Marcio_Osorio

"Into the trash would go volumes of political speeches [...]" -- Dr. Donald E. Simanek, Lock Haven University, on Reduced English.

In an E-Prime only environment, politicians would have to rethink their promises. The president of my country, a hardened, soft-talking politician himself, for example would have to re-educate his speeches and promises. Most of his "999" secretaries, as he calls them, would probably hem and haw over the microphone while attempting to pick up their lines.

I cannot imagine right now how else a vote-oriented speech maker would induce his or her voters to believe him or her without using the verb to be.

Karen

Easy, and well written Marcio. If they became specific in their promises, they would eliminate the 'to be' verb. Give me an example of a promise made by your esteemed president and I will present it to you in e-prime.

How is that for a score

Marcio_Osorio

K, thank you for your time and response. Often the speeches of my president come loaded with "is" of predication.

In his undeterred wish to quench people's hunger he solemnly promised that "Project Zero Hunger is going to alleviate the 'horrors' of famine" and that "everything will be taken care of to ensure healthcare, with more hospital facilities [...]" He also promised to stop endemic or rampant violence with an inaugural speech that began, "I'm going to stop violence [...]" And he may have tried to stop it, only it seems to have gotten out of hand.

I just want to make a long story short. As assertively as I can point it out, politicians have long resorted to long winded, lengthy political speeches laden with often impractical promises. In Latin America at least.

Karen

So possibly you can help your president by identifying the ways that Project Zero Hunger will alleviate the horrors of famine and as a result this action will ensure health care with more hospital facilities. He could have started his 'Stop Violence' speech with the steps he intends to take that will reduce violence altogether. The more transparent he becomes with how he intends to take action, the better his results. Look at Guilliani in New York. He made a similar speech on cleaning up the streets of NY when he represented NY, and he walked his talk. Today people feel a lot safer walking the streets of NY. I believe people need transparency for no other reason than it builds deep trust.

Marcio_Osorio

Thank you for suggesting transparency. I like former NYC mayor Giuliani's "walk the talk" policy. Of all the politicians in my country, only a minority will indeed make sound speeches while purging them of all the unnecessary bells and whistles (read "empty promises").

Yet I would like to see how a politician would make a speech without the to be crutch. This I will unfortunately never see!

Karen

Never is a long time......

Marcio_Osorio

Can't think of an EP equivalent to "Never is a long time..."

Karen

Now, I could easily give you an answer to this Marcio, but then you would have my answer and not your own. Don't give up. What do you interpret as the subject of this statement? Start from that point and build your sentence.

Marcio_Osorio

Never say never?

Karen

Try again Marcio. 'Never say never' does not mean the same thing as, 'never is a long time'. Remember the subject, 'time'. Keep at it.

Marcio_Osorio

K, I have not heard of a single politician that has delivered speeches in EP. I will die a very old man if one of them resolves to deliver it in EP.

Karen

We would not want you to die, even as a very old man, so best your politicians keep their speeches in standard English It saddens me that so few people have taken an interest in e-prime and have not joined in on conversations where they could get practice.

After all, practice is where we perfect our ability to learn.

Marcio_Osorio

Karen, thank you once again for responding. The other forum members, it seems to me, apparently have not built up enough interest to come out and play with us.

"Ask not what your forum can do for you but what you can do for your forum" and may God bless the members.

On your "After all, practice is where we perfect our ability to learn."

Practice makes perfect.

Karen

So good to hear from you Marcio, I thought everyone had abandoned ship. People want to know about e-prime, but they don't want to take out time to practice a skill that would further their employability. I have had so many participants in my training programs that have learned this skill and found out soon afterwards that their bosses promoted them to higher positions, just because their business writing skills had improved remarkably.

To learn more is to earn more........Karen

Marcio_Osorio

The more you learn, the more you earn.

I cannot think of anything to say right now. I appreciate your telling me it feels good to hear from me, however. Thank you for putting up with me and my ideas so far, anyway.

That is not politically correct. I'm still struggling behind the concept of non-aggressive language.

Marcio_Osorio

My last post on this thread predates yours by some 56 hours. (Please note that every post contains and shows the date and time in which the writer published it. The date and the time appears on top of every post, toward the left.)

I only wish my statesmen, the president of my country (Brazil) included, would make their speeches without using the verb to be. If one of them ever succeeds in doing it, then I will vote for him.

I have not voted for any of them since 1989.

Karen

Sounds like you would really enjoy taking part in the voting process. Maybe you can write a speech for your president. You never know until you try. Pass it through me so I too can help you write this speech. Lets get your vote out there..........Remember, a no vote, acts as a vote to whomever wins.

