7 Steps to Better Writing - Charles Maxwell 2020

Subordinate less important details
Step 6 – Revise

Successful business and technical writing requires communicating a lot of facts. Doctors, lawyers, engineers, scientists, accountants, analysts, and sales people need to convey abundant, detailed information. This section shows how to provide details without overwhelming readers.

In the same way that an artist creates depth perception by painting close objects larger and in greater detail than similar objects that are farther away, good writers emphasize some details more than others. This creation of perspective holds true at the document level and continues down to the sentence level. Creating this hierarchy of sentence elements is call subordination.

Use clauses to subordinate less important facts

One method to subordinate less important facts is to place less important ideas in dependent phrases. The following conjunctions often signal subordinate clauses: after, although, as, because, before, how, if, since, so, unless, until, when, where, while, why. Pronouns that can function to create subordinate clauses include: that, what, which, who. Both conjunctions and subordinating pronouns signal sentence structure, and in this way, they guide the reader.

Here are examples of subordination.

Note the large number of prepositions in the sentences that lack subordinate clauses and the fewer number of prepositions in the rewrites that include subordination.

So, one way to recognize sentences that may need subordinate clauses is to look for prepositions.

The most common prepositions are: at, by, for, from, in, of, on, to, with. These nine words are used 90% of the time when a preposition is present. Other single-word prepositions include: aboard, about, above, across, after, against, along, alongside, amid, among, around, as, aside, astride, atop, before, behind, below, beneath, beside, besides, between, beyond, but, concerning, despite, down, during, except, excluding, failing, following, given, including, inside, into, like, minus, near, next, notwithstanding, off, onto, opposite, out, outside, over, past, per, plus, regarding, round, save, since, than, through, throughout, till, times, toward, towards, under, underneath, unlike, until, up, upon, versus, via, within, without, worth.

While most prepositions are single words, some prepositions include two or three words. Just a few examples are: according to, ahead of, because of, close to, due to, as well as, in case of, in front of. Most multi-word prepositions include one of the common short prepositions in, of, and to. You can find a longer list at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_prepositions.

Good writing does not completely eliminate prepositional phrases, but it does keep them to a modest level.

Writing that weighs all ideas equally, and which abounds with prepositions, is called catalogical writing; in other words, details are listed like entries in a catalog. On the other hand, writing that subordinates less important sentence elements is called analytical writing. In this usage, analytical implies an intricate linking of words and ideas, rather than just listing them.

Use noun adjuncts to subordinate less important facts

Another technique for subordination is to transform independent nouns into noun adjuncts. Noun adjuncts are nouns that modify other nouns. Here are examples.

Although some noun adjuncts offer word economy, this technique should not go to the extreme, such as the following.

Use adjectives to subordinate less important facts

A third approach to subordinating ideas is to change prepositional phrases into adjectives. Here are examples.

In summary, replace prepositional phrases with dependent clauses, noun adjuncts, and adjectives. This can transform flat, categorical writing into analytical text, which your readers will understand better.