My first
goal is to get students and teachers to think differently about writing, to
change their perspective. But the perspectives I offer may not be easy to
accept, whereas some of you may see these perspectives as a given. Certainly,
there is nothing new about what I have gathered here, except for the
perspectives that evolve from how I order this information to help us
understand how we use language and how we communicate. I believe we will
understand each other as a result.
Sometimes,
thinking differently about something we think we already know promotes growth.
You may find
this book helpful in many ways, including improving your writing, or helping
others to do so. The more you understand
how you have come to use language, and what language does, the better you will
write. But if those linguists who affirm that language is thought are accurate,
then the more clearly one understands one’s language the more clearly one may
also think!
The overall
goal of this book is to get students and teachers to think—and talk—more
clearly about how they use language to communicate in writing, but also in speech.
I believe better writing, and teaching of writing, will result.
The
Elements of Writing is not a data dump of information! Instead, this book
attempts to be transformative, to change the reader’s thinking. Metaphorically,
I hope to help you shed the chains of inaccurate and dysfunctional thinking
about writing. In this respect, I hope you will challenge my concepts, and test
them in your day-to-day experiences.
Part 1
Introduction
A Series of Premises: Language
Part 2
The Psychology of Writing
Part 3
Essay Introduction
What This Book Is and Is Not
Life in the Rabbit Hole
The Big Kahuna: Part 1
The Big Kahuna: Part 2
Some Preliminary Words on Inherent Structure
I’ll See It When I Believe It
Embrace the Dream
Developing Language Self-Consciousness
Can You Draw This Dog?
A Word on Repetition
Side Trips in the Journey of Life
Miscellanea and Short Remarks