Essay Writing Tips: Unnecessary Words Not To Use In Your Paper
Student writers write essays all throughout their academic careers. While it's a common assignment, it's an effective medium that helps students learn how to eloquently express their thoughts and interpretations about a topic within the confines of the work.
The academic essay is a piece of writing that's usually completed by a student. The essay itself contains several paragraphs that contain the body of the student writer's complied thoughts and interpretations about their chosen topic. Essays can virtually cover any topic that a student chooses; in most cases, an essay is assigned to students to express their understanding of a certain subject.
Students write essays in many ways. While it's simple to start writing an essay, there are some pitfalls that students encounter during the process. Some students have a tendency, as an example, to overuse certain words within the body of their essay. Even though essays can contain any words permitted by their educational institution, some words can bog down the body of the work, making it harder for readers to understand.
Unnecessary words found in essays ~ do not use these words in your paper
Needless or unnecessary words make essays harder to read. In most cases, they hold down the rest of the essay's content, discouraging readability. Students also insert unnecessary words within an essay when they use words that sound professional, though don't do anything to further the integrity of their content. They make the content sound unprofessional instead, bringing down the quality of the content as a whole.
Omitting unnecessary words actually makes writing sound cleaner and concise. It also makes the entire essay easier to read. There's always a list of words and phrases that are unnecessary to use in an essay. According to some academic resources, those words and phrases are:
- “At the time that....” “At the time when....”
- “In the affirmative....” “In the negative....”
- “At this time....” “At present....” “At the present time....”
- “Subsequently”
- “Due to the fact that....”
- “In the process of....”
- “Presently....”
- “Previous to....” “Prior to....”
Most of the referenced words actually have substitutes that work better within the context of any type of essay. They also make an essay sound and read less awkward to both readers and listeners. Other examples of unnecessary or redundant phrases that could be shortened and retain the same meaning.
Students should avoid using the aforementioned words to craft stronger essays. Even if they do use these words during the writing process, they can always be edited out of the final version of their essay.