Is this sentence awkward?

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As to the materials required for making movable types of clay, Yingshan abounds in them all"clay, resin and wax. All these go to show that during the Song Dynasty, Yingshan was historically, geographically, economically and materially ready for the invention of Pi Sheng’s movable-type printing.

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Type: Question • Score: 2 • Views: 1,452 • Replies: 12

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@fansy,

Yes, it is a bit awkward

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@fansy,

they dont go to show

1 Reply

@oolongteasup,

Quote:

Yingshan was historically, geographically, economically and materially ready for the invention of Pi Sheng’s movable-type printing.

Can you paraphrase this part of the sentence?

1 Reply

@fansy,

It is possible that none of this sentence should exist. I don't know what being "historically ready" means. For that matter I don't know what being "geographically ready" means either.

I would suggest--

Yingshan was ready for the invention of Pi Sheng's movable-type printing.

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@fansy,

How about....

Quote:

Pi-Sheng invented movable-type printing in Yingshan during the Song Dynasty. At that time, Yingshan had abundant supplies of clay, resin, and wax, all of which are necessary to produce ceramic* movable type.

*I think you want to use the word "ceramic," not "clay" -- "ceramic" indicates clay in its hard, fired state, while "clay" connotes the soft, unfired state.

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ebrown wrote:

I don't know what being "historically ready" means. For that matter I don't know what being "geographically ready" means either.

Not that I want to belittle your willingness to help, but why do you post if you don't know what you are talking about?

At least I can see why Yingshan was geographically ready, but I've to gain more insight about Chinese history of this specific place as to know why it was historically ready...

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@Francis,

I am commenting on the word choice. I am "the reader". If the reader doesn't understand the phrase, then it is not a good phrase.

Please give me an example... any example... where a place was "historically ready" for anything. Can a place be "historically ready" but not ready? Can a place be "ready" but not "historically ready"?

I would guess this term would mean that "the time was right".

My assertion is that this phrase "historically ready" is awkward and ambiguous in any context.

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ebrown wrote:

If the reader doesn't understand the phrase, then it is not a good phrase.

Ebrown, I wonder sometimes what happens in your mind as to utter such obviously devoid of substance comments.

A phrase is intended to the expected audience. If the reader is not sufficiently educated for the text, he rarely can perceive its meaning.

Look this text:

Quote:

Blues orthodoxy asserts that circumstances did not permit blues music to develop until the Civil War - the War of Black Liberation - brought about the abolition and the Reconstruction.
Blues were not historically ready for invention until that point.That would only come later, after slavery was defeated and overthrown. This position or form of analysis is referred to as blues orthodoxy.

You probably mean this author doesn't know how to write?

Sure, I believe you...

1 Reply

@Francis,

Francis, the example you've offered isn't particularly well-written or well-edited.

I just took a look at the source of your example through Google books

Quote:

Encyclopedia of the African diaspora: origins, experiences, and culture

The segments I looked at read like a poorly edited undergrad thesis.

1 Reply

@ehBeth,

Ok, ehbeth, what about this one:

Quote:

He seems to think in terms of generations and hesitantly predicts that only "eighty years" after 1948 will the Palestinians be historically ready for a compromise.

or this one:

Quote:

to see how liberalism in this period distinguished between those who were historically ready for democracy (England, above all) and those who were not

1 Reply

@Francis,

The formulation seems awkward to me. I would not recommend that anyone use it.

If I found it in a student paper I was editing, I would ask the writer to clarify what they are trying to express, and then ask them to rewrite it.

I don't think it helps anyone to encourage poor writing.

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@sozobe,

this is lovely

sozobe wrote:

Quote:
Pi-Sheng invented movable-type printing in Yingshan during the Song Dynasty. At that time, Yingshan had abundant supplies of clay, resin, and wax, all of which are necessary to produce ceramic* movable type.

*I think you want to use the word "ceramic," not "clay" -- "ceramic" indicates clay in its hard, fired state, while "clay" connotes the soft, unfired state.

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Is this sentence awkward?

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