorry! Should rather be: It works the same way in German, for example. To...
Ah. My original definition was wrong. That's what you get for not looking things up, but just writing something yourself.
Sorry!
A syllable is a single sound pronounced as a unit.
Should rather be:
A syllable are the sounds pronounced as a single unit.
It works the same way in German, for example. To take an extreme example: "schlimm" (terrible) is a single syllable.
Don't worry, English is a beautiful mess and a lot of times when someone tries to explain it logically at some point they give up and say something along the lines of "fuck it, that's just how it...
Don't worry, English is a beautiful mess and a lot of times when someone tries to explain it logically at some point they give up and say something along the lines of "fuck it, that's just how it is" :P
I think that's because it's an imperial language since the brits so it has all kinds of influence from all over the world.
English (which at it's core is a mix of German and Anglo-Saxon grammar with many French words added in) works just the same as the rest of the Germanic languages (German, Flemish, Afrikaans,...
English (which at it's core is a mix of German and Anglo-Saxon grammar with many French words added in) works just the same as the rest of the Germanic languages (German, Flemish, Afrikaans, Danish, Icelandic etc.) for syllables.
The "single unit" is what you can say in one go:
b
ba
ban
blan (whatever that is)
bland
sbland (also meaningless)
sblandf (even more meaningless)
sblandfg (now we're pushing it)
They can all be said in one go so they're a single unit, therefore a single syllable. aba would either be pronounced a-ba or ab-a and must be two units, even though they're two short units.
Better is made of two units: bett-er or bet-ter so it's two syllables. If you're American and pronounce better as "bedr" that's one syllable again (just like bitter can be bitt-er or "bidr")
I do have trouble visualizing precisely what you mean, but please don't take this as a criticism of your great explanation. I don't think I can truly get this via text.
I do have trouble visualizing precisely what you mean, but please don't take this as a criticism of your great explanation. I don't think I can truly get this via text.
I think I can help (hopefully). Syllables in English are (almost?) always defined by vowel sounds. The thing that I think requires some intuition is figuring out exactly which consonant sounds are...
I think I can help (hopefully).
Syllables in English are (almost?) always defined by vowel sounds. The thing that I think requires some intuition is figuring out exactly which consonant sounds are part of which syllable, but simply counting the number of syllables in a word should be fairly straightforward, even for folks who speak English as second/third/etc language.
"Make" has one syllable, because it has one vowel sound, a long "a" (/eɪ/, dipthongs count as one vowel sound in syllable counting). "Bland", as above, also only has one vowel sound, a short "a" (/æ/).
"Single" has two syllables, because it has two vowel sounds, /i:/ (from the first syllable, "sing") and /ə/ (from the second syllable, "le", pronounced /əl/).
Picking a word from my paragraph above, "intuition" has four syllables, "in", "tu", "i", and "tion". Each of these has a distinct vowel sound in it.
This is all about pronunciation, not spelling, which is why sometimes a word might have, say, 3 syllables if pronounced by an American, but 4 if pronounced by someone from England. And sometimes we insert vowel sounds (especially schwas, /ə/) even when there are no actual vowels in a given part of a word. For example, the name Dwight can be pronounced as a single-syllable word (/dwaɪt/), or as a two-syllable word (De-wight, /dəˈwaɪt/), depending on the accent of the speaker.
I never understood it as a kid when we were taught to clap along with syllables! I still don't understand that exercise...they would slow down and break apart words in ways you would never...
I never understood it as a kid when we were taught to clap along with syllables! I still don't understand that exercise...they would slow down and break apart words in ways you would never actually say them to clap along and I was just like "I can do this at any point and break up words however I want to! I can clap any time how is this supposed to teach me anything???"
This really hurt me in college when I had to do linguistics and quite a few things relied on that basic understanding everyone around me had. Over time I've learned to fake it and have a decent guess at what they are, but it still hasn't really clicked with me. I'm somewhat convinced they're just a lie and no one wants to admit that they don't know either and are just cutting up words randomly.
I really shouldn't have an opinion because I have very little knowledge on this subject, but I'll say it anyway. It doesn't seem that the concept itself is a lie, but rather the notion that the...
I really shouldn't have an opinion because I have very little knowledge on this subject, but I'll say it anyway. It doesn't seem that the concept itself is a lie, but rather the notion that the concept is intuitive is a lie.
