As you may already know, the choice and use of particular words and phrases can have a serious effect on the overall quality of your writing. One particular form of this that you can easily avoid is the use of main clauses with an inanimate subject.
Basically, we’re referring to a main clause that includes no people in the statement, focusing instead on either an object or a concept. While this type of writing isn’t always wrong, it can be a particularly problematic error that leads to confusing writing.
Anytime you can have people involved in any particular statement, always make sure to include them. This is as crucial a component of clear writing, as it is to use the best grammar software available. You can see this specific technique used heavily in well-written blogs, which try to humanize topics by adding a human element even to technical subjects.
In technical, academic and formal writing, using main clauses that have inanimate subjects is usually allowed. However, only use them when actual people can’t be substituted for the subject, such as when discussing mathematical concepts or business statistics. For other forms of writing where people are involved directly, refusing to use them in your subject clutters your meaning – which is why you often see the technique done in political speeches that try to evade discussing certain matters in a clear manner.
Need samples? Take a look at these sentences and see how clearly they manage to relay their message, by simply “personalizing” the subject.
Vague: Bombings were held in the capital this morning.
Clear: Insurgents bombed the capital this morning.
Vague: Homes around the neighborhood were foreclosed.
Clear: Banks foreclosed many homes in the neighborhood.
