Word info

E-Prime

Proper noun

Meaning

E-Prime

A modified form of English that eliminates the verb be and thus avoids the passive voice, intended to reduce the dogmatism of language and the likelihood of misunderstanding and conflict.

Source: en.wiktionary.org

Examples

Albert Ellis advocated the use of E-Prime, especially in writing, as a way to avoid muddled and blame-based thinking that distresses psychotherapy patients. Source: Internet

E-Prime tends to make the expression of higher orders of abstraction more difficult, e.g. a student is more likely to be described in E-Prime as "She attends classes at the university". Source: Internet

E-Prime and Charles Kay Ogden 's Basic English may lack compatibility because Basic English has a closed set of verbs, excluding verbs such as "become", "remain", and "equal" that E-Prime often uses to describe precise actions or states. Source: Internet

General semantics cuts the link between the two through the practice of silence on the objective levels, adopting a self-reflexive attitude, e.g., "as I see it" "it seems to me" etc., and by the use of quotation marks — without using E-Prime. Source: Internet

Korzybski observed improvement "of one full letter grade" by "students who did not generalize by using that infinitive". citation Although this took place before the invention of E-Prime, it does show the application of general semantics to psychotherapy. Source: Internet

Bourland and Johnston then edited a third book, E-Prime III: a third anthology, published in 1997. Source: Internet

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