I use those words in day to day speech. I like words, I use lots of them. But that said, I would mostly try to avoid them when writing, unless I knew they'd work for my intended audience.
who in the name of God would use words he suggests as alternatives on a day-to-day basis, such as "despondent", "ravenous", or "herculean"?
I use those words in day to day speech. I like words, I use lots of them. But that said, I would mostly try to avoid them when writing, unless I knew they'd work for my intended audience.
And if I edit you, I'll keep taking out that "very." :-) FWIW, I believe that I have used both "despondent" and "ravenous" in casual conversation in the last week. (My Grubhub order was late.) I...
And if I edit you, I'll keep taking out that "very." :-)
FWIW, I believe that I have used both "despondent" and "ravenous" in casual conversation in the last week. (My Grubhub order was late.) I haven't needed to make any Herculean efforts recently, but that likely would be the term I used if I needed to discuss it.
I applaud you for using extensive and peculiar vocabulary, I would like to chat with you. It would be an enjoyable experience. I was criticizing the categorical terms and prescriptive aspects of...
I applaud you for using extensive and peculiar vocabulary, I would like to chat with you. It would be an enjoyable experience. I was criticizing the categorical terms and prescriptive aspects of the author's standpoint, as well as his apparent lack of understanding of some relevant social needs regarding our use of intensifiers. But it is not bad to use unexpected words. I do that myself, just not in English.
This was a fun article to read. I like that the author revels in the complexity of language as they arrive at their preferences rather than just treating their proscriptions as gospel with no...
This was a fun article to read. I like that the author revels in the complexity of language as they arrive at their preferences rather than just treating their proscriptions as gospel with no explanation needed or considerations given.
I try to stay away from “very” myself but I definitely end up using it occasionally. I can see how, from an editor’s perspective, it’s a bland and unnecessary word, but I also think for texts that need to meet less rigorous requirements (e.g. internet comments), it’s essentially an “invisible” word along the lines of “he said” in dialogue. We scan it and see it without much thought at all. Not great as an intensifier, but also not a detriment to the writing either.
Another word I try to avoid is “just” in professional communications. Left to my own devices I will always write something like “I just wanted to let you know…” as opposed to “I wanted to let you know…” which almost always reads better. Something in my brain defaults to thinking using “just” feels socially necessary, but reading it written out always feels wrong. I edit it out of probably 50% of the emails I send.
I do disagree with the author’s distaste for “throat clearers”. Part of this is because I’ve never met a transition word or phrase I’ve disliked, and the other part is that I read a lot of choppy student writing that could benefit from some flow and contour. There’s definitely an art to using “that said” and “in sum” and the like, but I’d rather more people go for them than avoid them. In general I think more transition words and phrases would help people express their thoughts at length. They’re a way of embedding structure and directing the reader’s thought, and they can be quietly powerful when used well.
Professional editor here (which is why I loved BC Dreyer's essay so much). When we edit (ourselves or another's writing), the goal is to make the prose the best that it can possibly be. One way to...
Professional editor here (which is why I loved BC Dreyer's essay so much).
When we edit (ourselves or another's writing), the goal is to make the prose the best that it can possibly be. One way to do that is to embrace conciseness and to encourage information density. That keeps a reader's interest so they feel the author is getting to the point. "I try to leave out the parts that people skip," said Elmore Leonard.
In other words, if I can delete a word -- like "very" or "just" -- and the meaning does not change, I generally delete the word. As Mark Twain wrote, "Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very;' your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be."
That's not the same as a transition word or paragraph. Those serve a purpose. In many cases, I tell the writer to add a short paragraph as a transition, because the reader can get lost. (Wait, how did you get from THAT statement to THIS one? Or, the writer fails to tell me why a situation is bad before they explain how to do so.)
Perhaps it's different when you're trying to find out what a student thinks about a subject. But when you write for someone else -- such as a paying magazine subscriber -- what matters is the reader's interest and what they get out of the prose. Not the writer's personal contemplations and throat clearing.
Before deciding to go into teaching, I was actually planning on becoming an editor myself! You’re in good company, and kudos to you for all of your invisible and often thankless hard work. I know...
Before deciding to go into teaching, I was actually planning on becoming an editor myself! You’re in good company, and kudos to you for all of your invisible and often thankless hard work. I know a (little) bit about how much goes into that!
