Expository Writing

1
Expository Writing

• Lesson Five
• Editing for grammar
• Dr. M. Connor

2
More on grammar

• Dont be afraid to seize whatever you have
  written and cut it to ribbons. It can always be
  restored to its original condition in the
  morning.
• E.B. White
• Especially if you have the right software.
• Jan Venolia

3
Todays lesson

• Much of todays lesson will be taken from Jan
  Venolias excellent book Rewrite Right! Your
  Guide to Perfectly Polished Prose, 2/e, Berkeley
  Ten Speed P, 2000.
• Available through Amazon.com http//www.amazon.co
  m/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1580082394/qid109968751
  8/sr8-1/refsr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/002-9428137-34512
  36?vglancesbooksn507846

4
Valuable tools

• Your word processing program contains two
  powerful tools to help your writing
• Spell check
• Grammar check
• Just be aware of their limitations

5
Spell check

• A spell checker is a valuable tool for catching
  misspelled or unintentionally doubled words.
  BUT
• Documents may still include incorrect words.
• A spell checker assumes a correctly spelled word
  is the right word.
• If you write t-h-i-e-r house, it will catch it
• If you write there house, it wont!

6
Grammar check

• Remember, this program is written by computer
  programmers, not English teachers!
• They sometimes incorrectly flag text
• They sometimes miss obvious errors.
• They have trouble with things like who/whom,
  that/which, and the proper use of apostrophes.

7
Tracking revisions

• This is a feature of WORD. To find it, go to
  TOOLS and Track Changes.
• You can delete your golden prose, but you dont
  have to worry about it being permanently gone if
  you decide that you do like it after all.
• This removes some of the pain of editing.

8
Getting started

• No passion in the world is equal to the passion
  to alter someone elses draft.
• H.G. Wells
• Ah-ha, this is probably why I teach writing!
• Unless its the resistance to sitting down and
  editing your own.
• Jan Venolia
• Amen, says Dr. Connor!

9
Two level editing

• There are two steps in editingrewriting (major
  work) and editing (minor work)
• Rewriting can also be called first level
  editing
• Editing can also be called second level
  editing.
• Today were looking at this level.

10
Read more than once

• When editing a paper, your own or someone elses,
  its always a good idea to read it through once
  to see what its about, but then skim it over
  several times, each time looking for something
  different.
• You can catch the different types of error more
  easily if youre specifically looking for them.

11
Second-level editing a checklist

• Punctuation
• Do punctuation marks help readers grasp the
  meaning?
• Is there any surplus punctuation?
• Grammar
• Do subjects and verbs agree?
• Do pronouns and antecedents agree?
• Are pronouns in their correct case?
• who/whom, I/me/myself, etc

12
Checklist, continued

• Grammar
• Do pronouns refer clearly to their antecedents?
• Did you remove dangling and misplaced modifiers?
• Are the tense and the mood of the verbs
  consistent?
• Are related parts of sentences parallel in form?
• Are there fragments or run-ons?

13
More checklist

• Mechanics
• Are abbreviations kept to a minimum? Are they
  used correctly?
• Is capitalization correct and consistent?
• Are numbers below 10 spelled out? Are numbers
  above 10 written as figures?
• Are words correctly spelled?
• If your writing includes quoted materials, have
  the quotations been presented correctly?

14
Why worry about grammar?

• Grammar, rhetoric, and logic enrich enormously
  the phenomenon of being alive.
• George Santayana

15
Grammar helps the reader

• Good grammar is transparent. Instead of getting
  in the way, it helps readers understand what is
  written.
• Most native speakers use grammatical rules
  without being aware of it, but even we need to
  use a good grammar sometimes.
• Non-native speakers also need to know how to use
  a grammar! If you dont have one, get one soon!

16
Agreement

• Every part of a sentence should agree with every
  related part.
• In every day English, that means
• Use singular verbs with singular subjects and
  plural verbs with plural subjects.
• Make a pronoun singular if its antecedent is
  singular and plural if the antecedent is plural.

17
Make the subject and verb agree in number

• The wastepaper basket is a writers best friend.
• Isaac Bashevis Singer
• Basket is singular, is is singular.

18
And again...

• We are confronted with insurmountable
  opportunities.
• Pogo (an American cartoon)
• We is plural, are confronted is plural

19
A word about numbers

• Ive mentioned that we use words for one through
  10, then switch to numerals.
• There are some exceptions.
• Of course!

20
Exceptions

• Use words when a number starts a sentence
• Fifty million Frenchmen cant be wrong.
• And if a related number appears in the sentence,
  write it as a word, too
• Twenty members voted yes fifteen voted no.
• One dollar out of every ten earned goes to health
  care.

21
And..

• Express large numbers in figures or in mixed
  figure-word form, but be consistent.
• 10,000,000 or 10 million
• 5.7 billion
• 3 1/2 billion

22
Dates

• Use figures for dates
• July 4, 1776 or 4 July, 1776
• 7/4/76 or 7/4/1776 (in the first we might assume
  you meant 1976)
• Because Europe and America write dates
  differently (in US month is written first, in
  Europe, day), it is preferable that you use the
  word for the month.
• July 4, 1776