Zach's Ten Commandments
After several years of teaching, I've noticed that students make many of the same grammar and style mistakes in their writing assignments. Here are some of the most common ones and information on how to avoid them.
Thou shalt avoid run-on or otherwise awkward sentences. Learn more here:
Thou shalt avoid comma splices and unnecessary commas and include necessary commas, such as the Oxford comma. Learn more here:
Thou shalt recognize the difference between hyphens and dashes and use semicolons, colons, and em dashes appropriately. Learn more here:
Thou shalt use quotation marks correctly, avoid using too many quotations, and frame quotations clearly. Learn more here:
Thou shalt avoid the passive voice when the active voice would be much clearer. Learn more here: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/active-vs-passive-voice/
Thou shalt respect verb tense agreement. Learn more here:
Thou shalt maintain parallel structure. Learn more here:
Thou shalt not write in an overly informal way (but when writing philosophy, feel free to use personal pronouns to clearly state your arguments and conclusions). Learn more here:
Thou shalt use paragraph breaks strategically. No one wants to read a massive block of text!
Thou shalt not assume that your reader is familiar with the topic under discussion or expect the reader to be a "mind reader" who can uncover your unstated assumptions, premises, definitions, or background knowledge. In general, I recommend following Jim Pryor's advice (Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper):
"Pretend that your reader has not read the material you're discussing, and has not given the topic much thought in advance. This will of course not be true. But if you write as if it were true, it will force you to explain any technical terms, to illustrate strange or obscure distinctions, and to be as explicit as possible when you summarize what some other philosopher said.
In fact, you can profitably take this one step further and pretend that your reader is lazy, stupid, and mean. He's lazy in that he doesn't want to figure out what your convoluted sentences are supposed to mean, and he doesn't want to figure out what your argument is, if it's not already obvious. He's stupid, so you have to explain everything you say to him in simple, bite-sized pieces. And he's mean, so he's not going to read your paper charitably. (For example, if something you say admits of more than one interpretation, he's going to assume you meant the less plausible thing.) If you understand the material you're writing about, and if you aim your paper at such a reader, you'll probably get an A."
After several years of teaching, I've noticed that students make many of the same grammar and style mistakes in their writing assignments. Here are some of the most common ones and information on how to avoid them.
Thou shalt avoid run-on or otherwise awkward sentences. Learn more here:
Thou shalt avoid comma splices and unnecessary commas and include necessary commas, such as the Oxford comma. Learn more here:
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/comma-splice/
- https://uwc.utexas.edu/wp-content/uploads/Commas_2019.docx
- https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/09/us/dairy-drivers-oxford-comma-case-settlement-trnd/index.html
Thou shalt recognize the difference between hyphens and dashes and use semicolons, colons, and em dashes appropriately. Learn more here:
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/hyphens-and-dashes/
- https://uwc.utexas.edu/wp-content/uploads/Semicolons-Colons-and-Em-Dashes_2020.docx
Thou shalt use quotation marks correctly, avoid using too many quotations, and frame quotations clearly. Learn more here:
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/quotation-marks/
- https://uwc.utexas.edu/wp-content/uploads/Direct-Quotations_2015.docx
- https://uwc.utexas.edu/wp-content/uploads/Paraphrasing_MLA8_2018.docx
Thou shalt avoid the passive voice when the active voice would be much clearer. Learn more here: https://www.grammarly.com/blog/active-vs-passive-voice/
Thou shalt respect verb tense agreement. Learn more here:
Thou shalt maintain parallel structure. Learn more here:
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/parallelism/
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/parallel-structure-prepositions/
- https://www.grammarly.com/blog/parallelism-with-not-only-but-also/
Thou shalt not write in an overly informal way (but when writing philosophy, feel free to use personal pronouns to clearly state your arguments and conclusions). Learn more here:
Thou shalt use paragraph breaks strategically. No one wants to read a massive block of text!
Thou shalt not assume that your reader is familiar with the topic under discussion or expect the reader to be a "mind reader" who can uncover your unstated assumptions, premises, definitions, or background knowledge. In general, I recommend following Jim Pryor's advice (Guidelines on Writing a Philosophy Paper):
"Pretend that your reader has not read the material you're discussing, and has not given the topic much thought in advance. This will of course not be true. But if you write as if it were true, it will force you to explain any technical terms, to illustrate strange or obscure distinctions, and to be as explicit as possible when you summarize what some other philosopher said.
In fact, you can profitably take this one step further and pretend that your reader is lazy, stupid, and mean. He's lazy in that he doesn't want to figure out what your convoluted sentences are supposed to mean, and he doesn't want to figure out what your argument is, if it's not already obvious. He's stupid, so you have to explain everything you say to him in simple, bite-sized pieces. And he's mean, so he's not going to read your paper charitably. (For example, if something you say admits of more than one interpretation, he's going to assume you meant the less plausible thing.) If you understand the material you're writing about, and if you aim your paper at such a reader, you'll probably get an A."