Clarity, Part 2

Gary Richardson "Three Clear Bubbles" via Flikr,Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic

 In this post I will summarize the things I learned while reading four more sections of "Clarity" within the "Rules for Writers" book.

Active verbs: I did not know that the placement of the verb has direct impact on its effect.  It also helps to name the person or thing that preforms the action in a way that puts emphasis in the right places.  The active voice means that "the subject does the action" and is structured as such to provide a more clear and more direct message. 

Eliminate distracting shifts: There are common errors, typically involving a confusing shift in perspective or emphasis. One distracting shift that may effect me is making my verbs "consistent in mood and voice" which states it is important to maintain a certain degree on consistency, especially in verb usage.

Exact words: Connotations are an important and often overlooked aspect to word choice.  Connotation, or "emotional colorings", are essential to the emotional effect of word choice. Additionally, keeping nouns specific is nearly always beneficial to conveying something.

Appropriate language: It is important to use language that is inclusive and universal.  Also, in most situations, being overly wordy comes across as pretentious and is far more difficult to understand.  Sticking to more plain English is typically a good idea.  Additionally, slang and nonstandard English should be avoided in a majority of situations. 

Going through my draft, I found some things that I think apply to these sections.  There are a few times where I could use these to improve upon the draft.  For example, the sentence "His polarizing opinion epitomizes the opposing views that participants in this argument take." comes across as slightly too wordy and confusing.  I rewrote the sentence as "His polarizing opinion is evidence of the divide within the community" which seems to be easier to convey. A distracting shift in my sentence structure can be found in the sentence "Artificial intelligence should be taken seriously is the clear consensus, but the question is, should it be feared?" which is more effective when written as "The clear consensus is that artificial intelligence should be taken seriously, but the question is, should it be feared?"