PositionofTopicSentences
Cbapter 1 IParagraphStructure 5
3.Atopicsentenceis themostgeneralstatementintheparagraphbecause
it givesonlythemainidea.It doesnotgiveanyspecificdetails.Atopic
sentenceislikethenameofa particularcourseona restaurantmenu.
Whenyouorderfoodina restaurant,youwanttoknowmoreabout
a particularcoursethanjust"meat"or"soup"or"salad."Youwantto
knowgenerallywhatkindofsaladit is.Potatosalad?Mixedgreensalad?
Fruitsalad?However,youdonotnecessarilywanttoknowallthe
ingredients.Similarly,a readerwantstoknowgenerallywhattoexpect
ina paragraph,butheorshedoesnotwanttolearnallthedetailsinthe
firstsentence.
Followingisa generalstatementthatcouldserveasa topicsentence.
TheArabicoriginofmanyEnglishwordsisnotalwaysobvious.
Thefollowingsentence,ontheotherhand,istoospecific.It couldserveasa sup-
portingsentencebutnotasa topicsentence.
Theslangexpressionsolong(meaning"good-bye")isprobably_$.corruptionof
theArabicsalaam.
Thissentenceistoogeneral.
Englishhasbeeninfluencedbyotherlanguages.
Thetopicsentenceisusually(butnotalways)thefirstsentenceina paragraph.
Experiencedwriterssometimesputtopicsentencesinotherlocations,butthe
bestspotisusuallyrightatthebeginning.ReaderswhoareusedtotheEnglish
wayofwritingwanttoknow whattheywillreadaboutas soonas theybegin
reading.
Synonyms
Synonyms.wordsthathavethesamebasicmeaning.donotalwayshave
thesameemotionalmeaning.Forexample,thewordsstingyandfrugalboth
mean"carefulwith money."However,callingsomeonestingyisaninsult,
butcallingsomeonefrugalisa compliment.Similarly,a personwantstobe
slenderbutnotskinny,aggressivebutnotpushy.Therefore,youshouldbe
carefulinchoosingwordsbecausemanyso-calledsynonymsarenotreally
synonymousatall.
Sometimesa topic sentencecomesattheend. Inthiscase,theparagraph
oftenbeginswitha seriesofexamples.Otherparagraphsmaybeginwitha series
offacts,andthetopicsentenceattheendistheconclusionfromthesefacts.
