Is sentence in English with long subject bad?
I heard from someone that in English, sentences with a long subject are considered confusing and hard to read. Is it true?
An example for such a sentence:
...(Some statements about how mathematics is related to computer science.) Therefore, the PhD courses about conducting research in mathematics I took during my master studies are also relevant for research in computer science.
The context is a motivation letter for a PhD application.
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2 answers
Is It Bad?
This is a subjective question because there is no specific rule which will tell you if the sentence is bad. However, if you are wondering what makes a sentence more (or less) clear to a reader there may be some things that we can use as a guide.
Taking a look at your example sentence we find that there are two different messages communicated:
Therefore, the PhD courses about conducting research in mathematics I took during my master studies are also relevant for research in computer science.
- PhD courses about conducting research are relevant for research in computer science.
- You took one of these courses during your master studies
Since most readers find sentences that communicate one idea at a a time clearer and more simple to understand you may want to break that sentence into two.
Possibly Less Clear and More Misunderstanding
That also means that your example sentence may be less clear and may lead to misunderstanding and if the author is attempting to achieve clarity and understanding in the reader then this sentence is less good than breaking the sentence into two.
This post was sourced from https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/41565. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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It depends on the larger context.
I've read your example over and over and don't find it confusing. But the word "therefore" is odd. It implies that there's already a discussion immediately before this sentence about those courses. If that's the case, then it would redundant to restate the information about the courses and it would, therefore, appear cumbersome.
If you said "It turns out" instead of "therefore" the long sentence might fit better. But it would still depend on what came before the sentence.
Yes, in general you want to avoid long subjects like that but, if they're necessary, it's okay to use them. The fact that you already took the courses is quite relevant and the fact that they're PhD level courses that you took before you were a PhD student (maybe) is reasonable information. It's just all information that doesn't have to be in the same sentence with the most important part: the utility of courses from one field for another.
So it's less about specific rules and more about the overall readability of your work.
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