This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. The writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It’s like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use sentences of medium length. And sometimes, when I am certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals—sounds that say listen to this, it is important.
― Gary Provost, 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing
Avoiding Stylistically Unvaried Repetitiveness
The Principle of Linguistic Economy
Linguists believe that human languages share certain universal features due to our, arguably, universal patterns of thinking and reasoning. More specifically, our use of the language is thought to be governed by common evolutionary psychological and cognitive forces, resulting in the global community of languages with a number of shared linguistic principles, of which the most prevalent is the principle of economy, or the principle of least effort. The economy principle aligns with our limited nature, namely, our physiological, psychological, and cognitive constraints.
In simple terms, the economy principle expresses the rational, logical drive in us to avoid repeating the same thing in the immediate context because we sense that it is unequivocally wasteful. Inherent in our discomfort with repetitiveness lie deeper psychological mechanisms, including the so-called avoidance, or fear, of the identical or of the repeated—the phenomenon that linguists have labelled the principle of horror aequi. The principle has a wider application referring to the evolutionary pressures for less of the same. Although the principle of horror aequi applies to most instances of bad repetitiveness, which are deemed stylistic usage errors, one particular case of repetition constitutes a grammatical error, known as the repeated name penalty.
Wanting to avoid repetitions is a powerful motivator, and language users have developed a number of techniques to minimize repetitiveness and eliminate redundancies, including paraphrasing and lexical replacement by using synonyms or near-synonyms instead of repeating a given word in the immediate context (synonymy), omission of shared/repeated or inferable constituents (including in balanced parallel or contrasted constructions) (ellipsis), omission and delaying of shared/repeated suffixes or clitics (suspended affixation), pronominal substitution and/or pronominal omission (pro-dropping).
As a feature of style, that is, of good style, repetition of the same word within a single sentence or in the immediate context is considered infelicitous in both English and Turkish—unless the repeated word is part of the parallel structures within the sentence. The repeated words are thus signalers of linguistic parallelism, another seemingly universal feature of human languages.
The Principle of Linguistic Parallelism & Repetitiveness in Parallelism
The harmony between thought and reality is to be found in the grammar of the language.
― Ludwig Wittgenstein
We tend to express similar or identical ideas by using similar or identical grammatical forms. In grammar, such forms are referred to as parallel. In mirroring the construction’s content through its form and in matching the form and its meaning, lies the essence of linguistic parallelism.
Parallelism is normally associated with coordination, in which case coordinated parallel items are identical not only in their grammatical forms (e.g., nouns/noun phrases, adjectives/adjective phrases, verbs/verb phrases, adverb/adverb phrases, or as independent or dependent clauses, etc.) but also in their syntactical functions (e.g., subjects, objects, complements, predicates, determiners, or attributive/adverbial modifiers). When it comes to optional attributive or adverbial modifiers, to be deemed parallel they should also belong to the same semantic category (e.g., modifying qualifying nouns, temporal adverbials, or conditional dependent adverbial clauses).
The examples of equal parallel grammatical forms include serial items, such as lists, enumerations, compound independent clauses, a pair of balanced or contrasted (antithetical) clauses, etc. In addition to the lexicalized grammatical markers of parallelism (e.g., coordinating or correlated conjunctions, other quasi-coordinating connectives), equal parallel items can also be signaled by repeated lexical and/or function words (conjunctions, prepositions, articles, etc.), as demonstrated by the examples below, with the parallel items shown double bracketed [[…]], the shared items shown single bracketed […], and any shared elided items shown in grey ink […]):
You can come with us or take a taxi later.
[You can] [[come with us]] or [you can] [[take a taxi later]].
I rather sensed than saw them.
[I] rather [[sensed]] [them] than [I] [[saw]] [them].
As the examples above show, any case of coordination involves omission (ellipsis) of repeated/shared constituents without affecting the meaning of the sentence overall, because the omitted constituents can be inferred from the structure of the sentence thanks to the logic of parallelism.
In Turkish, parallel items can be signaled lexically, syntactically, and morphologically (through repeated suffixes or clitics):
Sıcaktan ve üzerindeki ağır elbiselerden terliyordu.
He was sweating from the heat and the thick clothes he was wearing.
Orhan Pamuk, Cevdet Bey ve Oğulları
[[Sıcaktan]] [terliyordu] ve [[üzerindeki ağır elbiselerden]] [terliyordu].
Bunlar, özel isimse büyük, cins isimse küçük harfle yazılır.
If these are proper names, they should be capitalized. If, however, they are common names, they should be written lowercased.
