Readability

[khigh]

Okay, I posted something similar elsewhere, but thought my fellow historians would know.  It's just a moment of concern for me- I learned about readability levels and ran my WS through it.  Well, I ran all of my papers from undergrad, and they all came out with a grade level of 18+ (my WS ended up being 19.4).  Is this going to be a concern? It looks like my sentences are long and complex and my words have many syllables.  

I ended up going with this particular WS because it has my own original translations taken from a document of over 700 pages of early modern Dutch, and which I translated the entire document in a semester as an undergrad.  Will this help? I just don't want my papers to be too unreadable and now I'm worried that this will hurt my chances.  I do have to say that the only fiction authors I read right now are Thomas Mann and Dostoevsky, so that may have some influence on my writing.

[gsc]

If it's a choice between a student who has interesting arguments, but hasn't presented them the most articulately, OR a student who writes beautifully, but has nothing interesting to say, I think most professors will choose the former.

You can teach writing. You can't teach originality. 

On the idea of readability metrics more generally, however, I think it's a red herring — quantifying something that can't really be quantified. Readability has much less to do with how many words are in the sentence, and much more to do with how those words are being used. Things like: does every sentence have a specific actor in it, or are you using passive voice to hide who's actually doing the acting? do you have a bunch of dangling participles? are the sentences so long that the beginning of the sentence and the end of the sentence are discussing different topics? do you have strong declarative sentences, or is every sentence burdened with participial clauses? did you use a more complicated word or phrase when a simpler one would have done better? do you have sentences or paragraphs that signpost your arguments and transitions? Etc.

Edited December 12, 2017 by gsc

[khigh]

It's not the passive voice- that's almost completely eliminated.  Here's the intro, which might make more sense, because I don't think it's difficult to read, but I have a hard time judging my own writing.  This was done for an undergrad independent study in Dutch History (politics of the Dutch Republic and historiography of the Dutch Republic).  There is a strong historiography and a good selection of primary documents. The first paragraph is the introduction and the second is at the end of the historiography to introduce the research.  The actual WS contains the historiography. I have no idea what makes it unreadable.

 

"The definition of words changes over time, evolving a certain connotation and breathing life into actions and documents, which allows one to rearrange and categorize in a way that may not have been possible even a short while ago.  Those definitions can alter the way a person views the past through documents and shape the narrative in a way that has not been done before. One does not need to limit the definition or connotation of words. The same can be done with documents.  Each document is one snapshot of a larger conversation and can take on a new meaning with each reading inside a larger album of documents.   This would include documents originally meant to constitutional or legal in nature. The Union of Utrecht and Pacification of Ghent, two such constitutional documents, can be seen not only as blueprints for a new fledgling state, but also as pieces of dialogue in the larger body of political conversation; additionally and more interestingly, the documents show not only that there is a conversation, but that the political dialogue during the formation of the early modern Dutch Republic was an important political game and identifies the players involved."

"This evolution of the rhetoric, constitution as a dialogue, can be used to show a new aspect of the governmental form of communication and persuasion.  The fledgling state government, working under the pretenses of an ongoing war and a newly formed political union, could be shown to be persuasive in their use of specific language in the constitutional documents, the Union of Utrecht and the Pacification of Ghent.  New research should show that the governing bodies of the forming Dutch Republic used their power of law-making and treaty writing to persuade their audience to come together against a common enemy in the Spanish and form a lasting union to protect their new government. Each of the two constitutional documents is a piece of conversation in itself, with the Union of Utrecht being a political response to the arguments left unresolved by the Pacification of Ghent. Both documents taken together show a conversation between the governing body and the populace."

[ashiepoo72]

Working on passive voice and overly-complicated language is good advice. I'll never forget the time I went hog wild with synonyms and one of my MA profs told me I used "belie" incorrectly. Also, cutting out unnecessary sentences/superfluous words (or combining several sentences that would be more effective as a concise single sentence). I collect verbs like other people collect baseball cards--it's always helpful to have a verb in your pocket that perfectly encapsulates the action you want to convey. I usually do this by writing down fun verbs from books I love (I know, total nerd move). Read your writing sample slowly, out loud, to a non-historian. That's how I did my final WS edit and it seriously helped.