Chinmay

Karen, you thought everyone had abandoned the ship?I think Marcio and I will support you in this abandoned ship!I would like to know more about Marcio's strange desire to hear his politician's speech in e-prime.I appear as the first person to hear about something called "e-prime" in our school.People here know only abt standard english.I have enlightened them about e-prime.Some seem amazed others ignorant.Anyway, this acts like a new door to a new future?What do u say?By the way, Karen's statement"To learn is to earn more" can read "If you learn more, you will earn more".Expecting quick replies, I end my reply.

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☆¢нιηмαу☆`·.¸. The Rising ☆ of XI A5

Chinmay

Forget abt that comment I made on becoming the first to post in 2008.It appeared wrong after all!

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☆¢нιηмαу☆`·.¸. The Rising ☆ of XI A5

Marcio_Osorio

My country has a reputation for having a system around which gravitate or orbit many corrupt politicians. They lavishly use the verb to be in everything they say. write and promise. If they started using Portuguese-Prime in their promises, they'd have a hard time concocting lies.

The media also lavishly uses the verb to be in everything they advertise. If the media wrote its reports and news in PP, then we would probably never miss the details nor the truth behind carefully conducted (inter)views. (The adoption of PP in 60 minute type shows would draw more TV watchers, and PP-speaking movie actors would decidedly make films much more interesting to watch, to name a few of the advantages of PP.)

Last but not least, PP would probably eradicate illiteracy faster. Just don't ask me how right now.

@Karen, I could have drawn up a speech entirely in Port-Prime for my president, but his "999" secretaries would probably intervene and render my speech useless.

Chinmay

In Portuguese, 'to be' appears when translated as 'ser' doesn't it Marcio?
I seem fascinated by languages and I looked up "Brazilian Portuguese".I came across the basics.
Onde está?
O que é que é?

Irregular
verb infinitive/
gerund/
participle present imperfect preterite future* SER
(to be)
sendo
sido sou
é
somos
são era

era
éramos

eram fui

foi
fomos

foram serei

será
seremos

serão I also found this table!So now let's see how we can replace 'to be'.

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☆¢нιηмαу☆`·.¸. The Rising ☆ of XI A5

Karen

Marcio, tell me about 999 in e-prime language. I loved how Chinmay took out time to learn a bit about your language.

Chinmay

What did you mean, Karen?

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☆¢нιηмαу☆`·.¸. The Rising ☆ of XI A5

Karen

Tell me what you didn't understand about my comment, I loved how Chinmay took out time to learn a bit about your language.

You wrote, "I seem fascinated by languages and I looked up "Brazilian Portuguese". This means that you took time out to learn something new.......I like that trait in people.

Chinmay

"Marcio, tell me about 999 in e-prime language"
999?Clarity, please.

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☆¢нιηмαу☆`·.¸. The Rising ☆ of XI A5

Marcio_Osorio

One of these days my president quibbled about having "999" secretaries or helpers in a TV interview. Just as playfully as not, today people have a "Fish Secretary" they can go to for more fish, a "Sports Secretary" to whom they can go ... for more sports!

Marcio_Osorio

It seems to me that all romance languages in the midst of which Portuguese stands as one have their share of to be verbs. On forms of the verb to be rely most promise-making politicians and orators and most of the con men. And the media itself.

lizard

I'd love to agree, but I can't.
It all depends on what kind of eprime you write.
If you use lots of "nominalizations" (verbs and adjectives bastardized into nouns), you'll confuse people just as if you used the verb "to be". And I don't need to tell you what happens when you use a weak eprime full of "have" and "seems".

I like these examples, taken from this page:

Atrocious eprime:
"Our belief in the supremacy of our reporting objectivity results in our trust of the New York Times's claim to the exhaustiveness of its coverage adequacy".

Better eprime:
"Because we believe we have the most objective media, we trust the New York Times when it claims to report 'all the news that's fit to print' "

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-Lizard

Can eprime help us write better?

Marcio_Osorio

l, I agree with you. I will follow your advice on "seem-less" writing but dropping the "have's" whenever at all possible.

Marcio_Osorio

Clarification. President Lula meant he had (appointed) too many Secretaries, a secretary for each provision, military or non-military. He has kept these to date. Never fired any of them.

Karen

Lizard, you wrote, Better eprime:
"Because we believe we have the most objective media, we trust the New York Times when it claims to report 'all the news that's fit to print' "
Another e-prime response you could consider:
Because the majority of readers who read The New York Times rate it as as the most objective media, we the Editors stand by our word when we say, 'All news reliable and fit for print'.

lizard

Hi Karen,

Thank you for this interesting take!

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-Lizard

Can eprime help us write better?

Karen

I interpret your statement, 'interesting take' as possibly something from which you can learn. So may I ask, what difference you saw between the way I wrote my statement and the way you wrote yours?

