Conciseness in Sentence

Conciseness

A sentence is concise when it only contains the most effective words or phrases.

Concise writing does not always have the fewest words, but it always uses the stronger ones.

Concise sentence eliminates unnecessary details or verbiage (excessively lengthy or technical speech).

Wordy:

He was terribly late to his English class due to the fact that he had to finish his math test.

Concise:

He was late for English because he had to finish his math test.

 (The meaning of the sentence is clearer, isn't it?)

Wordy:

Citizens who knew what was going on voted the president out of the office. (Too wordy!)

 

Concise:

Knowledgeable citizens did not vote for the president.

( Don't you think the 2^nd sentence is a lot easier to understand?)

One strategy to ensure concise sentence is by replacing vague words with more powerful and specific words.

Why?



• Using more specific words can lead to a more concise writing

• Allows readers to completely understand the messages in the writing better.

Test time!

Improve on the conciseness of the following sentences by replacing the vague words with more powerful and specific words.

You may choose the best option OR write your answer.

Multiple Choice

1. The manager believed but could not confirm that her employees were lying to her.

• The manager suspected, but could not prove, that her employees were lying to her.

• 1. The manager assumed that her employees were lying to her.

Multiple Choice

2. In the not too distant future, students will become aware of the fact that there is a need for them to make contact with their academic advisor.

• 1. Soon, students will realise that they need to contact their academic advisor.

• Students will be informed in the not-too-distant future that they need to contact their academic advisor.

Open Ended

3. They had come to the conclusion that the new system had bad results that cost people a lot of money.

Suggested answer for Q3:

They concluded that the new system had costly results.

Notice the changes?

had come to the conclusion > concluded

had bad results that cost people> costly results

Open Ended

4. He dropped out of school on account of the fact that it was necessary for him to help support his family.

He dropped out of school to support his family.

Notice the changes?

"...on account of the fact that it was necessary for him ..." has been omitted.

Good job, everyone!

Hold on. We have one more thing to cover.

Another strategy you can use to ensure concise sentence is to avoid redundancy.

• Basically, stop repeating yourself !

Don't repeat yourself in the sentence.

Improve on the conciseness of the following sentences by identifying redundant words, and revising the sentences.

Multiple Choice

1. Despite the fact that she had performed the operation a numerous number of times, she still reviewed the basic essentials each and every day.

• Even though she had done the procedure several times, she nevertheless went through the fundamentals every day.

• Although she had performed the operation a number of times,

  she still reviewed the essentials every day.

Open Ended

2. The first priority appears to be to group together the children that live in close proximity to one another.

Was the previous sentence confusing? Here is the better option.

The priority is to group the children that live in

proximity to one another.

(Cut the unnecessary words)

Multiple Choice

3. The local residents filled to capacity the new auditorium as they waited to hear the developer recount the past history of the archaeological site.

• The residents filled the new auditorium as they

  waited to hear the developer recount the history of the

  archaeological site.

• The new auditorium was packed to capacity as people waited to hear the developer recount the archaeological site's history.

Open Ended

4. In my personal opinion, we should refer back to last year’s budget to see how we postponed that expenditure until a later time.

Suggested answer:

In my opinion, we should refer to last year’s budget to see

how we postponed that expenditure.

Notice the redundancy?

refer back > refer

postponed ... until a later time? > postponed

I just CUT all the unnecessary words. Those words mean the same thing and add nothing new.

Cheerio, see you next week!

Regards, Ms Hanis.