Also, I think you’re right in that we have different goals. For me, the main thing I have to try to get my students to do is write more. The more minor optimizations talked about in the article don’t really mean much unless the writing is substantial enough to warrant that kind of attention, and my goal is to try to get students to write with substance in the first place. You’re focused on skilled writers honing their craft, while I’m focused on getting kids out of the perfunctory stages of written expression. As you’re well aware, writing is a craft and an art, and I deal much more with the basics.
Finally, a question for you because now I’m worried I’ve been very (lol) wrong about something for pretty much my entire life. Are phrases like “in sum” or “that said” not transitions? To me they feel like they fit the bill, but you’re definitely the authority here, so I’m curious if I’m way off the mark.
Strictly speaking, "in sum" or "that said" are transitions. They do tell the reader, "I'm going to change what I'm talking about," which at least is a clue. They just aren't GOOD transitions. At...
Strictly speaking, "in sum" or "that said" are transitions. They do tell the reader, "I'm going to change what I'm talking about," which at least is a clue. They just aren't GOOD transitions.
At best, they're clunky. In the same way that it's clunky to type "Conclusion" for the last section of an article. (That last sentence should be the primary takeaway.)
The author seems to be writing for another era. Back in the day, only editors and columnists had the privilege of signing their articles in newspapers. The tradition of impersonal writing remains in many websites and news organizations, especially those with a long tradition in print. You can certainly have too many intensifiers, but the categorical statements and the use of demoralizing terms ("cheating") for intensifiers made me less inclined to take the article seriously.
It makes a lot of sense to avoid intensifiers when you're being graded, in academics, in technical writing, or when someone is paying for you to write in that way. In such contexts, it is good to avoid subjectivity. However, in 2022, that is not most of our writing. Intensifiers are not "weasel" words, and they are useful even if imprecise. "Very", "pretty much", "actually", etc, communicate our own sentiments and attitudes towards whatever we are affirming. That is essential for 99% of what we write today: messages, emails, blog posts, articles on personal websites or for non-traditional organizations, Tweets, Facebook updates, forum threads and comments, etc. And what about fiction?
Ironically, had the author used some forbidden words, I might be more inclined to empathize with his perspective.
And who in the name of God would use words he suggests as alternatives on a day-to-day basis, such as "despondent", "ravenous", or "herculean"? If I used those words, I might as well get myself a deerstalker and a pipe!
That may be great advice if you're employed by Random House, The Washington Post, or The New York Times, but I will defiantly just keep putting "very" before things.
I think it'd be bad advice to use overly complicated language in those places too. Often using too big a word reveals that someone is just trying too hard rather than actually writing better.
We should use the right words. "Herculean" is rarely the right word. Another phrase is almost always better. Especially if your audience won't catch the nuance anyway. You'd need a very special crowd for "morose" to be the right way to describe a colleague's mood.
What makes a good writer is having words like "herculean" and "ravenous" and thousands of others in one's active vocabulary so you can use them in the rare occasions when they are the right word. Although each word is rarely right, together all these words that we don't use often will appear regularly in the best prose.
George Orwell's Politics and the English Language gives six rules for better writing. 75 years on they're still good and it's obvious why many still share the essay around:
Use short, everyday words more often than not. Write in an active voice. Use fresh imagery and cut unneeded words. Famously: "Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous."
I still remember The Economist's 2004 piece arguing that short words are best, written only in single syllable words..
Brevity is indeed the soul of wit; nailing a good punchline can convey a message more strongly than anything else. Clarity and precision, however, are required for setting up every good linguistic hit. And every other piece of communication that isn't setting up a punchline.
I agree with many of the points expressed here, though I'd like to add some context.
We're working in a cultural paradigm in which "good writing" is almost necessarily defined as "efficient writing," excepting for some restrained artistic color. Contemporary lifestyles are inherently capitalistic and work-oriented, emphasizing the need to maximize a particular output (gain) for a given input (effort) in all facets of being, even across intangible metrics like "happiness." We presume that the passage of time is rapid and place implicit value on learning, experiencing, and accomplishing the most "stuff" in a given timeframe.
This "economic" paradigm is baked into the superstructure of our culture; it is ideological. It seeps into art, especially writing, and imposes itself well beyond just "technical writing."
