Ch 6
Concision is the topic,
stressed
In literature, the struggle of the
novice is to acquire the literary language; the struggle of the adept is to get
rid of it. - G.B.Shaw
Concision is being tight and accurate!
Accuracy is saying what you mean, precisely. And being tight
about it means that you do not say what you intend in a longwinded manner, but state
it briefly. Succinctly. We complicate this and create ambiguity by not
exercising sufficient control over our thinking and writing processes. The
Reader Expectation approach provides us with the tools we need to exercise
control. In line with our contextual approach, we continue with local examples,
note what they say and how they say it, and what they could be saying, instead.
By definition, a paradigm shift is significant. See Ch 3
endnote # 8 that explains the terms ‘paradigm’ and ‘paradigm shift.’ There is no
paradigm to shift here. The misuse of the phrase instead masks and replaces what
is needed: that student interest in the subject, student attention,
participation, and the effective use of a teaching opportunity - all suffered. But
that is not said! Concision? No. Ambiguity, instead. The topic is off – it is
not about a paradigm shift but a change in learning activity. The phrase ‘the
original teacher was replaced’ is redundant. And ‘clearly inexperienced’? ‘Inexperienced’ would suffice. But such
phrasing results in weak end stress use. What’s the most important subject/character
in this sentence? The students. Any other? A weak substitute teacher. What if
we replaced the current ‘subject’ phrase and changed topic and stress positions?
1a. Students were
unable to relate to the new, inexperienced substitute teacher. Because of this,
attention levels, student participation, and learning opportunity – all
suffered.
Now compare 1
& 1a. Too often, we just put something down and expect, or perhaps hope, that
it will be sufficient. We know what’s in our minds. But how will the reader
know? The reader does not want or need to hear an errant claim that a paradigmatic
event happened in a classroom. But to know that students were negatively
impacted by an inexperienced teacher – now, that is relevant. Let’s try not to
have that happen again.
I have used bold print on redundancies. Concision is not just
about the meaning of a word or phrase, but also about the use of accurate grammar.
If you speak of science, math and more, you cannot reference them with the singular
pronoun ‘it’. You need a plural form. I find such errors in pronoun use all
over our written prose; world class education system, indeed.
The writer has something
in mind, but it has not been thought through thoroughly. Ah, more alliteration!
Students who are focused on science and math learn method and discipline, and
as their minds become accustomed to a specific mode of thinking, they stand to lose
both artistic and creative potential if they are not allowed the simultaneous
use of flexible and creative opportunity and expression. And neither science
nor math curricula allow for that. But the reasoning is entirely correct. And
is in some ways a very good critique of PISA assessment methodology! But only
inasmuch as science and math are separated from their creative work, which is
not always found in the average classroom, but exists on the cutting edge of
new scientific discovery and the experimental work therein. If students are
taught everything according to a sequenced formula, they get used to creating a
formula to make a thing work, and they begin to think that everything requires
a formula and must be expressed in mathematical terms. Hence, formulaic….then,
they are missing out on a great deal of creative opportunity.
And such a lack of creativity can leave them
with fairly rigid ways of thinking and structuring meaning, unless they have
the freedom to create extra-formula approaches, outside of conventional understanding!
This is what art and literature facilitate – they allow creative expression which
can be applied as a practitioner exercises interpretation. ‘Formulaic’ carries an important but weakly stated
observation - that of non-negotiable presuppositions. Next, can you become ‘too
constrained’? No. Constraint is an applied external force that is imposed on
you. In this case, the expression would work if the ‘external force’ were to be
identified. Bottom line, this writer, a professional academic, is struggling to
say that cognitive habits, if allowed to become set, will create fixed ways of
thinking. That’s it. Once we resolve the presenting issues, we get:
2a. A science
curriculum is taught according to a given set of presuppositions. The field of
science requires order and logical thinking, and scientific investigation has
little in common with freedom of expression. Such freedom is found in the
artistic fields of music, literature and the arts. A balanced curriculum would
ensure that students have equal exposure to all areas and methodologies of
study.
The word artefact/artifact
refers to a historical man-made item. Like
the cup of Christ, which waits somewhere to be found in an archaeological dig,
perhaps. The ‘historical and man-made’ aspect of this has also been extended to
refer to a characteristic resulting from a human institution, period, trend or
individual; or something or someone arising from or associated with an earlier
time especially when regarded as no
longer appropriate or important.
In this second sense, Michael Pollan of U Cal Berkeley once claimed
that morality is an artifact of human culture, devised to help us negotiate
social relations.1 However,
organized religion would probably rise up and organize prayer meetings against
such use, so it cannot be easily nor quickly said that it is a widely accepted
connotation. More of a philosophical claim perhaps, as versus ongoing religious
claims, the one going for freedom in voluntary and non-aggressive behavioral
aspects, the other supporting specific social mores that require acceptance. Of
course, there are exceptions. But morality is not yet an artifact! What is meant here? If the writer had said
that ‘relevance is like an artefact’ it would still be wrong because the
analogy fails.
