How to Avoid Colloquial (Informal) Writing, Summaries of English

Download How to Avoid Colloquial (Informal) Writing and more Summaries English in PDF only on Docsity! How to Avoid Colloquial (Informal) Writing While it may be acceptable in friendly e-mails and chat rooms, excessive colloquialism is a major pitfall that lowers the quality of formal written text. Here are some steps/tips that you can follow to help improve your overall writing. Reading this list and surveying your final copy of your EE before submission can earn you easy points on your EE: Steps 1. Understand what formal English is. Realize that if you write the way you talk, you most likely will end up using informal English. You even may find yourself committing grammatical errors! Remember, too, that talking informally can make the listener feel more comfortable, but writing informally can make the readers think less of you. Know when to use informal English and when to use formal English, and discover which style comes more naturally to you. 2. Understand basic English punctuation. In fact, you should follow this rule in all of your writing (although it is particularly important in formal English). Punctuating your writing as you go along can reduce your risk of leaving out punctuation marks. In a formal letter, you use a colon, not a comma, as in "Dear John:" 3. Realize that some punctuation is not acceptable in extremely formal English. The dash, the parenthesis, and the exclamation mark are not universally acceptable. In the most formal English, you should use the exclamation mark only when a character screams, "Fire!" or "Help!" You should avoid the parenthesis and the dash at all times in this style unless you quote an author who used them first. You should avoid the parenthesis and the dash in discourse that you transcribe yourself. Try to replace your dashes with colons in formal writing. 4. Avoid using common colloquial words and expressions. Again, these are words that, while acceptable in speech, should not be used in formal writing. Colloquial words and phrases are called "colloquialisms." There are also solecisms, such as "ain’t," which are grammatical errors. Finally, there are non-words, combinations of letters and characters that do not form real words, such as "alot." If you are in doubt about a certain word, look it up in the dictionary. If the dictionary makes no comment about it, but it sounds informal to you, consult another dictionary. A dictionary will label an incorrect word such as "ain’t" as "nonstandard" and informal word as "informal," "colloquial," or "slang." Some dictionaries also include phrases. For example, when you look up "to put up with" ("to tolerate") in the dictionary, you will see that it is informal. 5. "Omit needless words." Some adverbs and phrases significantly reduce the formality of your writing while adding little to it. A good phrase to delete is "you know." This phrase implies that you know what the reader knows or is thinking while reading your paper; you do not have this power. Some adverbs, such as "well" starting a sentence, often are needless. Starting a sentence with "well" can be useful in everyday writing as a way to contrast the sentence with what came before. Many writers, however, use "well" too often. 6. Avoid contractions. Contractions dramatically reduce the formality of your composition. Depending on how formal you need to be, you may want to avoid all contractions or use fewer contractions in your writing than you would use in your speech. "Cannot" is preferable to "can’t" in formal contexts. Some contractions such as "o’clock" (for "of the clock") are so commonplace that they are condemned in only the most formal writing. 7. Try to avoid the first and second person. Formal writing often tries to be objective, and the pronouns "I" and "you" tend to imply subjectivity. Phrases such as "I think that" can be deleted from a sentence when it is obvious that this is the author’s opinion. Using the pronoun "I" is almost always acceptable in personal writing, and the pronoun "you" is almost always acceptable in letters and how-to’s. In the most formal writing, "we" replaces "I," and "one" replaces "you." "One" also may be useful when you have a statement that does not apply to all of your readers. Finally, "one" can be useful in a letter when you have a statement that applies not to the reader but to people in general. 8. Know when to end a sentence with a preposition (even in the most formal of English). 9. Always include the relative pronoun. In speech and casual writing, you can say, "That was the boy I saw on the street" and make yourself clear. In formal writing, you should say, "He was the boy whom I saw on the street." In this style, you should be sure to always include "whom" even when it is not necessary to your meaning. Also consider this example: "There were five students who were complaining about the homework." If the relative pronoun is omitted, "complaining" becomes a kind of postpositive adjective, and the sentence is written completely in the neuter voice, with "were" as the only real verb. 10. Do not start a sentence with a coordinating conjunction. In the written language, do not use coordinating conjunctions such as "and" or "but" to start a sentence. In formal English, try to start sentence with "additionally," (or "moreover") "nevertheless," and "alternatively." In casual writing, you can start sentences with "also," but avoid this in formal English unless the word "also" is modifying a verb (usually in the imperative mood): "Also read Chapters Two and Three." Coordinating conjunctions are meant to join words and phrases, so a coordinating conjunction is left dangling without a role to play when a sentence begins with a coordinating conjunction. Simply attach the sentence that starts with a coordinating conjunction to the previous sentence; this produces a compound sentence. You also may use "additionally," "also," "either," "though," and "however" instead of starting with "and" and "but." You should tuck the words "also" and "however" in your sentence, not using them to start a sentence. "Though," coming at the very end of your sentence, can prove a painless alternative to starting your sentence with "but": "The passive voice can make your writing more formal. It can cause you problems, though." 11. Develop short, choppy sentences into longer, more graceful sentences. Formal writing generally uses longer sentences than casual writing. To make your writing more formal, try using more compound and complex sentences. Try to develop two simple sentences into one compound or complex sentence. Long sentences add variety to your writing. A long sentence can be particularly effective when it is paired with a short sentence; the contrast grabs the readers' attention. As the last sentence shows, you also can use a semicolon to join two simple sentences, provided that they are closely related to each other. 12. Avoid clichés. Clichés are sayings or expressions. Clichés make your writing informal and sometimes humorous. They often make your writing unoriginal, but sometimes, you can use them to make an original play-on-words. Here are some clichés to avoid in formal writing: o Hercules was as strong as an ox. o I have to give an arm and a leg to find a parking spot during the holiday season. o To genetically engineer is to play God. 13. Avoid stage directions. Do not commence a letter by telling the recipient what you plan to do in the letter or begin an essay by telling the reader what the paper will discuss. o "I am writing to you to ask you to. . . ." o "This paper is going to talk about how. . . ."