Words to make your essay sound smart
It is 5 AM and you have a paper due in 3 hours. After staying up all night, you have only managed to type up 5 pages of the 8 page requirement, and you are beginning to run out of ideas. Never fear, Text Inflator is here to save your sanity. Don't have any text to use right now?
40 Useful Words and Phrases for Top-Notch Essays
Writing is a series of choices. As you revise your draft, you make more choices. This handout will explain some common issues related to word choice and give you strategies for choosing the best words as you revise your drafts. For tips on making more substantial revisions, take a look at our handouts on reorganizing drafts and revising drafts.
Most instructors use terms like this to draw your attention to sentences they had trouble understanding and to encourage you to rewrite those sentences more clearly. Sometimes a sentence is hard to follow because there is a grammatical problem with it or because of the syntax the way the words and phrases are put together.
Sometimes, though, problems with clarity are a matter of word choice. See if you recognize any of these issues:. Take a look at the following list for some examples.
On the left are some phrases that use three, four, or more words where fewer will do; on the right are some shorter substitutes:. Keep an eye out for wordy constructions in your writing and see if you can replace them with more concise words or phrases. They are problematic because their overuse has diminished their impact and because they require several words where just one would do.
As a challenge, see how many alternatives you can create for the final two examples. When you choose words to express your ideas, you have to think not only about what makes sense and sounds best to you, but what will make sense and sound best to your readers.
Thinking about your audience and their expectations will help you make decisions about word choice. But the most important goal of academic writing is not to sound smart—it is to communicate an argument or information clearly and convincingly. It is true that academic writing has a certain style of its own and that you, as a student, are beginning to learn to read and write in that style. When writing for your professors, think simplicity.
Using simple words does not indicate simple thoughts. In an academic argument paper, what makes the thesis and argument sophisticated are the connections presented in simple, clear language. Most instructors will not be pleased if your paper looks like an instant message or an email to a friend. When writing academic papers, it is often helpful to find key terms and use them within your paper as well as in your thesis. This section comments on the crucial difference between repetition and redundancy of terms and works through an example of using key terms in a thesis statement.
These two phenomena are not necessarily the same. Repetition can be a good thing. Sometimes we have to use our key terms several times within a paper, especially in topic sentences. Sometimes there is simply no substitute for the key terms, and selecting a weaker term as a synonym can do more harm than good. Repeating key terms emphasizes important points and signals to the reader that the argument is still being supported.
This kind of repetition can give your paper cohesion and is done by conscious choice. In contrast, if you find yourself frustrated, tiredly repeating the same nouns, verbs, or adjectives, or making the same point over and over, you are probably being redundant. In this case, you are swimming aimlessly around the same points because you have not decided what your argument really is or because you are truly fatigued and clarity escapes you.
Writing clear sentences is important throughout your writing. You can apply these ideas to other sentences in your papers. It is not always easy to condense several paragraphs or several pages into concise key terms that, when combined in one sentence, can effectively describe the argument. However, taking the time to find the right words offers writers a significant edge.
Concise and appropriate terms will help both the writer and the reader keep track of what the essay will show and how it will show it. Graders, in particular, like to see clearly stated thesis statements.
For more on thesis statements in general, please refer to our handout. You work on it for several days, producing three versions of your thesis:. Version 1 : There are many important river and shore scenes in Huckleberry Finn. Version 2 : The contrasting river and shore scenes in Huckleberry Finn suggest a return to nature.
On the other hand, she still does not know how this return to nature is crucial to your understanding of the novel. Finally, you come up with Version 3, which is a stronger thesis because it offers a sophisticated argument and the key terms used to make this argument are clear. At least three key terms or concepts are evident: the contrast between river and shore scenes, a return to nature, and American democratic ideals.
By itself, a key term is merely a topic—an element of the argument but not the argument itself. The argument, then, becomes clear to the reader through the way in which you combine key terms.
We consulted these works while writing this handout. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Anson, Chris M. The Longman Handbook for Writers and Readers. New York: Longman, Grossman, Ellie. New York: Hyperion, Cook, Claire Kehrwald.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, New York: Riverhead Books, Tarshis, Barry. New York: Three Rivers Press, Williams, Joseph M. Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace.
New York: Pearson, You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Make a Gift. Word Choice.
Conversely; alternatively; on. According to X; X stated that; referring to.
Writing is a series of choices. As you revise your draft, you make more choices. This handout will explain some common issues related to word choice and give you strategies for choosing the best words as you revise your drafts. For tips on making more substantial revisions, take a look at our handouts on reorganizing drafts and revising drafts.
Do you remember how exciting it was when you learned to say supercalifragilisticexpialidocious?
As a "part of speech" transition words are used to link words, phrases or sentences. They help the reader to progress from one idea expressed by the author to the next idea.
Word Choice
To be truly brilliant, an essay needs to utilise the right language. In other words, they live on the land and in the water. To put it another way, they will die without the sun. That is to say, they must breathe air. To that end, a new study has been launched that looks at elephant sounds and their possible meanings.
50 linking words to use in academic writing
Writing an essay can be a daunting task for any college student, but especially one who wants to appear as intelligent as possible when writing. In other words, have something to say! Now, it is not the time to bust out the thesaurus. Try not to use too many adverbs or words that end in -ing as these overcomplicate your writing and can contribute to overuse of the passive voice, both of which make you sound less intelligent. Short sentences are easier to read and understand. Each sentence should have one simple thought. Make your paragraphs short, too. These add nothing to your overall content, but make your sentences too wordy. Consider blocking out your essay ahead of time in order to avoid this common pitfall. Knowing what you plan to say ahead of time can help mitigate this effect.
Bookmark Page Skype: We're online. Many students believe that academic writing is wordy and convoluted, and uses a lot of jargon.
Do you want your essays to sound more professional? A well-written essay takes the reader on a clear journey of your argument.
21 Words to Use in Your Essays to Impress Your English Teacher ...
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Inflate your writing
After years of writing assignments all throughout school, you start to become repetitive when choosing what words to use in your essays. But there is a whole language out there full of words that are sure to impress your English teacher! So next time you walk into English class, keep in mind these great words to use in your essays! Definition: noun a countless or extremely great number Replaces: a lot Myriad is one of the greatest words to use in your essays! If you want to make your teacher perk up, be sure to include this word in your essay! This word is sure to impress your English teacher, so you should remember to use it in your next essay! It rolls off the tongue and makes you sound like a literary genius! Definition: adjective wrong; incorrect Replaces: wrong Erroneous is an easy word to remember because the word means what it sounds like - something containing error. Including erroneous in your essays will take your writing to the next level!