[Bunlar], [[özel isimse]] [[büyük]] [harfle yazılır], [bunlar] [[cins isimse]] [[küçük]] [harfle yazılır].
Büyük olsun küçük olsun, evlerin sorunları bitmiyor.
Big or small, houses always have problems.
[[Büyük]] olsun [evlerin sorunları bitmiyor] [[küçük]] olsun, [evlerin sorunları bitmiyor].
A special kind of parallelism can also be observed in equivalent (not equal) forms, namely, in apposition. Specifically, in some specifying appositive structures where the appositive supplemental part may contain the same word(s) as the main clause (to revise/restate the related anchor in the main clause or to emphatically emphasize something). Appositive parallelism is thus also signaled by the repeated word(s) (and by the enclosing punctuation), as demonstrated by the example below, where the repeated the need leads the reader to the delayed omitted part, for speed:
I feel the need—the need for speed!
I feel the need—[I feel] the need for speed!
From the film Top Gun
Here, the expression bir müddet is emphasized through its repetition and further elaborated by the added new detail kısa in the appositive construction:
Bir müddet, kısa bir müddet, o kadın beni her zamanki âciz, miskin halimden kurtarmış.
[Bir müddet], kısa [bir müddet], o kadın beni her zamanki âciz, miskin halimden kurtarmış.
For a brief while, a woman had pulled me out of listless lethargy.
S. Ali, Kürk Mantolu Madonna
A few unequal (correlative-comparative) parallel forms (which are actually reduced adverbials forms) can also be signaled morphologically as well as lexically, with the two balanced parts of the sentences being parallel to each other:
The harder they worked, the hungrier they became.
[As they worked harder, so they became hungrier.]
Ne kadar [[çok çalışırlar]]sa, o kadar [[aç kalıyorlar]]dı.
No work, no pay.
[If there is no work, then there is no pay.]
[[İş]] [yok]sa, [[maaş]] da [yok].
In another Turkish example, the parallelism of the correlative construction ne ... ne ... allows for the shared verb bilinir to be elided:
Peşinden gelen bekçiye; “Artık üstüne gitme o çocuğun,” dedi bu yüzden. “Deli milletine katıldı o; ne ne yapacağı bilinir, ne ne söyleyeceği…”
“Don’t be too hard on the boy,” he said to the watchman, who had followed him in. “He’s lost his mind. He has no idea what he’s saying…”
Hasan Ali Toptaş, Gölgesizler
“Deli milletine katıldı o; [ne [[ne yapacağı]] bilinir], [ne [[ne söyleyeceği]] [bilinir]].”
What is interesting, however, is that the parallel elements contain the repeated ne, used in different functions: as a lexical word meaning “what” and as a non-lexical correlative conjunction in the correlative formula ne ... ne ... Such successive uses should be confusing, yet they do not seem so. The reason may have to do with the fact that the repeated nes in the parallel pairs have different functions and, because of that, we can keep better track of the dependency links within the sentence.
The matter of grammatical and syntactical repetitiveness is especially pronounced in Turkish, where the grammatically parallel forms in coordination do not only syntactically harmonize but also phonetically rhyme! To prevent morphological repetitiveness, Turkish can postponed the shared suffixes or clitics until the last coordinated item in the process called suspended affixation.
Suspended Affixation for Repeated Suffixes and Clitics
In the agglutinative Turkish, some function words take the form of a suffix “glued” to the related lexical word. Thus, any coordinated items (serial, or parallel, items) share their [suffixes + person/number markers], which Turkish allows to be temporarily omitted and postponed until the last item in the series in an economy process called suspended affixation (or group inflection/phrasal marking), as demonstrated in the example below:
Tebrik[lerimi] ve teşekkürlerimi sunarım.
I offer my congratulations and thanks.
Suspended affixation is an extension of the general economy strategy of ellipsis in parallelism, which allows for any repeated/shared constituents in coordination, including clitics and suffixes, to be temporarily elided (omitted) and postponed (delayed) until the last item in the series. Linguists say that the last item's [suffix + person/number marker] has scope (effect of governing) over all other coordinated items. In Turkish, coordination is more often asyndetic (conjunction-less); therefore, very often the only marker that signals coordination is a comma.
For example, in Pamuk's sentence below, the shared [conditional suffix + person marker] -sak of the coordinated subordinate verbs yürüyor, duruyor, bakıyormuş, and yapıyor is elided and delayed until the last verb, yapıyor:
“Eğer,” dedim, “sanki sokakta yürüyor[sak], duruyor[sak], gevezelik edip dünyaya bakıyormuş[sak], o an sokağın içinden yapıyorsak resmimizi, Frenk üstatlarının resmi gibi, sokaklarda en çok görülen şeyi, gölgeyi de resmimizin içine sokmayı öğrenmeliyiz.”