I'm not necessarily critiquing efficiency as a concept—I certainly read and write "economically" when appropriate, which is most of the time—but I am pointing out that it is just one philosophy we can use to evaluate literature. This internet comment, in an attempt to efficiently persuade, has an explicitly economic structure of argumentation, even if it's long and kind of technical. But I could write in an altogether different dimension: a purpose of self-expression, not economic rhetoric; an audience whose evaluation of a text's "meaning" is intertwined with or equivalent to its "form"; a mutually held attitude more spiritual or holistic than strictly mechanical.
The metrics we need to use to evaluate writing in such an unfamiliar paradigm are utterly foreign to most of us, but they do exist. Recognizing the distinction between these worldviews teaches us to evaluate writing with a unique level of self-awareness, humility, and respect for the author.
I agree with what you're saying here. It adds a lot of nuance.
To make an attempt at rephrasing your idea somewhat to focus on different aspects of the same trend:
For me best communication (written or otherwise) will always be the most efficient.
What I dislike is the continual push to simplify the arguments and thoughts into single issues, that every argument or thought makes an attempt of reaching only one main conclusion and getting there as fast as possible. The other valid, and sometimes important, "sub-conclusions" or reasoning that adds depth to an argument or passage is omitted.
Those omittances means we're conveying simpler thoughts efficiently, but the thoughts themselves have been simplified.
What happens with this simplified prose is that the simplified thoughts often boil down to explanations where complex patterns or conclusions are presented with only the most important cause, the other contributing factors left unmentioned.
The language trend you point out changes how we think and how we know. It also changes our framing of how we believe the world works. When most things, even extremely complicated systems where a ton of different things interact, we're often left subconsciously looking for the one most important contributing factor or cause, because that's what we encounter most places.
That's a problem when things aren't explained by one factor, but can only be explained by looking at many different factors interacting.
Consequently, the language trend of simplicity pushes the thinking trend to one of simplicity. It makes sense because language itself is a powerful way of knowing, but the "economic" or rationalized way of presenting arguments often lend reasoned arguments the impression of being unavoidable, necessary lines o thinking. They become presented as somehow objective, and consequently the framing, where we point our attention, and the whole process of focusing on something necessarily excluding other things we could be focusing on, is often forgotten.
This leads to the exactly same conclusion you put well:
The whole thrust of how people read a text critically or listen critically often focuses only on the wrong thing, only the rational or economical line of argumentation. We don't look at the premises, the implications of the arguments and where they lead us.
Many are extremely efficient at finding fallacies or deficiencies with minor details. These are often complete dead ends, totally irrelevant to the main conclusion: The whole is often larger than the sum of its parts and has many sub-conclusions necessary to see a fuller image.
I should note that efficiency is in relation to goal, and many acts of communication have salient emotional goals as well as propositional ones. Strategies for the achievement of emotional goals are often labeled as "noise" by those who fail to appreciate the emotional aspects of communication.
That is great, but I think there are many words in this article with more than one syllable :/
(archived).
I count two: Winston and Churchill. they can't be helped.
What ones am I missing?
Maybe I don't know what makes a syllable in English, but isn't "make" two syllables?
A syllable is a single sound pronounced as a unit.
It quickly gets tricky:
Strength has either one or two depending on pronunciation: streng-th (I can't think of a word where a g followed by th can be pronounced as a single syllable, but that doesn't mean there isn't one) or strenth (for example in many British dialects where the g isn't pronounced at all)
(Edit: Make is all one sound, where an imaginary make (pronounced mah-keh would rhyme with the drink sake and have two syllables just the same: sa-ke)
That's really weird, why isn't "make" two syllables? I don't get it.
English has a lot of diphthongs (two vowels as a unit) and you can put loads of consonants at the front and end of syllables.
I'm gonna write a little IPA to show where all the sounds are, and I'll put the vowels in bold. Each of these words has one syllable:
Really, if you want to count English syllables, your best bet is to look at the vowels. Consonants usually don't make another syllable.
It just kinda is that way? I dunno. I think syllables are one of the things many native English-speakers also struggle with a lot.
All the Germanic languages I know work and count the same way. I know some Asian languages (and probably many others) count syllables completely differently.
If you say it fast that might help?
"make make make make make make make make" is just as fast to say as "me me me me me me me me" where "really really really really really really really really" takes twice as long because it has two syllables.
You can say "make make make make make make make make me me me me me me me me" in exactly the same time it takes to say "really really really really really really really really" because they're equally many syllables (16).
