Student Handbook - The School of Language, Linguistics and Film

Words and phrases: Try to cut out the superfluous. Why say ‘conduct an investigation of’
when ‘investigate’ will do, and is easier on the reader?
Sentences: Always go for a clear and unambiguous structure, and remember that a
sentence must contain a main clause. Here are some examples of common non-sentences
found in essays: ‘For example, his mother.’; ‘For example, when the mother dies.’. If you are
juggling with more than two sub-clauses, the chances are that it would be better to break the
concepts you are trying to express into more than one sentence. A variety of sentence
length is an effective way of holding the reader’s attention, but not if the sentences become
convoluted in the process.
A key to effective communication is the punctuation of sentences. This can both clarify what
you are saying and make it easier to read. Two of the most common traps:
• Do not run sentences together with commas when they are really separate sentences.
Do not write ‘The mother is portrayed cruelly, her ugliness is heavily stressed’.
• Do use commas in pairs to delimit phrases or subordinate clauses; e.g., ‘The message
of the novel, in spite of the seemingly happy ending, is a pessimistic one’.
Paragraphs: Paragraphs are elements or building blocks of an argument; each paragraph
should show its logical links with the next. Paragraphing is a way of giving shape to a text by
breaking sequences of sentences, but it is always better if these breaks correspond to
coherent units, or at least have a clear purpose. Starting a new paragraph should indicate
that you are moving your argument along into new terrain. Many people do not take
advantage of this device. Some write in long paragraphs of uninterrupted strings of
sentences, in which it is easy to lose the point; others break the sequences so frequently
that paragraphs can contain little more than a sentence or two, in which case the argument
is lost in a sense of fragmentation. The best way to improve your paragraphing is to learn
from examples; look at the books which seem to you to present the argument most
effectively, study the paragraphing and try to emulate it.
Spelling
A great number of students have problems with spelling. This is not said to depress you (on
the contrary, it may come as a relief to know that the problem is so common), but because
a) it is a fact, b) it matters, and c) if you are one of those many who has difficulties with
spelling, now is the moment to do something about it.
• Take note of the corrections made by your teachers on essays. One practical suggestion
is that you keep a list of the words that you identify as those with which you have
difficulty, especially those which you use frequently. If you word-process, you could keep
this list in alphabetical order and build it up as you go along.
• As you are word-processing your essay, use a spell checker. It won’t cure the problem in
itself; apart from anything else, a spell checker may ensure that words are spelt correctly
but not that they are the words you wanted to use. But it will improve your end-product,
and, if you take note of the corrections it suggests (as above), in time it can help you to
improve your own spelling. You may also find it useful to keep a good dictionary at your
side as you write.
• One of the commonest mistakes nowadays concerns the use of apostrophes. In the
case of nouns, the apostrophe is used to convey possession, not plural. Thus you
should write the committee’s decision (= ‘the decision of the committee’), but not the
three king’s (which has no meaning). Unfortunately, the same is not true of pronouns; its
means ‘of it’, while it’s means ‘it is’ (and should not be used in essays anyway, as it is
too informal).
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