Turns out I'm not a total schlub after all!
According to this New York Times article, overusing nominalizations makes writing "flabby." Flabby in this context means that your verbs and adjectives are dead. The life they would give your writing, drained out by the evil zombie nouns!
Nominalizations (zombie nouns) occur most often when someone wants to sound smart (ahem . . . pompous) and so they tag suffixes to the end of otherwise lovely and lively words. Extrapolate becomes extrapolation. Pompous becomes pomposity. Radical becomes radicalism. Nominalizing suffixes has its place; the sin is in overuse. (Ahem . . . Academia!)
To test your own "writing fitness" follow this link to the Writer's Diet webpage and paste in an example of your writing that is at least 100 words but less than 1000. (I used my "Third Grade Show and Tell" post.)
So while I still carry around some "baby weight," I have the consolation of knowing that my writing is "fit and trim." I'm not a schlub as far as writing goes. And that's pretty sweet! Jig a celebratory jig!
3 comments:
But if I keep things "fit and trim," won't my writing lose its profundity?!
Perhaps, but never its profunditnessityisms.
I tried various samples of writing from my blog and then excerpt after excerpt from my thesis. It was much kinder to my blog writing. But, really, I put what needed to be there in my thesis, so I dunno...
Also, nice neologism right there.
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