argument

Let’s talk contractions.

First things first: If you’re working for a person or a company who insists that contractions be kept out of formal writing, don’t put them in your formal writing. This will help you avoid some problems. If the boss says no contractions, don’t use them. The funny thing is that when the boss tells you, it will probably come out as: “You can’t use contractions;” or “We don’t use contractions.” And you see the fun little issue there, right?

If you’ve been given the freedom to use contractions, or if you work for yourself and don’t have “the man” sticking false rules to you, there is no good reason not to sprinkle contractions in to even formal writing, where appropriate. Contractions can increase the readability and flow of writing. You probably don’t want to use them in every sentence, but a complete rejection of contractions leaves some sentences feeling cumbersome or unnatural. Usually you can substitute “cannot” for “can’t” without making your sentence too odd; not all contractions work like that, though. “Do not” sounds much more severe than “don’t.” And with some common contractions, the full-form of the phrase is nearly obsolete in spoken language. When was the last time you said, “Let us go to the movies tonight” instead of “Let’s go to the movies”? I’ll bet it’s been some time, unless you were trying to sound highfalutin (there’s a fun word I don’t get to use everyday).

And let me make one thing absolutely clear: if you’re writing dialogue—especially for works of fiction—please, please, PLEASE use contractions! Unless you are writing about some futuristic, purely-dystopian society where comfortably dialogue has been completely abolished, failing to use contractions will make your characters and conversations feel wooden and unnatural. We all use contractions when we speak; there’s nothing wrong with using them; and if you want your characters to read as real people, they should use contractions in conversation. Sorry about that, I’ve read a couple books where the characters spoke without contractions. You may have noticed that it bothered me a little bit.

And now for a disclaimer: I have neither performed nor read any studies on this next point, but will believe it true until proven otherwise. One of the biggest keys to persuasive writing is to get your readers to believe that your conclusion (the one you want them to reach) was their idea all along. And trust me, when they think, they probably use contractions. If you can lead your reader through to your conclusion in a way that is so natural she believes it was her own idea, you’re more likely to convince her you’re right. In doing this, it can’t hurt to write like your reader thinks; contractions and all.

That’s my two cents. And doesn’t that just read much more naturally than “That is my two cents”?

I thought so.

Last post I went on a bit of a rant regarding the death of “literally.” This post is about another word. This time, the word is “clear,” or in its other commonly-used form, “clearly.” Unlike “literally,” whose unseemly demise was brought about by our fascination with hyperbole, “clearly” has just been overused to the point that it needs to be buried. The problem with overusing “clearly” is most prevalent in legal writing; and it is from legal writing that it needs to be most swiftly excised.

Legal-writing-guru Bryan Garner includes “clearly” in a list of “weasel words.” Defining “weasel words,” he quotes Theodore Roosevelt: “One of our defects as a nation is a tendency to use what have been called weasel words. When a weasel sucks eggs it sucks the meat out of the egg and leaves it an empty shell. If you use a weasel word after another there is nothing left of the other.” Bryan Garner, Garner’s Modern American Usage 853 (3rd ed. Oxford Univ. Press 2009). Garner continues, “[s]ensitive writers are aware of how supposed intensives (e.g. very) actually have the effect of weakening a statement. Many other words merely have the effect of rendering uncertain or hollow the statements in which they appear.” Id.

In legal writing, and persuasive writing in general, “clearly” has come to mean, “I want you to see it this way.” And usually it means that what you are saying isn’t clear at all, but it is your argument. If an argument’s conclusion is, in fact, clear, you won’t need to tell your reader that it is. Judges, and readers in general, do not want you to tell them how clear your argument is. At best, it’s hubris; at worst, it’s insulting. The last thing you want to do is tell any reader, especially a judge, something like, “If you were as smart as I am, you would see how inescapable this argument is. If you don’t think it is clear, you’re obviously missing something.”

When it comes to legal argument, my philosophy has always been to write like you’re just telling the reader how it is, not like you are trying to convince them how it should be. It’s more convincing (and less insulting) to say, “The grass is green and the sky is blue,” than to say, “The grass is clearly green and the sky obviously blue.” It becomes exponentially worse when you are arguing a controversial point, where the judge may not want to agree that the law says what it says. The more you tell the judge how clear it all is, the more likely the judge will see it as anything but.

By all means, make your point, support your point, and summarize your point. But don’t tell me your point is clearly the only conclusion. If you have prepared a well-written, well-reasoned argument, everything in it should draw me to the conclusion that you want. You won’t need to tell me your point is clear. If you have to tell me how clear the conclusion is, you’re telling me that you’re point isn’t strong enough to stand on it’s own and needs you to stand behind it, constantly asking me why I can’t just see it the way you do.

And that, my friends, is clearly a bad idea.

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More than Labor Pains

Clean up your language!