Emphasis techniques¶
Position in the sentence¶
Start or end of a sentence. English tends to emphasize the first and last items in a list.
Adding adjectives¶
Adding an adjective draws attention and gives “ideas” more weight semantically.
Separate a part to it’s own phrase¶
Structurally isolating an item and giving it conceptual priority.
Repetition¶
See The writes options p. 177
Focusing modifiers¶
Restrictive (only, merely)
Additive (also, too)
Scalar, magnitude (even)
Use passive voice¶
New important information: Long passive, the by phrase should introduce and emphasize new information (in the context)
What happened: Short passive, for the object and the action (should have a good reason not to provide the identity of the doer).
By whom?: Passive voice can help to emphasize the agent:
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) inspects meat for contamination.
Meat is inspected for contamination by the FDA.
The object:
Passive allows object to serve as the Theme:
The blast was caused by a canister of benzene.
Use prepositional passive + stranding¶
English allows to turn the object of a preposition into the subject of a passive sentence:
They looked at the map (active)
The map was looked at (passive, stranding preposition)
Start with a concept word or phrase:¶
Break the grammatical rules of SVO and put a word or phrase at the beginning
Barcelona—the very word evokes images of a vibrant, tumultuous, exotic city.
Topic prominence¶
Move the topic to the front.
Information package¶
Select the best information package for the context: passive, cleft, etc. See table of focus and effect of information packages.
Dynamic verb¶
The correct dynamic verb emphasize the impact by duration and stopping point. To emphasize a process, use Activities. To emphasize a milestone use Achievements.
Class |
Example |
Focus |
|---|---|---|
Activity |
He searched for the truth. |
Labor |
Accomplishment |
He wrote the manifesto. |
Completed work |
Achievement |
He discovered the truth. |
Moment of insight |
Semelfactive |
He glanced at the clock. |
A brief, isolated act |
Start with verb¶
Sometimes you can begin with a verb, along with an adverb like only or first, or a negative like nowhere, not until, or never:
First came the governor, then her economic advisers.
Coordination¶
Make less important items subordinates
Verbal noun, a bit more formal¶
The careful selection of adjectives is essential.
Selecting adjectives carefully is essential.