Revising for Conciseness and Simplicity
The following passage is from a request for proposals published by the National Science Foundation. (Sentence numbers have been added here.) The questions below ask you to think about word choice (as discussed in “Choosing the Right Words and Phrases”).
1. This passage contains many prepositional phrases. Identify two of them. For each one, determine whether its use is justified or whether the sentence would be easier to understand if it were eliminated.
2. Part of this passage is written in the passive voice. Select one sentence in the passive voice that would be clearer in the active voice, and rewrite it in the active voice.
3. This passage contains a number of fancy words. Identify two of them. How can they be translated into plain English?