For various reasons, writers turn verbs into nouns in their sentences, even where verbs will function better. They are, in such situations, forcing nouns to do the work of verbs. Simple instances are when you use implementation for implement and democratization for democratize. One of the possible reasons could be complete unawareness of the implications of such a habit and style for readability and comprehension. Another reason is a deliberate sacrifice of clarity and meaning for sheer professional swagger and mystery mongering. Mystery mongering is the predilection for cloaking otherwise ordinary ideas in lexical tedium, believing you sound special and classy. When you prefer the use of noun forms to the verb forms of certain words, this is unnecessary NOMINALIZATION, which has been highlighted in an earlier edition as one of the redundancies to avoid like a plague – for good communicative use of English. As stressed in the earlier column, “nominalization can render writings ponderous, bombastic and generally uninteresting. And that is why “Shapiro discourages nominalizations and recommends that there should be at least one verb in every eight words in a well written sentence.”
Linda C. Mitchell and Georgia Saratsiotis suggest some “clues to finding nominalization.” When writing and proofreading, they advise you watch out for “verbs turned into nouns; the use of to be verbs; the use of passive voice; a missing agent.” Add to these nominalized phrases, which usually have the same effects as nominalized verbs, such as incoherence, difficulty of reading and unnecessary words or prepositional phrases. Turn all these around, using strong verbs to do the work more suitably. That technique is called DENOMINALIZATION. For example, instead of writing “The detective conducted an investigation of the crime,” write “The detective investigated the crime” (Mitchell and Saratsiotis). In the latter sentence, the verb investigate is conveying the message more effectively.
Let us talk some more on NOMINALIZED PHRASES, which we have identified as also capable of rendering sentences flabby and sloppy. Every example of circumlocution in the last edition of this column is indeed a good instance of nominalized phrases. In all the instances, strong, specific verbs are not used instead of circumlocutory phrases. Recall the following from “talking around, talking in circles”: make mention of (mention); make it possible for (enable); made a tour of (toured); made reference to (referred to); and will make to become weak (will weaken). In the same category of nominalized phrases are the following: gave a lecture (lectured); held a meeting with (met); made a declaration (declared); said in a statement (stated); performed the role of a teacher (taught); caused the devastation of (devastated); brought the deterioration of (deteriorated); carried out the conduct of (conducted); made a provision of (provided); held a discussion of (discussed); and did a repetition of (repeated).
Alongside the nominalized words and phrases highlighted in the foregoing are suggested verbs that could replace them for your statements to be more communicative and effective in certain contexts. It is thus better to say: The downpour destroyed the entire farmstead instead of: The downpour resulted in the destruction of the entire farmstead. In the corrected sentence, we have simply turned the nominalized phrase (resulted in the destruction of) into the strong verb destroyed. In that wise, the verb destroyed is doing the work more effectively than the long nominalized phrase, as substituting with the word has strengthened the sentence and lent it lucidity and fluidity. And to boot, we have saved four words thereby (Remember that when sentences get shorter and sharper, that is the typical effect, which is why brevity is a key element of good writing.)
Nominalizations and its attendant problems get more complex when they come in cascades. A cascade of nominalizations is what Mitchell and Saratsiotis describe as “consecutive nominalization” (http://www.sjsu.edu/writingcenter/docs/handouts/Nominalization.pdf accessed 06-11-2018). A good example is the sentence below:
Government’s preparation for the validation of the economic recovery strategies is nearing completion, after which it will be embarking on the democratization, decentralization and operationalization of the programme.
Quite an earful, isn’t it? It is clumsy, tedious and even difficult to read, let alone understand. It betrays “a knack for pomposity and ponderous verbiage.” Such bombast is typical social science register. Our task here is to de-nominalize the tedium to make sense of the lumbering construction. Here we go:
After validating the economic recovery strategies soon, the government will democratize, decentralize and operationalize the programme.
If you ask me, the de-nominalized sentence is cleaner, tidier, shorter and more intelligible. Most importantly, it says all that the writer must have intended to say in the original cumbersome sentence.
We find one more heavily nominalized sentence to de-nominalize, and this one is from “Pop” Errors in English: Writers Beware. It goes thus:
“The team made an assessment of allowances and benefits and comparative pay survey and a specific detailed classification of various jobs.”
As nominalizations come, “the sentence beats so much about the bush,” as “it is long on nouns and short on active verbs, and thereby rendered clumsy and uninteresting.” So, here is how the book re-constructs it:
“The team assessed allowances and benefits, compared pays and classified jobs.”
The original sentence has ONLY one verb in 21 words, violating Shapiro’s ratio 1 : 8, while the correction has three verbs in 11 words, overshooting the same law to telling effect. Such is the power of de-nominalization!
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