“If,” I said, “we intend to make our paintings from the perspective of pedestrians exchanging pleasantries and regarding their world; that is, if we intend to illustrate from the street, we ought to learn how to account for—as the Franks do—what is, in fact, most prevalent there: shadows.”
Orhan Pamuk, Benim Adım Kırmızı
👉 Note that constituents that have identical suffixes and are separated by a comma do not always constitute a series (or a pair) of items, as the sentence above demonstrates. The constituents sokaklarda en çok görülen şeyi (something that is seen from the streets the most) and gölgeyi de (the shadow, too) are not coordinated items. Despite their parallel grammatical forms, they are not semantically equal (which is a requirement in coordination). Instead, they are semantically equivalent, meaning that one can be replaced with the other without affecting the meaning of the sentence. This is the definition of apposition, with şey being the anchor within the main clause which links the supplemental appositive gölge to the main clause.
In the next example, the delayed constituent is the shared postposition için:
Ben öğretmen olduğum [için], birçok çocuğu bir arada gördüğüm için, baba ocağı içinde alınan sıkı bir terbiyenin değerini, belki başkalarından biraz da çok bilirim.
Since I am a teacher and I have observed many children together, I know perhaps a little more than others the value of a strict upbringing at one’s family home.
M.Ş. Esendal, Ev Ona Yakıştı
Suspended affixation can also be applied to different subjects, as the sentence below demonstrates:
Haydar Bey’in karısının rengi uçmuş[tu], elleri titriyor[tu], kızı baygınlıklar geçiriyordu.
Haydar Bey's wife was pale, her hands were shaking, and his daughter was fainting.
M.Ş. Esendal, Ev Ona Yakıştı
Repetitive Grammatical Forms in Non-Parallelism
In Turkish, words that are identical in their grammatical forms are often juxtaposed next to each without any connective placed between them, namely, in lexicalized binôminals, or reduplications, which are very common in Turkish. Otherwise, such words constitute a series and should be marked with a comma setting them apart. There are instances, however, when successive words are identical in their grammatical form but are neither serial items nor lexicalized binôminals, as shown below. To make sure these are not mistaken for serial or reduplicated items, a semicolon is placed between them:
Seni; işini elinden almakla tehdit ediyor.
She is threatening you that she will take away your job.
In English, however, we rarely encounter the juxtaposition of two words that are identical in their grammatical form without any connective placed between them. This can happen only if such words have different syntactical functions in the sentence or if they belong to different clauses. For example, the English word to can function as a preposition (I came to the school), adverb (I left to walk), and an infinitive-marker (I want to sleep). For example, two verbs are rarely juxtaposed in English without some modifications to one of the verbs. In most cases, either the infinitival to is placed between the two verbs (verb + infinitive), or the second verb acquires the suffix -ing (verb + gerund):
They want to come over.
They avoid coming over.
Other verb combinations have either prepositions intervening (verb + to + gerund) or an indirect object eliding to in between the verbs (verb + bare infinitive):
We are not admitting to doing anything wrong.
They often come to help us clean.
The one instance of two verbs placed next to each other without any change is when we want to intensify the meaning of the verb with do:
I do believe. [= I really believe.]
So, to avoid repeating to, English allows for to to be omitted (elided), or replaced with something else in the following common expressions:
We were asked to try to help them.
We were asked to try and help them.
In a rare case, the repetitive use of the same suffix in successive words, such as -ing or -ed, may also be problematic unless these are two successive verbs that belong to different clauses or two words of different syntactical categories. For example, an -ing participle may be used as a dependent simultaneous temporal clause, an object gerund, or a modifying adjective. An -ed participle may also be used as a modifying adjective:
He was cautiously walking rubbing his eyes.
main clause dependent clause
He has been enjoying studying art.
main clause gerund (object)
They have been studying fascinating artifacts.
verb modifying adjective
We have collected stained glass panels.
verb modifying adjective
As I have explained, in parallel constructions, repetitiveness of either lexical words, non-lexical words, or morphological elements is to be expected. The repeated elements indicate constructions that are identical in their grammatical forms and their syntactical functions. On the other hand, in both English and Turkish, there may also be instances of repeated elements that are not part of the grammatically identical forms and whose functions are different.