Say a word like manageable pronounced man-age-a-ble is four, but for those who say "mang-a-ble" (like many Americans) it's three. The rhythm becomes totally different.
I think because the concept of syllables works that way in English it was possible for someone to write an article with one-syllable words because in reality the word "make" clearly has two sounds, but one of those sounds is not considered a syllable. You probably wouldn't be able to do that in most romance languages, since you would be literally restricted to words with a single sound.
I wonder if it's the ejective k sound at the end that is tripping you up? It's not really considered a separate sound as it's not (typically) voiced, it's more like a stop at the end of the /meɪ/ sound at the beginning of the word. So it's pronounced /meɪk/ or /meɪk'/ all in one syllable, the k isn't separate.
English orthography (representing spoken sounds using symbols/letters) is a huge mess though, it's hard even for native speakers to sort out stress and syllables for unfamiliar words sometimes. I can't imagine coming to it as a non-native speaker/reader.
Ah. My original definition was wrong. That's what you get for not looking things up, but just writing something yourself.
Sorry!
Should rather be:
It works the same way in German, for example. To take an extreme example: "schlimm" (terrible) is a single syllable.
Don't worry, English is a beautiful mess and a lot of times when someone tries to explain it logically at some point they give up and say something along the lines of "fuck it, that's just how it is" :P
I think that's because it's an imperial language since the brits so it has all kinds of influence from all over the world.
And oh, what is "a single unit"?
English (which at it's core is a mix of German and Anglo-Saxon grammar with many French words added in) works just the same as the rest of the Germanic languages (German, Flemish, Afrikaans, Danish, Icelandic etc.) for syllables.
The "single unit" is what you can say in one go:
They can all be said in one go so they're a single unit, therefore a single syllable. aba would either be pronounced a-ba or ab-a and must be two units, even though they're two short units.
Better is made of two units: bett-er or bet-ter so it's two syllables. If you're American and pronounce better as "bedr" that's one syllable again (just like bitter can be bitt-er or "bidr")
I do have trouble visualizing precisely what you mean, but please don't take this as a criticism of your great explanation. I don't think I can truly get this via text.
I think I can help (hopefully).
Syllables in English are (almost?) always defined by vowel sounds. The thing that I think requires some intuition is figuring out exactly which consonant sounds are part of which syllable, but simply counting the number of syllables in a word should be fairly straightforward, even for folks who speak English as second/third/etc language.
"Make" has one syllable, because it has one vowel sound, a long "a" (/eɪ/, dipthongs count as one vowel sound in syllable counting). "Bland", as above, also only has one vowel sound, a short "a" (/æ/).
"Single" has two syllables, because it has two vowel sounds, /i:/ (from the first syllable, "sing") and /ə/ (from the second syllable, "le", pronounced /əl/).
Picking a word from my paragraph above, "intuition" has four syllables, "in", "tu", "i", and "tion". Each of these has a distinct vowel sound in it.
This is all about pronunciation, not spelling, which is why sometimes a word might have, say, 3 syllables if pronounced by an American, but 4 if pronounced by someone from England. And sometimes we insert vowel sounds (especially schwas, /ə/) even when there are no actual vowels in a given part of a word. For example, the name Dwight can be pronounced as a single-syllable word (/dwaɪt/), or as a two-syllable word (De-wight, /dəˈwaɪt/), depending on the accent of the speaker.
I never understood it as a kid when we were taught to clap along with syllables! I still don't understand that exercise...they would slow down and break apart words in ways you would never actually say them to clap along and I was just like "I can do this at any point and break up words however I want to! I can clap any time how is this supposed to teach me anything???"
This really hurt me in college when I had to do linguistics and quite a few things relied on that basic understanding everyone around me had. Over time I've learned to fake it and have a decent guess at what they are, but it still hasn't really clicked with me. I'm somewhat convinced they're just a lie and no one wants to admit that they don't know either and are just cutting up words randomly.
I really shouldn't have an opinion because I have very little knowledge on this subject, but I'll say it anyway. It doesn't seem that the concept itself is a lie, but rather the notion that the concept is intuitive is a lie.
I use those words in day to day speech. I like words, I use lots of them. But that said, I would mostly try to avoid them when writing, unless I knew they'd work for my intended audience.
I would say there are not a lot of people like you!
