We often take language for granted. We use it as a communication tool without thinking what might have happened happen if language hadn`t existed. Perhaps, humanity would have started texting much earlier. In fact, nowadays we`re just going back to our routes. Human ancestors used to draw cave pictures in order to express their feelings, emotions, transfer their thoughts. Don`t emoticons have an exact same function nowadays? So, the rules and even shapes of communication are changing all the time.
A modern generation prefers texting over calling and we find ourselves in an interaction vacuum sometimes because this world represents a lack of actual human interaction. Let`s take a look at the most common words and phrases that you can spot scrolling through your DMs. “Cool”, “LOL”, “See you later” and all possible equivalents of this awfully polite online language. But it`s not the point because if we started a discussion about the culture of online communication, then it would take you a couple of days to get done with this article.
Our aim here is to show how this style of verbal interaction with zero involvement of personal contact may influence your academic writing in a negative way. Just like 99% of situations in our lives, this issue can be called a double-edged sword. On the one hand, your essays and papers need to represent a style that is easy for comprehension and many writing guides advise you to write essays just like you`ll be writing a letter to your close friend. On the other hand, we need to pay extra attention to our language when it comes to the university assignments because, hello, it`s academic writing and its style is supposed to be a dozen of steps higher than your usual texting.
And the first thing that you should do to get your academic writing to that level of excellence, is to stop overusing certain words. Don`t worry, we`ve already prepared you a list. Of course, it may take some time to change your inner creative settings so you can always use alternative and more fancy word-combinations. So, before we accuse you of committing such a crime as repetitive including overused words into your essays, let`s find out more.
Many
I feel like I`m not supposed to spill this information on you because these sins sometimes also partly form my writing works, but I can promise you that at least here, I will do my best to avoid all these words. As a student, you must know such online platform as “Grammarly” which is a grammar-checking app. So, a special computer program of this website has run through 5 million student works and found the words which are being used excessively. We thought you could really use this information for achieving your academic success goals and we`re going to start with a word “many”.
No pun intended but you do use it too many times. There is nothing wrong with it and it`s fine to include it here and there when it fits the context. But there are so many alternatives that you can use! “Thesaurus” is a website that most of you must be familiar with. It`s free, so whenever you feel a need to find a relevant synonym, you can just go there. And in order to save you a couple of minutes, we`ve prepared the best substitutes for “many”. Handful, numerous, multitude or thousands (and other variations with numerals).
Best
It`s almost as common as “many” and because of such an excessive usage, “best” has lost its initial meaning. We just include this word so often that it stopped representing a feature of something that possesses exceptional qualities. Everything is “the best” nowadays no matter what it is, so in order to bring that word its initial linguistic power back, you should try using “incomparable”, “perfect”, “leading” instead. Besides, these words will make you sound smarter!
New
This word is yet another attention trigger because just like “the best”, “new” intrigues us. We have inquisitive minds, so every piece of information that can be called “brand new” will interest us. But it often happens that this word doesn`t have such a strong effect in linguistic terms as we have expected. So, when you proofread your work and come across an abundance of “new” stuff, consider changing it to “modern”, “updated” or “state-of-the-art” (this one sounds particularly fancy).
Great
Honestly, I was trying hard to avoid this little monster here and I bet, you`d want to do it too. “Great” is just so popular! Understandably, when you`re writing about a topic that you really like you can get carried away with an emotional part and just completely overdo with “greatness” of many issues in your essay. This word has a record-breaking number of synonyms and most of them will be relevant in absolutely any topic. “Thesaurus” can propose 44 variations of this word for you, so you should really stop exploiting “great”.