I don't know the conventions of your subfield, but the first 5 sentences of the intro are kind of fluff imo. I would open with a sentence or two that dives right into your specific geographic and temporal subject matter, lay out the documents you're focusing on, then loop around to how examining the constitutional documents illuminates an important political dialogue (then be specific about who is participating in said dialogue and what that dialogue is/why it's important). After that I would bring back in some of what you said in the first 5 sentences, but I would encourage you to go broad-to-specific (so something like "the definitions of words change over time, evolving certain connotations and breathing life into actions and documents; the Union of Utrecht and Pacification of Ghent reveal a shifting understanding of xyz...").

In the 2nd paragraph, instead of "the forming Dutch Republic" I would say "nascent Dutch Republic" maybe. That's just a nitpicky point on my part, though.

If I'm completely off base (I am a lowly modern Americanist after all), please feel free to ignore me  

[khigh]

My undergrad advisor was also a collector of words and I usually "translated" what he said for other undergrad students- so much so that I started to think I should charge for translation services.  He hated sentences less than 5 words and abhors getting right to the point, haha. He was trained by the university I applied to, so hopefully they have the same ideas. 

I'm going to force a non-historian to listen to my WS.  My boyfriend has heard it many times, but he has a PhD in history and has the same writing style. 

[hats]

On writing clearly, reading your own words out loud is key. Some people prefer to have a text-to-speech read their paper to them. I prefer to read them to myself. Either way, it should help you hear how smoothly you've written it.

Although the "readability" metric is a fun number to play with, it doesn't mean anything for academics. First, it maxes out at a level below what's useful for us to talk about. I would guess that both Bill Cronon and Derrida would get the same score on this metric, which is a sign that it is not designed for us. It might affect how much I would be willing to assign a certain paper to 14 year olds, 18 year olds, and senior students in the major, but it doesn't capture distinctions in difficulty among professional arguments. Second, I don't think it actually measures clarity, either at the sentence or the argumentative level. If I understand it correctly, it measures how many big or obscure words you use — if you use them in their proper place, that is no detriment to a high-level argument! — and how long your sentences are. It's possible to have either clear or convoluted long sentences, and as long as you err on the side of the latter, you should be fine.

I will say that the one big "readability" thing that or a similar piece of advice has taught me is to vary sentence length, and especially to make sure to have some short sentences. As an academic, this is sometimes easy to forget! Tending to have long sentences is a sign that you're writing professionally, because many of our thoughts can't be conveyed in a five-word phrase. Having exclusively long sentences is a sign that you are not being very generous to your readers, so you should watch out for that.

[urbanhistorynerd]

I don't think your sentences over overly complex or too long. Your excerpt reads fine to me. Check out The Elements of Style and Writing History. Both helped me better formulate my writing.

[khigh]

Those were required reading for sophomore seminar. ?

[urbanhistorynerd]

13 minutes ago, khigh said:

Those were required reading for sophomore seminar. ?

That is great! For my freshman historical seminar we only had to read Benjammin's guide to history or something like that. Interesting introduction to history theory, but man, his explanation on writing history was terrible. I didn't realize my mistakes until I read those two.

[khigh]

2 minutes ago, kenalyass said:

That is great! For my freshman historical seminar we only had to read Benjammin's guide to history or something like that. Interesting introduction to history theory, but man, his explanation on writing history was terrible. I didn't realize my mistakes until I read those two.

Our introduction to historical theory was Sleuthing the Alamo, which was great.  It was a combination course to teach original research and historiography, so the prof chooses a broad topic that we would choose specific topics in.  Our semester was New Netherland, so we read quite a few books in the historiography.  It was much better than my capstone class- our topic was American West, though I did fall in love with my topic- how the West shaped baseball rules.

[urbanhistorynerd]

27 minutes ago, khigh said:

Our introduction to historical theory was Sleuthing the Alamo, which was great.  It was a combination course to teach original research and historiography, so the prof chooses a broad topic that we would choose specific topics in.  Our semester was New Netherland, so we read quite a few books in the historiography.  It was much better than my capstone class- our topic was American West, though I did fall in love with my topic- how the West shaped baseball rules.