Consider the following sentence, for instance:
Gereksiz yere tüketilen nakit kadar, yeteri kadar kullanılmayan nakit de işletmelerin faaliyetlerinin başarısızlığı üzerinde aynı etkiye neden olmaktadır.
(lit., Cash that is not used sufficiently also has the same effect on the failure of business operations as cash consumed unnecessarily.)
Genel Muhasebe I (Anadolu University), ed. Kerim Banar and Vedat Ekergil
In the sentence, two noun phrases, gereksiz yere tüketilen nakit and yeteri kadar kullanılmayan nakit, are compared using the lexicalized structure ... kadar ... . What’s more, these phrases are parallel contrasted phrases, signaled by the repeated word nakit—but not by the repeated kadars, which are part of the non-parallel phrases gereksiz yere tüketilen nakit kadar and yeteri kadar. And this is what makes the sentence confusing.
The first kadar is part of the comparison structure and cannot be rephrased. However, the adverbial yeteri kadar can be rephrased as yeterince, for instance. Note that X and Y are parallel contrasted phrases, meant to underline the paradox that underspending money is as bad for business as overspending it. Therefore, to accentuate the contrasting parallelism, we can also amend the adverbial gereksiz yere of the other phrase as gereksizce:
Revised (provisional):
Gereksizce tüketilen nakit kadar, yeterince kullanılmayan nakit de işletmelerin faaliyetlerinin başarısızlığı üzerinde aynı etkiye neden olmaktadır.
(lit., Insufficiently used cash also has the same effect on the failure of the operations of the businesses as unnecessarily consumed cash.)
The revised sentence is grammatical, but, as it often happens in technical or academic Turkish writing, logically it completely crumbles upon close inspection. Read the detailed breakdown of the logical issues in this sentence in my other post on logical fallacies in Turkish writing.
Repeated Words in Non-Parallelism
While certain lexical repetitiveness can be improved by a synonym substitution (unless the context is technical, in which case the terminological consistency takes priority over the style), non-lexical repetitiveness in non-parallel is more nuanced. For one, function words do not generally have synonyms or substitutes (save for that and who(m) in relative clauses), and the only way to avoid repetitiveness of function words may be by paraphrasing. Secondly, save for personal and possessive pronouns (which are function words used to avoid repeating the same names or specifiers, whose referentiality is context-based), function words are non-referential, unlike lexical words expressed as proper names with unique referents.
In English, the same non-lexical word can be used in the same sentence multiple times because in most cases, the words are used in different syntactical functions or they belong to different clauses. When the same word is used successively, however, it may cause confusion. For example, in the examples below, the repeated is (copula) belongs to different clauses, and the repeated in is part of a phrase verb and of an adverbial:
What my point is is that you are wrong.
She finally came in in a huff.
To minimize confusion, a comma may be inserted between the repeated function words, even if it may be stylistically extraneous or grammatically incorrect:
What my point is, is that you are wrong.
She finally came in, in a huff.
In another sentence, the successively repeated pronouns (you) belong to different clauses. To make the sentence easier to read, the implicit that can be made explicit:
There’s nothing worse than people telling you you look tired
[There’s nothing worse than people telling you that you look tired.]
Helen Fielding, Bridget Jones' Diary
Some words can be both lexical and functional, so the incidence of their use is higher. One of the multi-tasking function words is that, which is a noun (Give me that), a demonstrative pronoun (Give me that book), an adverb (I like it that much), a complementizer (She said that …), and a relative pronoun (The book that I bought…). Again, to avoid repeating that in the same sentence, English speakers can omit it in the informal context (or replace it with who(m) or which, when appropriate).
Ellipsis of the inferable complementizing that in the informal register:
I think that that’s a good idea.
I think that’s a good idea.
Replacement of the relativizing that with very formal whom or less formal who:
That doctor that I spoke to has agreed to operate.
That doctor to whom I spoke has agreed to operate.
That doctor who I spoke to has agreed to operate.
Ellipsis of the inferable relativizing that in informal register:
That doctor I spoke to has agreed to operate.
In a Turkish example, the repetition of the word vakit (time) in the sentence below is acceptable because it is used in different functions: as part of the discourse connective o vakit (then) and as a lexical word in the phrase vakit kalmamak (no time left):
Ailenin misafirliğe gittiği gecelere gelince, o vakit de yine bitip tükenmez hazırlıklar sebebiyle akşam yemeklerine vakit kalmazdı.
As for the nights when the family went to visit, then, too, there would be no time for dinner because of the endless preparations.
