MbShea@PWP@English@UMCP

Check out this active voice exhibit from Duke's Scientific Communication overview. Read this web exhibit, starting with Principles 2 and 3.  In your reading for your science classes, you may want to look for these techniques. Then, return to Principle 1.

Principle 1 is new to you.  This focus concerns nominalizations.  Read this clip from a New York Times article, which calls nominalizations "zombie nouns." Writer Helen Sword says:

Take an adjective (implacable) or a verb (calibrate) or even another noun (crony) and add a suffix like ity, tion or ism. You’ve created a new noun: implacability, calibration, cronyism. Sounds impressive, right? 

Nouns formed from other parts of speech are called nominalizations. Academics love them; so do lawyers, bureaucrats and business writers. I call them “zombie nouns” because they cannibalize active verbs, suck the lifeblood from adjectives and substitute abstract entities for human beings: 

The proliferation of nominalizations in a discursive formation may be an indication of a tendency toward pomposity and abstraction.

H.S.'s "Draft" -- a regular feature of the Times -- is a series about the art and craft of writing. 

----- 

How do we build trust in writing directions?  To be discussed.

Also, where on the web do directions live?

Friday, I will post an online document for Friday's digital class. You can respond by 11.59 SATURDAY (updated to give you moreflexibility), just before the stroke of midnight.  This is the Cinderella way of being clear about what day does "by midnight" actually mean.