And if I edit you, I'll keep taking out that "very." :-)
FWIW, I believe that I have used both "despondent" and "ravenous" in casual conversation in the last week. (My Grubhub order was late.) I haven't needed to make any Herculean efforts recently, but that likely would be the term I used if I needed to discuss it.
I applaud you for using extensive and peculiar vocabulary, I would like to chat with you. It would be an enjoyable experience. I was criticizing the categorical terms and prescriptive aspects of the author's standpoint, as well as his apparent lack of understanding of some relevant social needs regarding our use of intensifiers. But it is not bad to use unexpected words. I do that myself, just not in English.
If you've read BC Dreyer's book -- it's outstanding -- I don't think you'd conclude that he doesn't understand social needs.
I understand. I can only judge for the article.
This was a fun article to read. I like that the author revels in the complexity of language as they arrive at their preferences rather than just treating their proscriptions as gospel with no explanation needed or considerations given.
I try to stay away from “very” myself but I definitely end up using it occasionally. I can see how, from an editor’s perspective, it’s a bland and unnecessary word, but I also think for texts that need to meet less rigorous requirements (e.g. internet comments), it’s essentially an “invisible” word along the lines of “he said” in dialogue. We scan it and see it without much thought at all. Not great as an intensifier, but also not a detriment to the writing either.
Another word I try to avoid is “just” in professional communications. Left to my own devices I will always write something like “I just wanted to let you know…” as opposed to “I wanted to let you know…” which almost always reads better. Something in my brain defaults to thinking using “just” feels socially necessary, but reading it written out always feels wrong. I edit it out of probably 50% of the emails I send.
I do disagree with the author’s distaste for “throat clearers”. Part of this is because I’ve never met a transition word or phrase I’ve disliked, and the other part is that I read a lot of choppy student writing that could benefit from some flow and contour. There’s definitely an art to using “that said” and “in sum” and the like, but I’d rather more people go for them than avoid them. In general I think more transition words and phrases would help people express their thoughts at length. They’re a way of embedding structure and directing the reader’s thought, and they can be quietly powerful when used well.
Professional editor here (which is why I loved BC Dreyer's essay so much).
When we edit (ourselves or another's writing), the goal is to make the prose the best that it can possibly be. One way to do that is to embrace conciseness and to encourage information density. That keeps a reader's interest so they feel the author is getting to the point. "I try to leave out the parts that people skip," said Elmore Leonard.
In other words, if I can delete a word -- like "very" or "just" -- and the meaning does not change, I generally delete the word. As Mark Twain wrote, "Substitute 'damn' every time you're inclined to write 'very;' your editor will delete it and the writing will be just as it should be."
That's not the same as a transition word or paragraph. Those serve a purpose. In many cases, I tell the writer to add a short paragraph as a transition, because the reader can get lost. (Wait, how did you get from THAT statement to THIS one? Or, the writer fails to tell me why a situation is bad before they explain how to do so.)
Perhaps it's different when you're trying to find out what a student thinks about a subject. But when you write for someone else -- such as a paying magazine subscriber -- what matters is the reader's interest and what they get out of the prose. Not the writer's personal contemplations and throat clearing.
Before deciding to go into teaching, I was actually planning on becoming an editor myself! You’re in good company, and kudos to you for all of your invisible and often thankless hard work. I know a (little) bit about how much goes into that!
Also, I think you’re right in that we have different goals. For me, the main thing I have to try to get my students to do is write more. The more minor optimizations talked about in the article don’t really mean much unless the writing is substantial enough to warrant that kind of attention, and my goal is to try to get students to write with substance in the first place. You’re focused on skilled writers honing their craft, while I’m focused on getting kids out of the perfunctory stages of written expression. As you’re well aware, writing is a craft and an art, and I deal much more with the basics.
Finally, a question for you because now I’m worried I’ve been very (lol) wrong about something for pretty much my entire life. Are phrases like “in sum” or “that said” not transitions? To me they feel like they fit the bill, but you’re definitely the authority here, so I’m curious if I’m way off the mark.
Strictly speaking, "in sum" or "that said" are transitions. They do tell the reader, "I'm going to change what I'm talking about," which at least is a clue. They just aren't GOOD transitions.
At best, they're clunky. In the same way that it's clunky to type "Conclusion" for the last section of an article. (That last sentence should be the primary takeaway.)
Tangent: my family name is Wan, and it just dawned upon me that in English "wan" means pale and ill-looking.
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