Reşat Nuri Güntekin, Yaprak Dökümü
To reiterate, in both English and Turkish, the acceptable repetition can occur in non-parallel constructions as long as the repeated words either have different functions or belong to different clauses. If the repeated words in non-parallel phrases or clauses have the same function or belong to the same clause, the sentence may be stylistically faulty, falling within the purview of another linguistic principle—the principle of horror aequi, or the principle of the identical.
The Principle of Horror Aequi: the Fear of Repetition
As reasonable, economical agents, we want to get across as much and as quickly with as little effort as possible. Rooted in the full cognizance of our limitations, this prudent modus operandi reveals our sensible self, working to save our limited physical and cognitive resources.
For one, we are physiologically constrained by the limited capacity of our lungs and the need to breathe to be able to speak. Secondly, due to our cognitive limitations, we have to rely on our short-term memory when we process any kind of information, including sentences.
Processing a sentence involves realizing of all the underlying dependent relations (the dependency links) and other connections that constitute the sentence, almost at the same time, which is easier to do when the linked constituents are different enough to keep them apart. (That is unless the links processed are coordinated or parallel, in which case they must have identical and repeated markers signaling coordination or parallelism.) Comparing to the earlier constituents, the most recently used constituents become more prominent in our memory, which makes them immediately accessible when we connect constituents inside the sentence to understand it. Therefore, if some links have identical constituents, we have to make an extra effort to note and keep in mind that these constituents mean different things in their links.
How does the principle of horror aequi work in practice, let's say, in English? Here is an example of a very complex English sentence with two subordinate relative clauses. English sentences are almost never this complex, as this one happens to be both a garden-path sentence, which may be temporarily confusing to readers and require rereading, and a self-embedded one, with one of the relative clauses embedded within the other one thus breaking it in the middle. For most readers, the sentence would be impossible to understand at the first reading:
Our colleague the Governor we voted for appointed as his deputy won the election.
It can be immediately improved by recovering the missing subordinating connectives of the two relative clauses. Nevertheless, the sentence is still difficult to read:
Our colleague that the Governor that we voted for appointed as his deputy won the election.
So, according to the principle of horror aequi, the complexity of the sentence is exacerbated by the fact that the markers signaling the relative clauses are identical: that and that. So, as the principle suggests, we can improve the readability of the sentence by replacing one of the pronouns that with the equivalent, and dissimilar, whom. The sentence suddenly becomes much easier to process:
Our colleague whom the Governor that we voted for appointed as his deputy won the election.
[Our colleague [whom the Governor [that we voted for] appointed as his deputy] won the election].
Again, English sentences are never this complicated. Although self-embedding, or center-embedding, is technically easy to achieve, it’s too complex for us to process (parse) due to the limitedness of our memory, which is unable to hold several unintegrated links at once.
On the other hand, should we add another level using that but in a different function, to signal a complement clause, the complexity of the sentence will not increase:
We were told that our colleague whom the Governor that we voted for appointed as his deputy won the election.
In other words, it is acceptable to repeat markers with clauses that function differently because they participate in different dependency links and do not affect our ability to understand the sentence. However, if the repeated element is a proper name, we can run into trouble if we repeat it in the same sentence.
Repeated Name Penalty: Ungrammatical Repetition
Now, let’s consider a variation of the principle horror aequi applied in practice, namely, in the pragmatic avoidance of repeating the name in the same sentence because it causes confusion. Repetition of the name within the same sentence is not simply stylistically infelicitous: it’s a grammar and usage error, known in linguistics as the repeated name penalty.
Consider the references to a person (or persons) in the sentences below, which vary in their structures (with the asterisk * marking the ungrammatical sentences).
1. In these compound sentences, the same person is grammatically the shared subject of two compound clauses (with the dropped constituent marked with Ø):
*Mehmet kapımızı tamir etti ve Mehmet mutfağımızı boyadı.
*Mehmet repaired our door, and Mehmet painted our kitchen.
Mehmet kapımızı tamir etti ve Ø mutfağımızı boyadı.
Mehmet repaired our door, and he painted our kitchen.
Mehmet repaired our door and Ø painted our kitchen.
2. In these complex sentences, the same person is grammatically the shared subject of the independent (main) clause and the dependent (subordinate) clause:
*Mehmet kapımızı tamir ettikten sonra, Mehmet mutfağımızı boyadı.
*After Mehmet repaired our door, Mehmet painted our kitchen.
Mehmet kapımızı tamir ettikten sonra, Ø mutfağımızı boyadı.
After he repaired our door, Mehmet painted our kitchen.
