Academic Writing:

How to Write Clear Sentences

When we write for university, we are often told to write “critically” or “academically.” These
words can pressure or tempt us to start writing overlong and complicated sentences, even
when the point we are trying to communicate is quite simple. In other words, when we start
trying to write “academic” essays, it is easy to forget about clear expression and start
confusing ourselves and our readers instead.

Let’s read!
This worksheet highlights some key principles for writing clear sentences. We are going to use
a chapter called “The secret of clear sentences,” taken from Julia Copus’s Brilliant Writing
Tips for Students (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), as our guide. Here’s the first
page:

The guiding principle here might be: don’t force your reader to become a detective. You can
achieve this by making the subject in each sentence clear and easy to find.

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So far, so vague. Let’s read on and pin down some examples:

Although there are exceptions where you need an introductory or qualifying phrase (like in
this sentence), the best way to make a sentence clear is to start with the main thing that
sentence is about. Any first draft will be stuffed full of overcomplicated sentences, but if we
can develop a process to step back, locate the main idea, and start from there, our sentences
will gain clarity and purpose.

As an example, let’s re-read my previous sentence. I think “overcomplicated sentences” was

the main idea there, so let’s highlight it and turn that into the subject beginning our sentence:

Overcomplicated sentences fill any first draft, but if we locate the main idea then we
can move it to the start and make the sentence clearer.

Notice how I also simplified the action (“stuffed full of” “fill”) and removed redundant
words that don’t communicate any new information about the subject. Take the phrase

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“develop a process to step back.” That felt meaningful when I wrote it, but the meaning was
lost on me when I re-read it. Or “gain clarity and purpose” – we are rarely purposeful if we’re
unclear, or vice-versa, therefore we don’t need to say both. If we repeat ourselves, by
definition we aren’t communicating anything new about the subject, so we should avoid using
two different words to say pretty much the same thing in the same sentence.

Okay, let’s turn the page:

Another way to think about this is to link your main thing (call it subject, topic, or idea if you
prefer) to the thing you want to say about it, and the quickest way to do this is to follow the
subject with a clear action in the form of a simple verb. For example:

Many candidates were placed under consideration by the selection committee’s

members.

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What’s this sentence even about? I think it’s the “selection committee.” The word “members”
is redundant (you can’t have a committee without members, so it tells me nothing I didn’t
know already). Let’s make “the selection committee” the subject beginning the sentence
then.

But what’s the action? It’s somewhere in “were placed under consideration,” but I’m having
to hunt around to find it. If we had to get it down to one word, which word would we pick? I
think it’s “consideration,” even if we need to adapt it to make it work as a verb. With a little
tinkering though, rewriting it to start with a clear subject followed by a simple main verb, we
get the following:

The selection committee considered many candidates.

Hardly the most exciting event ever recorded, but doesn’t that feel easier to follow? And
crucially, we’ve cut out half the words without losing any information – if anything, we’ve
made it possible for the reader to understand the key information without undertaking
unnecessary detective work.

Finally, the chapter summarises these principles as a four-step proofreading process:

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In summary
• Sentences should always say something about a clearly-defined subject.
• The best way to make a sentence clear is to start with the subject and follow it up with
an action that connects it to the point you want to make about your subject.

See what happens if you try to complete the following sentence starters:

o Jones (2008) argues…

o My research demonstrates…
o These statistics suggest…

You will notice that all of these sentence starters are examples of a subject-verb
pairing. Even though the examples are purely imaginary, these prompts should compel
you to finish the thought and make a point about the subject.

What next?
Thinking about proofreading strategies is the next step for you to achieve the clear writing
principles outlined in this guided reading. See our proofreading tips for some suggestions, and
try out some exercises to help you embed these principles in practice.

Further reading
Bizup, Joseph and Joseph M. Williams, Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace. 11th ed. Harlow:
Pearson, 2014. Ebook. Library Catalogue:
https://capitadiscovery.co.uk/yorksj/items/489831
Copus, Julia. Brilliant Writing Tips for Students. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.
Library Catalogue: https://capitadiscovery.co.uk/yorksj/items/77157
Osmond, Alex. Academic Writing and Grammar for Students. SAGE Study Skills. London
and California: Sage, 2013. Library Catalogue:
https://capitadiscovery.co.uk/yorksj/items/93370
“Improving Sentence Clarity.” The Online Writing Lab. Purdue University. Website:
https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/mechanics/sentence_clarity.html

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York St John University, 2020