Area III · Lexical Mechanics & Style
De-nominalization
Killing zombie nouns
Turn abstract nouns back into the verbs and adjectives that animate them.
Definition & mechanics
De-nominalization converts abstract nouns built from verbs and adjectives—nominalizations, or “zombie nouns”—back into the verbs and adjectives that animate them. “Perform an evaluation of” becomes “evaluate”; sentences shorten, agents reappear, and prose regains momentum.
A curiosity
Helen Sword named them “zombie nouns” because they lumber across the page, consuming the living verbs in their path. Once you see the suffixes, you cannot unsee them.
Example
BeforeThe implementation of the new policy led to a reduction in the occurrence of violations by the staff.
AfterAfter we implemented the new policy, staff violated the rules less often.
Copy-ready prompt
Copyable Prompt
Apply the concept of De-nominalization (identify abstract nouns derived from verbs or adjectives—“zombie nouns” such as “implementation,” “reduction,” “evaluation”—and convert them back into active verbs and adjectives; restore clear agents as sentence subjects) to the provided text and rewrite in place. Apply the edits directly to the file as a clean, production-ready deliverable. Output ONLY the revised document text without embedding revision notes, changelogs, or meta-commentary in the file itself—put any explanations in your chat response only.