After Mehmet repaired our door, he painted our kitchen.
3. In these simple sentences, the same person is grammatically the subject and the possessor:
*Mehmet Mehmet’in kapısın tamir etmedi.
*Mehmet repaired Mehmet's door.
Mehmet kapısını tamir etmedi.
Mehmet repaired his door.
You can immediately notice that something is off with the sentences marked with the asterisk*, which conspicuously have the same name repeated within the sentence. They are, indeed, ungrammatical. Yet the equivalent sentences, in which the repeated name is either replaced with a corresponding pronoun or dropped (in English) or just dropped (in Turkish), are perfectly grammatical.
🚩In other words, the repetition of the proper name either provides more information than necessary, thus creating redundancy or creates ambiguity, potentially implying that there is more than one Mehmet in the picture. As studies in linguistics have shown, incorrectly repeated names in sentences are penalized by causing confusion, ambiguity, and delayed response in reading. Hence, the name the repeated name penalty.
The sure way to avoid repeating the same referent is to replace the name with a corresponding pronoun:
┌────────────────────────────────┐
Hâdiseden sonra Ekrem’i her görüşümde onun sözünü hatırlamış[tım] ve [genç adama] acımıştım.
Whenever I saw Ekrem after that, I would remember what Nevzat had said, and I could not help but pity the young man.
Ahmed Hamdi Tanpınar, Saatleri Ayarlama Enstitüsü
Pronominal Replacement or Pronominal Omission (Pro-Drop)
The repeated name is that of the most frequently repeated constituent in any narrative—the subject. Pragmatically, the subject (and the topic) is the main reference point around which any coherent story pivots around. To refer to the same character(s) without having to use the name every time the character is mentioned, the languages have developed an efficient referent-tracking technique—namely, pronominal substitution in English or pronominal omission (pro-dropping) in Turkish—to help readers and listeners keep track of the recurrent characters.
Used as recurring reference points, English personal and possessive pronouns are essential in maintaining coherence and consistency in any narrative. While English repeated subjects (possessors and objects) are grammatically required to be replaced with their corresponding pronouns, Turkish repeated subjects or possessors can be omitted altogether when they can be inferred from the grammatical structure of the predicate or from the context.
Replacing proper names with personal pronouns or omitting such personal pronouns altogether is an efficient way to refer to prominent referents in a narrative—that is, to persons or things previously mentioned as subjects (topics). This allows speakers and writers to avoid excessive and faulty repetitions.
Synonymic Replacement (Synonymy)
In both English and Turkish, the one way to avoid repeating the same referent is to replace it with a synonym at the second mention of the constituent, as Sabahattin Ali illustrates below:
Nihat sözlerini bitirip ayağa kalkınca Ömer’in yerinden kımıldamadığını gördü. Elini onun omzuna dokundurdu; Ömer biraz irkildi, fakat vaziyetini bozmadı. Öteki, acaba uyudu mu diye bakmak için biraz eğilince arkadaşının, gözlerini mukabil taraftaki kanepelerden birine dikerek, fevkalade meraklı bir şey seyreder gibi etrafla alakasını kesmiş olduğunu gördü.
When Nihat stopped speaking and stood up, he saw that Ömer had not moved from his place. He touched Ömer’s shoulder. It startled Ömer, but he did not move. When the Nihat leaned over him to see whether he was asleep, Nihat saw that his friend had turned away, staring at a sofa across, as if he were seeing something very curious.
Sabahattin Ali, İçimizdeki Şeytan
The two main characters, Nihat and Ömer, are identified in the first sentence, of whom Nihat is established as the subject-topic of the discourse. Therefore, in the second sentence, the explicit reference to Nihat can be safely omitted, as opposed to the non-subject Ömer. In the third sentence, the name reference to Nihat is replaced by the word öteki (the other one), while Ömer is described as arkadaş (the friend).
Stylistic Repetitiveness in Reference Textbooks, Academic and Technical Materials
bu isimler arasında … isimleri anabiliriz ⟶ burada isimleri anabiliriz
Bu isimler arasında Müfide Ferit, Güzide Sabri, Kerime Nadir, Muazzez Tahsin Berkant gibi isimleri anabiliriz.
Among these names, we can mention such names as Müfide Ferit, Güzide Sabri, Kerime Nadir, Muazzez Tahsin Berkant.
Yazılı Anlatım Türleri ve Uygulamaları I: Düşünce Yazıları
Revised:
Burada Müfide Ferit, Güzide Sabri, Kerime Nadir, Muazzez Tahsin Berkant gibi isimleri anabiliriz.
