By Dana P Skopal, PhD
When reading, our mind is looking to understand what is going on. This ‘what’ can be ‘who’ is doing what, or covers ‘what’ is happening, such as a ‘report states the findings’. In English, the who or what is the nominal group, which is a group of words describing a head noun.
As we are using grammatical terms your eyes may start to glaze over. But understanding the role of your nouns is important. If your nouns are not clear then most likely your reader has not understood your message.
As your reader wants to know what is happening or what they need to do, that information is generally in a nominal group – the words describing the ‘who’ or ‘what’. Let’s look at a noun: information.
Step 1: with a determiner (a/ the)
the information
Step 2: describing the kind of information
the latest information
Step 3: adding more details
the latest information on the company merger
By adding the description, a writer can be specific – a great way to convey details. However, check the length of your noun groups by reviewing the length of your descriptions. Your reader wants to be able to understand the ‘what’ or topic that you are writing about. Do not hide your message in lengthy complex noun groups.
Next, by building a message with noun groups, a writer can establish a flow of information. The flow or links are principally encoded in the nominal groups, and that relates to the coherence of the message. Before you delve further and read more on coherence, perhaps first make sure that you know how to identify the ‘what’ and ‘who’ in your writing. Aim not to confuse your reader by writing long-winded nominal groups such as: the re-establishment of the vegetation cover of a site by the use of nursery grown plant stock instead of naturally germinating native plants (see Skopal & Herke, 2017, p. 145).
Further reading:
Halliday, M.A.K. (1994). An Introduction to Functional Grammar (2nd ed.). London: Edward Arnold.
Skopal, D. P. & Herke, M. (2017). Public discourse syndrome: reformulating for clarity. Text & Talk, 37 (1), 141–164, doi: 10.1515/text-2016-0041.
Copyright © Opal Affinity Pty Ltd 2018