Style Lesson 3: Actions

1. Style Lesson 3: Actions This chapter focuses on VERBS

2. Sentences are stories Williams suggests that writers think of sentences as stories with characters (subjects) and actions (verbs).

3. Important definitions Simple subject Whole subject Character Action Verb The evidence that you offer is not reliable.

4. Subject verb = character action Back in elementary school, we learned that the subject of the sentence was the doer of an action and the verb of a sentence was the action. Jane jumps. = subject verb (doer/character action)

5. Nouns But the doer (character) isn’t always the subject of a sentence. Any noun can be the subject of the sentence. Jane’s jumping went on and on. Jumping went = subject verb Jane is the doer (or character) but jumping is the subject of the sentence.

6. Verbs The main action isn’t always the main verb of a sentence. Often the action has been changed into a noun. Jane’s jumping went on and on. Jumps becomes jumping and went becomes the main verb of the sentence.

7. Back to elementary school Williams suggests we return to the idea that doers=subjects and important actions=verbs. Even complex academic prose will be more clear and more powerful if we make doers (what Williams calls characters) the subjects of our sentences and if we make actions the verbs of our sentences.

8. Principle 1 Make your main character the subject of your sentence. More on this principle in Lesson 4

9. Principle 2 Make the important actions the verbs of your sentence. The director completed a review of the data. Vs. The directed reviewed the data.

10. Nominalizations First drafts often have important actions as nouns Often this action has been changed into a noun. Nominalization (or nounialization) is a noun derived from an action. (It is also a noun derived from an adjective. Carelessbecomes carelessness. More on this problem in Lesson4.)

11. Nominalizations Actions become nouns: Discover becomes discovery. Resist becomes resistance. React becomes reaction.

12. Nominalizations Character + actions become nouns (gerund): She flies becomes her flying. We sing becomes our singing.

13. Nominalization Some verbs are, without any change, positioned as nouns: Hope (verb) becomes hope (noun) Result (verb) becomes result (noun) Repair (verb) becomes repair (noun)

14. The outsourcing of high-tech work to Asia by corporations means the loss of jobs for many Americans. What is the simple subject and verb of this sentence?

15. The outsourcing of high-tech work to Asia by corporations means the loss of jobs for many Americans. Ignoring introductory phrases, underline the first eight words in a sentence. a) Do you have an abstract noun (especially a nominalization) as the simple subject? b) Do you have 6 or 7 words before you get to a verb? “Yes” means your sentence may need revising.

16. The outsourcing of high-tech work to Asia by corporations means the loss of jobs for many Americans. • Decide who your main characters are • Decide what actions these main characters perform (look especially to those nominalizations, those actions that became nouns)

17. Main characters: corporations, AmericansActions of these characters: outsource, loose New sentence parts: 1. Corporations outsource high-tech work to Asia 2. Many Americans loose jobs 3) Use conjunctions (because, if, when, although, why, how, whether, that, since, so long as, provided that) to make the logic of the relationships clear

18. Practice The problem was the topic of our discussion.

19. Patterns to watch for Nominalizations with “empty verbs” or “bland verbs” such as to be (is, are, were) to seem, to have, to do Nominalizations following “There is” and “There are” Multiple nominalizations in a sentence

20. The results of making actions the verb of the sentence: Your sentences are more concrete and thus more powerful (nominalization results in abstract, vague nouns) Your sentences will be shorter and thus more direct since they will be free of unnecessary verbiage. The logic of the relationship of the ideas will be more clear. You sentences will tell a more coherent story.

21. Useful Nominalizations Williams does thinks some nouns derived from verbs do useful work and shouldn’t be rewritten. 37-38