Here, we can mention such names as Müfide Ferit, Güzide Sabri, Kerime Nadir, Muazzez Tahsin Berkant.
denen ... demektir ⟶ ... demektir
Haptetmek denen şey budur ki bir kimsenin ağzına sözünü ot gibi tıkamak demektir.
Revised:
“Hapetmek”, bir kimsenin ağzına sözünü ot gibi tıkamak demektir.
Haptetmek means to put a word in someone's mouth like weed.
In this sentence, we have a misplaced modifier, her türlü (any kind), and the unfortunate pleonastic expression sorumluluğundan sorumlu olmak (to be liable for liability):
… sorumluluğundan … sorumlu olmak ⟶ sorumlulukları üstlenmek
Firma, çalıştıracağı tüm personelinin SGK, Bölge Çalışma Teşkilatı ve yetkili kamu ve yerel kuruluşlarla olan ilişkilerinden, hukuki, cezai ve mali her türlü sorumluluğundan sorumlu olacaktır.
Revised:
Firma, çalıştıracağı tüm personelinin, SGK, Bölge Çalışma Teşkilatı ve yetkili kamu ve yerel kuruluşlarla olan ilişkilerinde her türlü hukuki, cezai ve mali sorumluluklarını üstlenir.
The company shall assume any legal, penal, and financial obligations of all its personnel to be employed by the Social Security Institution, the Regional Labor Organization and the relations with the authorized public and local institutions.
anlaşıldığına göre ... anlaşılmaktadır
İlgili kararlardan anlaşıldığına göre Osmanlı yönetiminin yerelde asayişi temin etme konusunda titizlik gösterirken, idarecilerin gayri Müslimlere karşı herhangi bir hak ihlalinde bulunmamaları ve görevlerini kötüye kullanmamaları konusunda da özen gösterdiği anlaşılmaktadır.
Saliha Okur Gümrükçüoğlu, “İstanbul kadı sicillerine göre gayr-i Müslimlerin sosyal ve hukuki konumlar”
Revised:
İlgili kararlardan, Osmanlı yönetiminin yerelde asayişi temin etme konusunda titizlik gösterirken, idarecilerin gayri Müslimlere karşı herhangi bir hak ihlalinde bulunmamaları ve görevlerini kötüye kullanmamaları konusunda da özen gösterdiği anlaşılmaktadır.
According to the historical records of their judicial activities, Ottoman administrators did their best to diligently maintain the order within the Ottoman territories. They were also careful not to abuse their powers and respect the rights of the local non-Muslim populations.
anlaşıldığına göre ... anlaşılmaktadır
Eski eserlerden anlaşıldığına göre Ankara’nın Etiler devrinde de önemli bir yeri olduğu anlaşılmaktadır.
Revised:
Eski eserlerden anlaşıldığına göre, Ankara Etiler devrinde de önemli bir yere sahipti.
As understood from ancient records, Ankara played an important role in the Etiler period.
The sentence below has repetitive words, which can be removed. The sentence is also “padded” with verbals expressing similar ideas. This suggests excessive stylization that may need revision. (Watch for passive verbals, in particular.) Too many verbals are also confusing to process:
eserler … eserleri
geziler … gezilerden … gezi
Yurt içinde yapılan geziler ve yurt dışında yapılan gezilerden hareket edilerek yazılan eserler olmak üzere gezi türü eserleri ikiye ayırabiliriz.
(lit. We can divide books of the travel genre into two categories: books written about trips made in the country and books written about trips made abroad.)
Türk Dili, Yazılı ve Sözlü Anlatım, ed. Nurettin Demir and Emine Yılmaz
The coordinated items have repetitive elements, which can be elided:
[yurt içinde] [yapılan geziler] ve [yurt dışında] [yapılan geziler] = [yurt içinde] ve [yurt dışında] [geziler]
Finally, there is some unvaried repetitiveness that may be avoided:
Revised:
Seyahat kitaplarını, yurt içi ve yurt dışı gezileri anlatan kitaplar olarak ikiye ayırabiliriz.
We can categorize travel books as books about domestic and international trips.
... ile ilgili olarak yapılan kayıt ... ile ilgilidir
Gürgen Ticaret işletmesinin yapmış olduğu satış ile ilgili olarak yapılan ilk kayıt, satış hasılatı ile ilgilidir.
(lit. The first record made regarding the sales made by Gürgen Ticaret business is related to the sales revenue.)
Revised:
Gürgen Ticaret'in satışları ile ilgili ilk kaydedilen, satış hasılatıdır.
