Writing Unified Paragraphs

Posted by qpen on September 9, 2009

Previously, we discussed Keeping an Idea Book and Writing In A Journal FreeWriting, Brainstorming, Mapping, Incubation, and Shaping and Grouping Ideas, Topic Sentences, and Fighting Writers Block. This time we will be discussing:

Writing Unified Paragraphs

A paragraph is unified when all its sentences clarify or help support the main idea. Unity is lost if a paragraph goes off the topic by including sentences unrelated to the main idea. Here is a paragraph about databases, which lacks unity because two deliberately added sentences go off the topic:

We have all used physical databases since our grammar school days. Grammar school is known today as grade school or elementary school. Our class yearbooks, the telephone book, the shoebox full of receipts documenting our deductions for the IRS-these are all databases in one form or another. You see, a database is nothing more than an assemblage of information organized to allow the retrieval of that information in certain ways. Anyone who is well organized has a better chance of succeeding in college or in the business world.

In the preceding paragraph, the second and last sentences wander away from the topic of databases. As a result, unity is lost. A reader quickly loses patience with the material that rambles and therefore fails to communicate a clear message. The paragraph that follows is more unified because all its sentences, including the ones adding interesting details, relate to the subject of databases. (This paragraph was taken from “Personal Computers” and was written by Erik Sanberg-Diment)

We have all used physical databases since our grammar school days. Our class yearbooks, the telephone book, the shoebox full of receipts documenting our deductions for the IRS-these are all databases in one form or another, for a a database is nothing more than an assemblage of information in certain ways. A telephone took, for example, assuming that you have the right one for the right city, will enable you to find the telephone number for, say, Alan Smith.

Coincidentally, it will also give you his address, provided there is only one Alan Smith listed. Where there are several Alan Smiths, you would have to know the address, or at least part of it, to find the number of the particular Alan Smith you had in mind. Even without the address, however, you would still save considerable time by the telephone database. The book might list 50,000 names, but only 12 Alan Smiths, so at the outset you could eliminate 49,988 telephone calls when trying to contact the elusive Mr. Smith

The sentence that contains the main idea of a paragraph, called the topic sentence, shapes and controls the content of the rest of the paragraph.

Some paragraphs use two sentences to present a main idea. In such cases, the topic sentence is followed by a limiting or clarifying sentence, which serves to narrow the paragraph’s focus. In the second example, the second sentence is its topic sentence, and the third sentence is its limiting sentence. The rest of the sentences support the main idea.

Professional writers do not always use topic sentences, because these writers have the skill to carry the reader along without explicit signposts. Learning writers are often advised to use topic sentences so that their writing will be clearly organized and their paragraphs will not stray away from the controlling power of each main idea.

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