I'll have to check that one out!

My class topic was on the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The professor was fantastic and a highly distinguished Japanese scholar. It was setup where every two weeks we look at a different historical approach to the bombings. One unit was cultural history, the other economic, and what not. We didn't learn too much historiography, which disappointed me. The class was mean't to teach original historical researching and writing.

Do you have the reading list for that capstone? The next history of the West course won't be taught until after I graduate. State school with a shrinking history department budget problems I guess.

Are you applying for programs next year in the fall? If so, lets be friends! I'm applying next year too.

[khigh]

27 minutes ago, kenalyass said:

I'll have to check that one out!

My class topic was on the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The professor was fantastic and a highly distinguished Japanese scholar. It was setup where every two weeks we look at a different historical approach to the bombings. One unit was cultural history, the other economic, and what not. We didn't learn too much historiography, which disappointed me. The class was mean't to teach original historical researching and writing.

Do you have the reading list for that capstone? The next history of the West course won't be taught until after I graduate. State school with a shrinking history department budget problems I guess.

Are you applying for programs next year in the fall? If so, lets be friends! I'm applying next year too.

I'm applying for one program for 2018- Minnesota. My department was very big on historiography and we had a few Americanists that focused on the West- one does Texas, one is Military, and one is Women in the West.  My mentor was the only Europeanist (other than a one year contract prof).  I took over 10 classes with him. My capstone class didn't have any specific books because it was like doing thesis credits. I have an extensive book list for it, but they are all about the history of baseball.

 

My sophomore class was a lot more extensive, with 6 weeks dedicated to how to write historiography and do original research and then 10 weeks of writing and rewriting our papers.  Department is small enough that we were able to have weekly one on one meetings with the prof for that class, with each of us focused on our specific topics.  Mine was the evolution of language in contractual documents establishing the colony of Rennslaerswijk (Albany). 

 

[psstein]

If you're explaining complex ideas, you're going to have a lower "readability" score. We're not writing fiction, we're writing history.

 

[khigh]

25 minutes ago, psstein said:

If you're explaining complex ideas, you're going to have a lower "readability" score. We're not writing fiction, we're writing history.

 

It was about the use of constitutional documents as pamphlets/political dialogue among the masses instead of viewing them as static pieces of law, or the writing of constitutions as persuasive documents meant for the layperson instead of the framework of a government.  I guess it is pretty complicated.

[TMP]

11 hours ago, khigh said:

the evolution of words' meanings and connotations are influencing the  way documents can be interpreted and pieced together into various narratives.  As such, legal documents are also subjected to a range of analyses, from strict to liberal interpretations. The Union of Utrecht and the Pacification of Ghent offer not only concrete structures for the fledging Dutch Republic but also mediums for dialogue among the  Dutchto define their new country.

New research show that the governing bodies of the forming Dutch Republic used their power of law-making and treaty writing to persuade their audience to come together against a common enemy in the Spanish and form a lasting union to protect their new government. Each of the two constitutional documents is a piece of conversation in itself, with the Union of Utrecht being a political response to the arguments left unresolved by the Pacification of Ghent. Both documents taken together show a conversation between the governing body and the populace."

One of my major teaching goals with my undergrads was to get them to work on their writing.  Not all appreciated it when they realized that I gave a damn (I had one who complained that his midterm exam grade was unfair: "I thought this was supposed to be a history course where we learn facts, not writing!"  The prof rebuked on my behalf  ).  I told them to write their papers, not just for me and the professor, but also for their proud grandparents (they giggled).  In my department, we are about being accessible as writers and we don't think there has been enough writing instruction at any level, college or high school.

In your case, I've re-written the first paragraph to show what "trimming the fat" means and clear, straightforward writing for history looks like (Cutting from 196 words to 69, which would give you so much more room for analysis and substential evidence down the way).  This is exactly what professors mean by being "concise"/"succinct".  

