HISTORY DEPARTMENT

 

Quick Tips for Better Writing

by
Todd F. Carney
Southern Oregon University

(Copyright 1996, 2004 Todd F. Carney. This material may be used for instructional purposes without permission, but all commercial rights are reserved.)

1. Make and use an outline. It will help you keep your thoughts organized and logical.

2. Write your papers three times: first, to get the paper's elements in rough form; second, to make sure all your paper's elements are complete and in logical and rhetorical order; and third, to polish all your paper's parts and to meticulously check for spelling or typographical errors.

3. Save your most important point for last. Admit to points that might run counter to yours at the very beginning.

4. Read your drafts aloud. If your sentences are hard to read aloud, they will be hard to read silently. Pay attention to the "sound" of your writing. Train your "ear" by reading more.

5. Make the paragraph the basic unit of writing: one thought, one paragraph. There should be no one or two sentence paragraphs in your writing.

6. Avoid passive voice whenever possible. Instead of writing, "John was punished by his father for stealing the candy," write, "John's father punished him for stealing the candy." Always make the subject of the sentence (in the grammatical sense) active.

7. Write emphatically. Avoid the use of disclaimers such as, "in my opinion," "I feel," "it seems to me," and the like. If your name is on the paper, readers will know it is your opinion.

8. Make sure your sentences contain the minimum necessary parts: a subject, an object, and a verb.

9. Ruthlessly eliminate all unnecessary words, phrases, and sentences.

10. Commas are used only for purposes of clarity and proper grammar. They are not used to indicate a "pause" in the flow of words.

11. Use a comma before the last item in a series, as in Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear.

12. Avoid using contractions such as can't, don't, and wouldn't, in formal writing.

13. Observe the difference between to, too, and two, and between there, their, and they're.

14. Do not confuse an adjective with an adverb. He walked slow is incorrect. He walked slowly is.

15. Use the past tense in history papers.

16. Always form the possessive of a noun with an apostrophe-s, even if it ends with an s, except that the possessive of it is its, not it's. Never use an apostrophe to form a plural. 1990s, not 1990's, is correct.

17. Avoid the use of slang in formal writing. Never use obscenity.

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