A Sense of Doubt blog post #1789 - The IT Phenomenon and good sentence rules

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1789 - The IT Phenomenon and good sentence rules

And so, some more instruction and stuff about grammar.

I will be directing my students to these posts. Then again, posting the content this way is in lieu of creating a big power point, though I have some of those, too.

First, the abundant and overuse of "it" without having the word be a substitute for a clear subject. It phenomenon falls into the same category as THIS PHENOMENON (same problem; different pronoun).

THE IT PHENOMENON

The word it is a pronoun. It, the word it, replaces another word or phrase, a noun, a subject. However, students often use it at the beginning of a sentence, and it refers to nothing. Examples:

            It started a long time ago.

            It had been a long time since Joe had gone to the bar.

            It was a nice day.

Now, the last example has a noun for it, it=day.  But for a pronoun to replace a noun, the noun must precede (to go boldly before) the pronoun which replaces it (the noun, you see).  Therefore, "It has been a nice day" doesn't really do the job.  "The day was nice" works much better. 

Yeah, we don’t talk that way. But the “write as you talk” is not necessarily good advice. And it all depends on the situation. See? I wrote one of those sentences with an "it" (the one with depends in the sentence). The point is not to eliminate all such sentences but to reduce their frequency.

COROLLARY: THIS PHENOMENON

The "It Phenomenon" functions much like the "This Phenomenon," in which the writer assumes that the reader understands the subject without restating it or stating it at all.

And so, writers compose sentences, like

"This is why we need..."

"This explains the ..."

"This type of thing shows the real flaw..."

Often the "this" represented by the pronoun consists of a complex series of ideas, concepts, and/or evidence.

RESTATE THESE IDEAS.

"This fatal flaw in Kant's reasoning demonstrates why..."

"This re-imagining of music proves why our culture needs Brian Eno..."

"This scene from the Matrix explains the concept of how people conceive of their world..."

... and so on.

SOME SENTENCES

NOTES ON SENTENCES

and OTHER FURRY BIRDS

 

One easy rule to remember about sentences: 

            ALL sentences have some kind of subject, such as I, Bill, or the athletic supporter.

            And ALL sentences use some kind of verb, such as to run, to sing, or to puke.

As you revise your papers or other people's papers, check the sentences: does each sentence have a subject? Does each sentence have a verb -- a word or group of words that performs an action or is involved in some active process?

Without a subject and a verb (predicate), there can be no sentence.

If the sentence lacks one of these parts then the sentence is incomplete, a fragment. Here's an example, taken from a real paper: 

"A person that was never thought of until one hot, summer day." 

Why is this sentence incomplete?

Because all the language describes the person. The word "that" connects the rest of the content to the word person as description and not as active verb construction in a sentence.

SENTENCE VARIETY

 

There are many ways to construct sentences. Writers vary sentence structure to make their writing sound interesting. Although the options for sentence structure number into the millions (probably), keeping in mind the two basic forms of complex/compound sentences proves quite useful. These two formats are known as

                        the coordinated                       and                  the subordinated

sentence.

Think of the coordinated sentence like a train. Remember "Conjunction Junction" from ABC's Grammar Rock series in the Seventies? Like that. Think of sentences parts as train cars and conjunctions as the linkers between the cars. Isn't that a fun idea?

Words such as and, but, or, yet, so, nor, for work as coordinating conjunctions joining short sentences into longer compound sentences.

EXAMPLES

Bruno's tie-dyed shirt resembles a kaleidoscope.

                     +

Bruno paid only twenty dollars for it at the Grateful Dead concert.

                     =

Bruno's tie-dyed shirt resembles a kaleidoscope, and he paid only twenty dollars for it at the Dead concert.

                     OR

Jimmy-Biz tie-dyes fifty-seven shirts a day.

                     +

He never sells enough to make a profit.

                     =

Jimmy-Biz tie-dyes fifty-seven shirts a day, but he never sells enough to make a profit.

Subordinating is more complicated. There are many more subordinating conjunctions than coordinating ones. Just a few: after, before, unless, when, if, because, since. A writer may choose to use these words at the beginning or in the middle of a sentence. Wow, more choices than on Wheel of Fortune!

EXAMPLES

After Bruno put on his new psychedelic shirt, he felt a strange tingling at the back of his head like a wave on the beach.

OR

Bruno packed his tie-dyed shirt away in an army surplus trunk, locked it, and shoved it under his bed because he thought demons from the ninth dimension possessed it.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++


- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2001.11 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1652 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.