FWIW--and not to slam your adviser-- times have changed since your adviser went to that PhD program.  The PhD program and its faculty may have changed their approaches to training PhDs to make sure that their writing is marketable, not just to the academy but also to the general public.  Through me, my undergrad adviser has learned a lot what's changed and stayed the same since she finished and she really appreciated all the changes and thought they're for the better.

Of course, you should translate the documents according to the original language but, as my German professor reminded me as he worked with me, say what the original means in idiomatic English.  Don't adhere too closely to the original as in translating word-for-word.

My $.02.

[khigh]

19 minutes ago, TMP said:

One of my major teaching goals with my undergrads was to get them to work on their writing.  Not all appreciated it when they realized that I gave a damn (I had one who complained that his midterm exam grade was unfair: "I thought this was supposed to be a history course where we learn facts, not writing!"  The prof rebuked on my behalf  ).  I told them to write their papers, not just for me and the professor, but also for their proud grandparents (they giggled).  In my department, we are about being accessible as writers and we don't think there has been enough writing instruction at any level, college or high school.

In your case, I've re-written the first paragraph to show what "trimming the fat" means and clear, straightforward writing for history looks like (Cutting from 196 words to 69, which would give you so much more room for analysis and substential evidence down the way).  This is exactly what professors mean by being "concise"/"succinct".  

FWIW--and not to slam your adviser-- times have changed since your adviser went to that PhD program.  The PhD program and its faculty may have changed their approaches to training PhDs to make sure that their writing is marketable, not just to the academy but also to the general public.  Through me, my undergrad adviser has learned a lot what's changed and stayed the same since she finished and she really appreciated all the changes and thought they're for the better.

Of course, you should translate the documents according to the original language but, as my German professor reminded me as he worked with me, say what the original means in idiomatic English.  Don't adhere too closely to the original as in translating word-for-word.

My $.02.

Thank you for your help. Funny enough, the prof I put in my application to work with was one of his advisers at the U. I do use idiomatic English for a lot of my translations, but for some, the only thing that will work is a direct translation (one of my more substantial works was the evolution of the word privilege to right in contractual documents in New Netherland). It's going to take some work to be more concise. I honestly hate reading concise works- either articles or fiction; I always chose the longest books at the library growing up and based what I read off page count.  I tend towards Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Mann, and Hugo for my fun reading and would rather dig my eyes out than ever have to read Hemingway again. Give me 50 pages describing the red of a rose any day. Orwell was brilliant, but 1984 could have been a few hundred pages longer.

Maybe I need a time machine. 

[TMP]

3 hours ago, khigh said:

Thank you for your help. Funny enough, the prof I put in my application to work with was one of his advisers at the U. I do use idiomatic English for a lot of my translations, but for some, the only thing that will work is a direct translation (one of my more substantial works was the evolution of the word privilege to right in contractual documents in New Netherland). It's going to take some work to be more concise. I honestly hate reading concise works- either articles or fiction; I always chose the longest books at the library growing up and based what I read off page count.  I tend towards Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Mann, and Hugo for my fun reading and would rather dig my eyes out than ever have to read Hemingway again. Give me 50 pages describing the red of a rose any day. Orwell was brilliant, but 1984 could have been a few hundred pages longer.

Maybe I need a time machine. 

Yes but  you will need to learn to love being concise because fellowship applications, journal articles and book publishers very, very often have word limits.  A standard book review will run anywhere between 500-1000 words and somehow you have to pack the entire book within that limit. Your dissertation also *should* not be more than 300 pages of text (or roughly 100,000 words). Accepting this reality early on while do you well on the very long run.

While it is fine to read Russian novels (I'm in middle of Tolstoy's War and Peace at the moment) and let some of the author's writing influence you in terms of creativity, you need to remain aware of your limitations when you actually sit down to write whatever damn thing you have to write for your profession as a historian.

[Tigla]

I will most definitely second TMP's last two posts. I'm currently working in an archive in Germany and translations are key. Although a direct translation may make sense, the question remains does it capture the meaning of the original? Unfortunately, that is the current problem with a lot of literature in my field and I could go on for hours about it.

