Writing with Emphasis

The power of emphasis is paramount for any persuasive writing. Whether it be writing in a journal, blog writing, or writing for a big-time publication, emphatically diverse sentences and writing strategies make the most bland material powerful and robust. Editorials are all about emphasizing points. Emphasis wins arguments if used correctly.

As stated by the Harbrace College Handbook, a writer can stress points without being particularly wordy. Here, we will discuss some of those points.

Keep important words first or last; keep unemphatic phrases out in the cold. Add stress to sentence endings by using semicolons and hyphens. Words following such punctuations are, typically, main points of the author.

Example (Harbrace): Unemphatic: In his book, Murrow argued against capital punishment, it seemed to me.

Example (Harbrace): Emphatic: Morrow argued against capital punishment.

The first example contains far more words than needed in conjunction with a tacked-on and unnecessary attribution. The point is punched home in the second example - the reader is not bogged down in language.

The cumulative sentence and the periodic sentence stress ideas with their very construction. A cumulative sentence stresses main ideas first with lesser details following. Periodic sentences give lesser information first, leaving the stressed points for last. Both are quite effective, yet the cumulative form is far more common. Try the periodic form though, periodically, as it carries far greater emphatic power.

Example (Harbrace): Cumulative: The old Dunkard preacher and his wife came into the country is 1856, their wagon full of what they had imagined in Indiana they would need in the new land.

Example (Harbrace): Periodic: Suffering from malnutrition and neglect and who knows what mental agonies, Phillis Wheatley died.

The periodic sentence emphasizes through suspense and tease. The cumulative through directness.

Repetition is a great tool to establish patterns, a great tool for argument, a great tool of emphasis. Readers look for patterns in writing as patterns allude to overall themes and messages. Moreover, as the first sentence of this paragraph shows, arranging ideas in an ascending order of climax is also a powerful tool that stresses important points.


The writer must rely, in most cases, on the active voice as well. The active voice engages the reader, lending a sense of immediacy to the material presented. As the active voice stresses the subject or doer of the sentence, the active voice presents ideas and thoughts in a strong, direct manner. Why waste time running in circles, padding your writing with useless words, when the point may be reached in a paragraph or single sentence?

Another rule to keep in mind is the rule regarding forms of have or be. Whenever we use these verb forms the power of our sentences seems to be drained. The real action often lies in a verbal phrase or in an object or complement (Harbrace).

Example: (Harbrace): Unemphatic: Our college is always the winner of the conference.

Example: (Harbrace): Emphatic: Our college always wins the conference.

The second example showcases the real action where as the first hints at the real action. It is always better to simply state the real action instead of having readers infer the real action. The second example also gets straight to the point and in less words.

There are more examples and ways in which our writing can be more emphatic, but these aforementioned examples cover the main concepts. Sentence length and variation are other good tools used in emphatic writing.

Unemphatic sentence composition isn't always a bad thing because the use of emphatic sentence structure can become stale and boring to a reader. So mix it up. Use a variation of sentence structures to keep your writing fresh and unpredictable as much as possible - predictability can be both good and bad; it depends on the situation and overall theme of writing and audience.

Obama's First Year

When President Barack Obama took the oath of office on Jan. 20, 2009, he was a breathe of fresh air, a new swooning, oratory voice in a crowd of haggard and dated "re-election-centric" politicians. Americans, especially young Americans who were new to the game of politics, were captivated by his personality, his ambition, his truthfulness.

And then he was thrust into a political maelstrom, one that many believed he would quickly succumb to. Many voiced his lack of experience would do this, his choice of friends that, to many, seemed radical and would make Obama unpopular, or that he would break under the nit-picky microscope cast upon him by the American people. Many said he would never survive in politically polarized Washington, a place that is characterized by "insider culture" and crooked deals.

It didn't help that the second Bush Administration had completely dismantled the economy and left what the Clinton Administration had done to bolster the economy in shambles. It didn't help that Obama was left with the wreckage. It also didn't help that Obama brandished the yoke of war upon his shoulders as he stood atop the nation's capitol a year ago.

In a world where the image of president has been crafted into a celebrity instead of commander-in-chief, instead of policy-maker, instead of politician, Obama faces heat from all sides - the media in particular with its short-sighted lectures on the Obama of right now, his rights and wrongs of right this moment, not the Obama who is striving for a better America in the long run. In the modern political world we, as Americans, have to realize that partisan-ism has become the moniker of the day, it has become selfish and ego-centric, it has become synonymous with the bottom line. Modern partisan-ism has become banal and a rigor-mortis to many positive policies of the Obama Administration.

Obama has revitalized the economy. True, the economy may not be where it was before Bush wrangled it, but strides are being made and progress noticed. A new faith has been found in the stock market and Americans are beginning to buy homes again.

Obama has re-focused our military efforts on al-Qaeda and al-Qaeda's allies within Afghanistan and given a timetable for our exit from Iraq. He has made strides in foreign relations and made diplomacy a central theme throughout his presidency making it evident that future wars will be avoided unless absolutely necessary for the protection of the American or any oppressed peoples. Obama has re-extended America's hand to the world and redefined the war on terror to mean something more than simple wholesale conflict with those who hold different ideologies than us. He has provided something fresh in this aspect: we will hold discourse with our enemies not just our allies.


It is too early to judge Obama's health reform immediately. It is too early to judge if Obama has failed in foreign politics or excelled - we can only go by the positives currently given to us. It is too early to determine if Obama has completely failed in bi-partisan politics or simply encountered a road block. But we cannot place the full burden of failure, if any, truly, is to be had, on one man. And the same can be said of his aforementioned accomplishments.

It is not about one man. It is about an administration and the government as a whole.

Yes, the commander-in-chief holds much power, but Obama could not do much of what he has done without the aid of Congress. Moreover, Congress is what stands in the way of health-care reform. When the Republicans don't play ball, or Democrats if the situation permits, nothing can be accomplished.

I'll close with this quote given by President Obama in an article discussing the tribulations of the Health Care Reform bill.

"The classic example being me heading over to meet with the House Republican caucus to discuss the stimulus," the President said, "and finding out that [minority leader John] Boehner had already released a statement saying, We're going to vote against the bill before we've even had a chance to exchange ideas."

Let's give the administration a chance. Let's remember how President Obama first captivated us and promised the Administration would try to crack the mold of Wallstreet politics (Although some would say the stimulus played right into the hands of corporations looking for an easy handout, I'm waiting a while before I make that judgment). Let's take the Administration out from underneath the microscope and let it breathe a little. Let's give another year a chance, another year to see if its policies truly work, another year for bi-partisanship, another year until we truly judge it as a whole.

U.S History

A 93 year old Japanese man survived both Fat Man and Little Boy, the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.

He was a businessman working at the docks in Hiroshima the day the bomb was dropped. He suffered minor burns and was otherwise all right.

He decided to visit his family in Nagasaki the next day when the following bomb was dropped. He survived. He became a man that survived two of the most devastating attacks in history and died an old man. That is remarkable.

I also learned that the United States had, unbeknown-st to me, a sitting emperor in the 1860s by the name of Joshua Abraham Norton.