Even when your topic and approach are interesting, your style of expressing your meaning can really engage your reader with your thinking about the issues. Here are some strategies for revising your paper to express yourself more emphatically.

• Rewrite your introduction, changing the way you grab your readers' attention and the way you express your central idea. Compare the versions to see which you like best or combine them for a more effective opening.
• Rewrite your conclusion, changing the way you reiterate and reinforce your central idea. Compare the versions to see which you like best or combine them for a more effective closing.
• Look at each paragraph and ask yourself some questions.
  • Can I make the purpose of the paragraph more clear? more interesting?
  • Where might additional or different details and examples strengthen and clarify meaning?
  • Where might I eliminate unnecessary repetition so that the remaining details are more forceful?
  • Will readers recognize that all elements of the paragraph are related to each other? and to the overall central idea of the entire paper or report? If not, how can I add that clarity, for example, transitions like "for example"?
  • Does the order of the paragraphs make sense? build emphasis?
• Look at your sentences (syntax) . In a short paper, you can review every sentence for effective expression.
  • Which sentences can be combined to strengthen your meaning and emphasis as well as eliminate wordiness?
  • Vary your sentence structure, beginning some sentences with prepositional phrases or subordinate clauses to add interest and emphasis.
  • Rewrite selected sentences to practice varying your approach; decide which versions are most effective.
• Attend to your word choices (diction): You are writing for a general audience of educated adults—not stuffy or scholarly but not casual and colloquial either.
  • Clear information, midlevel diction, moderate tone, and logical presentation are essential.
  • Review your word choices for important points. Have you used precise, meaningful words?
  • Circle each instance of "it," "this," "that," "there," "you," and "I." Where might you substitute more exact and effective words?
  • Verbs: Use present tense for narratives and attributions of source material, for example, "Professor Williams remarks"; however, shift tenses when logic demands: for past events and dated past events, for example, "In 1973 Professor Williams remarked..." (97-98).
• Use appropriate point of view: Write about the issue, not about yourself.

  • Use third person pronouns—identify elements under discussion with appropriate descriptive terms and labels rather than vague "we, us, our, this, it" or the always inappropriate "you."
  • Do use first person ("I" and "we") for personal experience and for actions that you actually performed, as in experiments and research projects. However, avoid "in my opinion" or "I believe/I think" unless the reader is likely to become confused about whose idea is being expressed.
• Use appropriate voice: Whenever possible use active voice rather than passive voice, for example, "The Institute for Silence in Elementary School concludes" rather than "It is concluded by the Institute for Silence in Elementary School." A more straightforward example: "The vampire feasted on Elvira's blood" rather than "Elvira's blood was drained by the vampire." Or even more simply, "Mice eat cheese" rather than "Cheese is eaten by mice."
• See Guidelines for Academic Papers and Writing Resources and Guides for additional suggestions.