More important, however, is TMP's last post. Word limits are a killer in grad school and the professional world. If you want to publish anything, hitting word limits is a must. Last year (at the beginning of my program), I sent out an article for publication and was denied before editing because I was 3 words over the word limit for the CfP. This might be an outlier, but it taught me that word limits will be the bane of a historian's existence for the future. Learning how to cut fluff and 'fanciness' (as my advisor recently described it) while conveying the proper message is a tricky and difficult skill, but a necessary one. 

[khigh]

6 hours ago, TMP said:

Yes but  you will need to learn to love being concise because fellowship applications, journal articles and book publishers very, very often have word limits.  A standard book review will run anywhere between 500-1000 words and somehow you have to pack the entire book within that limit. Your dissertation also *should* not be more than 300 pages of text (or roughly 100,000 words). Accepting this reality early on while do you well on the very long run.

While it is fine to read Russian novels (I'm in middle of Tolstoy's War and Peace at the moment) and let some of the author's writing influence you in terms of creativity, you need to remain aware of your limitations when you actually sit down to write whatever damn thing you have to write for your profession as a historian.

Thank you. I'm going to look into this some more, as it seems that the dissertations coming out of the Netherlands are closer to the 500 page range.  I have the relative few coming out of the USA in the last ten years and most of them seem to hit the 500 page mark and that is what I have always been told to aim for. I may email Dr. Israel to see what's coming out of England in terms of length. I do feel, however, that a lot of the work coming out of the USA reads more like a military tactics manual than a piece of academic art. "He did this...he did that...people thought..." The seminal works in my field are long (Geyl's concise history is 1500 pages, Israel's Rise and Fall is 1243 pages, Catterall's Community is 580).

I can write concisely, but I find it to be among the most boring to read.  I have no problems with writing book reviews and grants, but why does the art of writing need to be removed from the US academic field, especially in the dissertation?

[khigh]

5 hours ago, Tigla said:

I will most definitely second TMP's last two posts. I'm currently working in an archive in Germany and translations are key. Although a direct translation may make sense, the question remains does it capture the meaning of the original? Unfortunately, that is the current problem with a lot of literature in my field and I could go on for hours about it.

More important, however, is TMP's last post. Word limits are a killer in grad school and the professional world. If you want to publish anything, hitting word limits is a must. Last year (at the beginning of my program), I sent out an article for publication and was denied before editing because I was 3 words over the word limit for the CfP. This might be an outlier, but it taught me that word limits will be the bane of a historian's existence for the future. Learning how to cut fluff and 'fanciness' (as my advisor recently described it) while conveying the proper message is a tricky and difficult skill, but a necessary one. 

 

Translating is not a problem for me- especially from Dutch to English, with capturing the meaning of the work.  My minor was in foreign languages and I have various fluency in Dutch, German, French, Italian, Frisian, and Afrikaans. I did a few independent studies and directed readings in translating and interpreting primary documents. 

Model UN helped me with being concise by putting 3 topics on one page and requiring you to accurately describe the position of the government you are "working for". I'll work on it more. The interesting difference in my department was between the Americanists and the Europeanists and how they taught writing- the Americanists believed in concise writing with no fluff (one is a military historian) and the Europeanists taught the art of writing.  We did more tactics and training type books with the Americanists and more philosophy and tomes with the Europeanists.  For German history, we read Mann and Judt and Nietzsche. Braudel and  was our influence for Mediterranean History. Sartre and Robespierre was read for French Revolution. In American military history, we read, well, I couldn't tell you because I got rid of those books. I'd have to dig out my syllabus.

[dr. t]

On 12/12/2017 at 12:07 PM, gsc said:

You can teach writing. You can't teach originality. 

I don't think I agree with this at all. In a lot of ways, it's much easier to teach originality than it is to teach writing, but I think it's particularly artificial to think of them as separate skills.

[khigh]

I'm going to look more into writing styles. I did a brief overview, but I'm going to head to the library.  It seems that many Dutch academics are trained in the French school, which may make a difference.  Then there is the "argumentative" style of the Americans versus the "musing" style of the French/British schools. My major influencers thus far have been trained in the French school, which may make all the differences. The following article peaked my curiosity.