What is relevance? Relevance is not morality, and you cannot
call it old-fashioned, for example! Relevance is a value, an attribute, a
quality. It is relational, and it is a given. When relevance fails,
relationships fail. As such, after creating it, we need to grow it, not
maintain it! There is an important difference here! You can attempt to argue,
as Pollan did, for morality being an artifact. But you cannot argue that for
relevance. You would only end up saying that the idea of relevance is
historically dead and no longer of any use. That would be tantamount to saying
that all human inter-relationships will now fail by default! If you want to echo
Pollan you must do some hard thinking first, and not adopt an unthinking,
uncritical blind acceptance because you feel that it makes for a powerful
sounding expression!
Check the comparative difference between ‘maintain’ and ‘grow’.
To keep a factor or a person continually relevant to an individual requires
effort, or relationship loses relevance and becomes irrelevant! You cannot
‘maintain’ a relationship. Predictability is not a given. You must develop it,
or it will weaken and slip away…so you see the errors that affect concision in
meaning. Finally, which is more concise – ‘human endeavor’ or ‘human effort’ or
maybe just ‘effort’? If you check it
out, you will find that ‘endeavor’ = attempt, and ‘attempt’ means just that. It
is inconclusive. It may succeed. It may also fail. An endeavor is an attempt we
make to achieve a specific goal. The success of the endeavor will depend on the
degree of effort invested in it! Aha! Know the differences, because only then
can you nuance word use for effect!
Know your
words before you attempt to use them. When a professional speaks and writes
thus, what are we to make of it? I picked this one out of an IPS (Institute of
Policy Studies) public lecture. You get the point. The problem occurs because
we know what we want to say but are not sufficiently knowledgeable about the
words we use. It ends up being a guessing game because we have not made the
required effort to check the words that we have chosen to use! Professional
writing standards are not about guessing games! Let’s repeat it again and then restate it:
3.Relevance is an artefact created by human endeavour, and
having been created, must be maintained by human endeavour.
3a. Relevance is a relational value inherent
to human relationships and is critical to a successful long-term relationship.
And relationships require ongoing effort to remain strong.
Note the
differences in how the stress positions have been used. The original ends weakly.
The stress position is not used well, and so the sentence ends rather flatly.
In the revision, the ending is strong and leaves the reader with no doubt of
what is intended. This is why endings serve to stress the point of a sentence.
They must always be strong and bring out the intended stress of the point. And
the point must be sharp, in order to get through. Not blunt. Bluntness may
indeed impact, but it almost always gives the impact of dull force. It just
smashes and fails to cut through. Concision is sharp, and it cuts. Moving on…
4.a The
danger is that people will fail to fully understand, much less appreciate, the
totality of the many separate schemes now in place, and yet to come in the next
fifty years, and may be perplexed by the State’s role in ensuring retirement
adequacy. Should that happen, a creeping cynicism may start to undermine the
social contract which the CPF in its simple boldness represented.
4.b It may
be appropriate then, at this critical juncture of Singapore’s history, during
which the government’s budget has implicitly embodied a model of co-responsibility
for what was previously a self-funded model of retirement savings, to
explicitly create an integrated unified platform for all future schemes to
supplement the CPF.
4a and 4b make
up a single paragraph. Effective analysis requires that we deal with 4b first,
and all of it later. Also, look back at page 2 of Chapter Four which talks
about commas and interruptions, a discussion which applies very appropriately
here. In writing long sentences, there has always been an understanding that
any sentence over 28 words is not effective. That is not necessarily true, but a
long sentence is always harder to control when it comes to clarity and
concision. It will tend to wander, get sidetracked, grow ambiguous, and lose
strength, finally ending when the writer has run out of thought energy! This
sentence is one such example. Unfortunately, it is also the work of a
professional academic. From what we have seen thus far, it appears that these
sentences are created to look impressive, but apart from that, they can be
challenging, to state it kindly.
4.2 The danger is
that it may be appropriate then,
at this critical juncture of Singapore’s
history,
during which the government’s budget
has implicitly embodied
a model of
co-responsibility
for what was previously
a self-funded model of retirement savings,
to explicitly create
an integrated unified platform
for
all future schemes to supplement the CPF. Amen.
4.3 The danger is
that people will fail to fully understand
the totality of the many separate schemes now in place and
may be perplexed by the State’s role
in ensuring retirement adequacy. A creeping cynicism may start to undermine
the social contract which the CPF represented. It may be appropriate then
to explicitly create an integrated, unified platform for all
future schemes to supplement the CPF.
Now we can
start to get a sense of it, but it’s still very convoluted. Which is to say?
Well, look at the metadiscourse in the first sentence. 19 words before you get
to the subject. Not good for the reader. Then note the lack of continuity in
expression – which comes first, the self-funded model or the co-funded model?
Figure that one, and it makes you ask why the writer did that – why reverse the
chronology of it? If you want to describe forward movement, going backwards is
not the way to do it. Lastly, look at
what is marked off in italics and ask whether you could replace those portions with
sharper words and phrases. Remember, you are working to sharpen the accuracy of
both idea and image. At the end of the exercise, we get:
4.4 People may fail to understand the combined effectiveness
of the many current but separate savings schemes. Their lack of understanding
might make them uncertain about the Government’s ability to provide adequate
funds for their retirement. This could lead to folk questioning the
Government’s commitment to them. However, since the Government has decided on a
model of shared responsibility for retirement savings, it could provide a
platform through which to understand the savings schemes that supplement the
CPF. This would give citizens a sense of how the system functions and how the
results will serve their retirement needs.
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