We have a difference of opinion on your statement, 'e-prime can improve our writing or hurt it'. The hurt it part doesn't make sense to me, so can you elaborate on why you say 'hurt it'?

lizard

Hi Karen,

When I judge the quality of writing, I do so from the standpoint of readers. The NYT example you worked on shows that one can write awful e-prime that a normal reader simply cannot read without getting a headache:
Our belief in the supremacy of our reporting objectivity results in our trust of the New York Times's claim to the exhaustiveness of its coverage adequacy.

But you don't have to look that far, you'll find plenty of awful e-prime in e-prime anthologies! As the piece you read mentions, when one starts out in e-prime and tries to remove the verb "to be", one often tends to introduce 1) many weak nouns derived from verbs (as in the example above), 2) instances of the pronoun "I" and 3) instances of the verb "to have". This yields to "noun-creep", "I-creep" and "have-creep" that slow down reader comprehension instead of improving it.

To give you an example of "have-creep", many e-prime writers will translate "the flower is red" into "the flower has a red hue" (or tinge, color, etc.) This kind of phrasing slows down the reader (especially with more complex examples) and therefore hurts the writer's writing, from my standpoint.

To give you an example of "I-creep", many e-prime writers will translate "the sky was dark" into "I saw the sky as dark". Again, simply awful style as far as normal readers go. Of course, you can write much better e-prime, such as "Night had fallen" or "Clouds obscured the sky". This completes my point, that e-prime can either improve one's writing (from the reader's standpoint) or hurt it.

To judge reader comprehension, I base myself on my editing experience reading the manuscripts of others and having mine reviewed by many different readers. I also learned enormously about clear writing from the Joseph Williams book mentionned on the "Writing Tools" page linked at the top right of the article that comes up when you click on my signature. You can pick up a used copy for a few bucks and I can't recommend it enough if the topic interests you. Just as e-prime did, this book added golden arrows to my writer's quiver.

As for your question about why I called your "New York Times" translation an "interesting take", I said that because your translation makes different assumptions from mine about who the "Our" in the original refers to.

Wishing you a new year filled with joy and laughter,
and a magnificent Sunday,

Lizard

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-Lizard

Can eprime help us write better?

Karen

Thank you for taking the time to give your feedback. I didn't find a convincing argument from your side in regards to e-prime hurting our writing. However, I did read numerous opinions that you wrote to try and qualify your statements. If you had actual data to support your opinions your comments would have peaked my interest. For me, your example of the flower written in e-prime gave that flower more depth and character than simply saying the flower 'is' red. In fact I felt that the sentence flowed and allowed me a mental vision of many colors. (Thank you for that experience.)

lizard

Hello Karen,

If you want to maintain that "No one can ever turn an e-prime phrase that readers find harder (or less pleasant) to read than its be-loaded counterpart", suit yourself. I can barely hold my laughter.

Try replacing "It's two o'clock" in every Hollywood script with "My watch appears to have a reading that indicates two o'clock"---not far from how many novice e-Primers express themselves.

Or take an example from this forum, a request to translate this flowing English phrase:
"Female sex is not the weaker sex but the nobler one"

Someone suggested:
"In moral power, a woman acts far superior to man."

Now what reader would prefer this E-Prime translation to the original? It distorts the original meaning, it packs two grammar mistakes and it sounds awful.

Someone else suggested:
"In moral power, a woman far surpasses a man."

I can see how some readers might prefer this sentence to the original, though not all would.

So I repeat: E-prime can improve your writing or make it worse.

Do you still want to say that readers will never, ever find an E-Prime phrase hard on the ear compared with its English equivalent? The publishing world disagrees with you, as does 99.9 percent of the reading public. But you don't have to get a job in publishing. I shared my experience editing manuscripts and having my own writing edited. If it doesn't convince you, you may have a different sensitivity from that of the average reader.

On the side, you wrote that I'd failed to "peak your interest". Careful writers spell it "pique". Peak means something else altogether.

I understand the appeal of holding on to one simple rule for all seasons. However, I have no interest in discussing religion or psychology.

I suspect you'll want to have the last word on this thread so I will now politely retire from this discussion.

Thanks for making me laugh and sorry for hurting your feelings, if I have. I had written careful replies to your questions, and your last post made me impatient.

Wishing you a truly glorious day,

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-Lizard

Can eprime help us write better?

Karen

I can only guess that your impatience reflects a sign of your maturity. I will also guess that this imaturity of yours weaves itself throughout many areas of your life. To assume you have hurt my feelings you must also assume that I care about your personal opinions. You didn't and I don't.

As for the spelling of peak, my error, but hardly a word that any reasonable person would bring to ones attention.
You have now added the word 'never' which I did not write. You have changed the meaning of what I actually wrote. Perhaps you should just stick to editing material

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