Introduction to Professional Writing
English 290
Handout 5 — Writing on the Job Documents

Due Tuesday, March 5
EXCEPT the in-class, bad news letters, which are due at the end of the period on Thursday, March 1.

 

Syllabus

Handouts

Readings in Harty: Chase, Zinsser, Siegel, U of Wisconsin, and Maggio, Forbes, Lewis, Glatthorn, Swift, Fielden & Dulek, Killingsworth, and Mathes & Stevenson.

Note: You'll be working on these documents in class over the next two weeks, so bring your diskettes and save files to your UNM account, just in case you forget your diskette.

Packet worth: 15 points

Packet Elements

Use the readings by Chase, Zinsser, Siegel, U of Wisconsin, and Maggio and our class discussion on Tuesday, February 20 for the first four tasks.

1. Compile a list of strategies for producing Plain English and for editing gobbledygook. . Please be sure you understand each item you list, and ask for clarification if you don't. It might be a good idea to give a short example of each strategy or a short explanation.

2. Revise one paragraph (or more, if need be) of the "Our Water. Our Future" handout. Your goal is to convert reader-friendly prose to thick, difficult-to-process, gobbledygook by using ten of the strategies on the list you assembled. Annotate your decisions as I did on the model I provided you, documenting just what you have done to make the passage less comprehensible. This is an in-class group project at the invention stage. But after you brainstorm together and work on the document in class with your row-mates, take it home, work on it some more, and turn in your own version. Turn in both the original passage and your revised and annotated version.

3. Edit a paragraph (at least 90 to 100 words) of unintelligible prose. Rewrite the passage, making it easily comprehensible for an audience of non-specialists. Use the examples provided below on this web page or find your own. You should reduce the number of words; just be sure to begin with 90 to 100. Begin by trying to deduce a context--an audience, a purpose, a genre--for the piece of writing you are examining, if these are not clear (if clear, say what they are). In a couple of sentences, write out your vision of this context. Turn in a) the original, b) a statement of context, and c) your revision.

4. For each item on the list of nine strategies for avoiding gender bias on pp. 90-91 (U of Wisconsin), compose two sentences--one that violates the principle and one that corrects that violation. In other words, do what the authors have done, making up your own examples.

 

For the following documents, use the advice discussed in readings by Forbes, Lewis, Glatthorn, Swift, Fielden & Dulek, Killingsworth, and Mathes & Stevenson. We'll discuss in class some of the data and strategies you'll be working with so that you'll have plenty of ideas when you begin to write.

5. Draft an email message OR a letter (you decide) to Joseph Quintero of CIRT, from me (Professor Susan Romano), addressing one of the following issues and making a specific request. (Use some of the advice about organization that Fielden & Dulet and Killingsworth offer you.) We'll discuss in class my relationship with Mr. Quintero and the pros and cons of letters and email for this particular situation

  • a solution to problems with the printing situation in ESC 109.
  • the installation of Macromedia Dreamweaver (a web development tool) and Adobe Photoshop (a graphics editor) in ESC 109 so that we can work on the ProPenCity web site in class together.

6. Draft a letter of response from the CIRT office, denying permission (the bad news letter). This letter will be done in class on Thursday, March 1, so you'll have to have at least a good draft of # 5 above in hand to respond to.

7. Package these documents (all except number 6, which I'll collect at the end of the period on March 1) and write a cover memo describing briefly at least one key decision you made while composing or revising EACH DOCUMENT.

Sample Text # 1
From Lanham exercise book

My main reason for writing this book is to reassert the methodological priority of the search for the laws of history in the science of man. There is an urgency associated with this rededication, which grows in direct proportion to the increase in the funding and planning of anthropological research and especially of the role anthropologists have been asked to assume in the planning and carrying out of international development programs. A general theory of history is required if the expansion of disposable research funds is to result in something other than the rapid growth in the amount of trivia being published in the learned journals.

Sample Text # 2
From Lanham exercise book

On the other hand, the firmness (or rigidity) of some university faculties, including my own, in resisting the awarding of credit for remedial work arises directly out of their sense of vulnerability of the standards for college level work, standards already weakened by diversity, competition, a shocking grade inflation since the mid-1960s, the powerful pressure of the market for enrollments and the call for relevance. The fact that there are differences on this matter, both of views and of practice, is the best evidence for how soft is the concept of academic standards in higher education, and consequently how vulnerable those standards are to market pressures, especially the pressure to maintain enrollment at all costs.

Sample Text # 3
from Fidelity Select Portfolios Notice of Special Meeting of Shareholders

Discussion of Proposed Modifications. Eliminating each fund's fundamental policy regarding temporary investments for defensive purposes and adopting a non-fundamental temporary, defensive investment policy will allow FMR to more clearly communicate each fund's investment strategy consistent with other Fidelity funds with similar investment disciplines. The addition of preferred stocks to each fund's non-fundamental temporary, defensive investment policy could be considered more risky than investment-grade debt instruments, which are permitted under each fund's current fundamental policy.

However, fundamental policies can be changed or eliminated only with shareholder approval, while non-fundamental policies can be changed or eliminated without shareholder approval. Changes in non-fundamental policies, however, are still subject to the supervision of the Board of Trustees. Therefore, any future changes to the fund's proposed non-fundamental temporary, defensive investment policy, while not requiring shareholder approval, would require approval of the Board. The elimination of each fund's fundamental investment policy and the adoption of comparable non-fundamental investment policies are not expected to materially affect the way each fund is managed.