 

https://www.erudit.org/en/journals/meta/2006-v51-n1-meta1129/012998ar/

[dr. t]

I think your sentence structure is unnecessarily complex, to the overall detriment of your argument. You also have quite a few unforced errors, particularly the absence of necessary words.

FWIW, these would be my edits for your first paragraph above:

"The d Definitions of words changes over time, evolving a certain connotations and breathing life into (changing the meanings of?) actions and documents, which allows one to rearrange and categorize in a way that may not have been possible even a short while ago.  Those definitions can alter the way a person views the past through documents and shape the narrative in a way that has not been done before (redundant). One does not need to There is no limit the definition or connotation of words, and so to. The same can be done with documents.  Each document is one snapshot of a larger conversation and can take on a new meaning with each reading inside a larger album of documents (this is unnecessarily restricting your previous argument, which is that documents change simply when the meanings of their words do - broader context is unnecessary).   This would include documents originally meant drafted to be constitutional or legal in nature. The Union of Utrecht and the Pacification of Ghent, two such constitutional documents, can be seen are (don't pull the punch - this is what you're arguing) not only as blueprints for a new fledgling state, but also as pieces of dialogue in the larger body of political conversation (I'm confused - you were talking about how documents change their meaning over time, but now you are talking about them as singular moments in time - which do you want to talk about); additionally and more interestingly,  (never tell your audience what they should find interesting - demonstrate that it is) the documents show not only that there is a conversation, but that the political dialogue during the formation of the early modern Dutch Republic was an important political game and identifies the players involved. ('interesting' is one word for the argument that a political argument inherent in a text was part of a political game, and that people were involved in that game - you might also try 'trite', 'tautological', or 'self-evident')."

[dr. t]

17 minutes ago, khigh said:

I'm going to look more into writing styles. I did a brief overview, but I'm going to head to the library.  It seems that many Dutch academics are trained in the French school, which may make a difference.  Then there is the "argumentative" style of the Americans versus the "musing" style of the French/British schools. My major influencers thus far have been trained in the French school, which may make all the differences. The following article peaked my curiosity.

If the above paragraphs are representative of your work (and I assume they are, because why else post them), then you have a lot of basics to get down before worrying about these sorts of esoteric differences. Your style isn't "musing". It's meandering, confused, and imprecise. My comments above illustrate some of the problems, but if this has passed muster with your professors, they're either not paying you too much attention or should not be tasked with teaching writing.

EDIT: This was really harsh! Wow! Clearly quals are getting to me. I stand by what I said, but please forgive the tone.

Edited December 13, 2017 by telkanuru

[khigh]

12 minutes ago, telkanuru said:

I think your sentence structure is unnecessarily complex, to the overall detriment of your argument. You also have quite a few unforced errors, particularly the absence of necessary words.

FWIW, these would be my edits for your first paragraph above:

"The d Definitions of words changes over time, evolving a certain connotations and breathing life into (changing the meanings of?) actions and documents, which allows one to rearrange and categorize in a way that may not have been possible even a short while ago.  Those definitions can alter the way a person views the past through documents and shape the narrative in a way that has not been done before (redundant). One does not need to There is no limit the definition or connotation of words, and so to. The same can be done with documents.  Each document is one snapshot of a larger conversation and can take on a new meaning with each reading inside a larger album of documents (this is unnecessarily restricting your previous argument, which is that documents change simply when the meanings of their words do - broader context is unnecessary).   This would include documents originally meant drafted to be constitutional or legal in nature. The Union of Utrecht and the Pacification of Ghent, two such constitutional documents, can be seen are (don't pull the punch - this is what you're arguing) not only as blueprints for a new fledgling state, but also as pieces of dialogue in the larger body of political conversation (I'm confused - you were talking about how documents change their meaning over time, but now you are talking about them as singular moments in time - which do you want to talk about); additionally and more interestingly,  (never tell your audience what they should find interesting - demonstrate that it is) the documents show not only that there is a conversation, but that the political dialogue during the formation of the early modern Dutch Republic was an important political game and identifies the players involved. ('interesting' is one word for the argument that a political argument inherent in a text was part of a political game, and that people were involved in that game - you might also try 'trite', 'tautological', or 'self-evident')."

Thank you!