The first recorded item in Gürgen Ticaret's sales is the sales revenue.
Genel Muhasebe I, Anadolu University, ed. Kerim Banar and Vedat Ekergil
One common usage issue has to do with providing a definition of something by defining it in terms of itself:
verdiğimiz tanımlar ... bir tanım
Ancak şunu unutmamak gerekir: Ne verdiğimiz tanımlar tek ve kesin bir tanım, ne de yapılan çözümlemelerde uygulanan yöntem tartışılmazdır.
However, please keep in mind that neither are our definitions single and definitive, nor is the method applied in the analyses indisputable.
Yeni Türk Edebiyatına Giriş, ed. Zeliha Güne
Revised:
Ancak şunu unutmamak gerekir: Verdiğimiz ne tanımlar tek ve kesin, ne de çözümleme yöntemi tartışılmazdır.
Ancak şunu unutmamak gerekir: Verdiğimiz tanımlar tek ve kesin değil, çözümleme yöntemi de tartışılmaz değildir.
Neither the definitions we give are single and definitive, nor the method of analysis is indisputable.
The sentence below has several stylistic repetitiveness issues:
insanlar … insanları
olmayan bir ... olduğundan
Aşk sınırları kuralları olmayan bir duygu hali olduğundan insanlar kimi zaman hiç aşık olmamaları gereken insanları sevebilirler.
Love is a feeling that has no boundaries or rules, people can sometimes love people they should never have loved.
Türk Kadın Yazarların Romanları
Revised:
Aşkın sınırları, kuralları olmadığından, insanlar kimi zaman hiç aşık olmamaları gereken kişileri sevebilirler.
Because love has no boundaries or rules, we may fall in love with those whom we should never have loved.
Stylistic Repetitiveness in Journalese, News Reporting
Certain style of writing requires a very dense packaging of referential information, including in news reporting, promotional blurbs (short promotional descriptions of books, films, events), and other summarizing marketing materials.
In Turkish journalese, and especially in news reporting, sentences tend to be regular (unmarked) with the canonical verb-final word order. They also often have extensive background details packaged into them to provide the context for the news being reported. The common pattern of sentences used in news reporting involves the use of introductory participial clauses -(y)an (more than one, at times) placed before the subject. Verbal clauses which can package many background details about the subject of the sentence.
Due to the limited number of reporting verbs, writers may repeat them within the same sentence, which, I believe, can be improved by replacing one of the verb a synonym instead:
… belirten … belirtti
Türkiye'deki esas sorunlardan birinin de sermaye yetersizlikleri olduğunu belirten Baron, sermayedarların memnun edilmesi gerektiğini belirtti.
“Ülkelerde Farklı Olan Ne?” at Sigortacılık Uygulamaları, May 2004
Revised:
Türkiye'deki esas sorunlardan birinin de sermaye yetersizlikleri olduğunu söyleyen Baron, sermayedarların memnun edilmesi gerektiğini belirtti.
Asserting that one of the main problems in Turkey is the lack of capital, Baron stated that the shareholders should be satisfied.
In the sentence below, for example, the author seems to care to avoid repeating the word zam (increase) yet overlooks the repetition of söylemek (to say):
… söylenen … söylenmektedir
Öğrendiğimize göre aylardan beri memur maaşlarına yapılacağı söylenen zam yapılamayacağı söylenmektedir.
Revised:
Öğrendiğimize göre, aylardan beri memur maaşlarına yapılacağı beklenen zam yapılamayacağı söylenmektedir.
As we have learned, civil servants' salaries, expected to be increasing months ago, reportedly will not be increasing.
... neticelendirdikleri ... neticesinde
Emniyet memurlarının başarı ile neticelendirdikleri baskın neticesinde tabanca imalini bilfiil yapan ve satan kimselerin yakalanması uzun sürmemiştir.
Revised:
Emniyet memurlarının başarı ile gerçekleştirdiği baskın neticesinde tabanca imalini bilfiil yapan ve satan kimselerin yakalanması uzun sürmemiştir.
As a result of the successful raid by the police officers, it didn't take long for the people who actually produced and sold guns to be caught.
karar alan ... karar verdi
Mart 2018’de yapılacak toplantı öncesi bir karar alan imamlar, Gül’e kazan kaldırmaya karar verdi.
https://ahval.me/tr/dolandiricilik/gazeteci-donmez-atlantadaki-sahtekarligin-bir-baska-yonu-daha-var
Revised:
Mart 2018’de yapılacak toplantı öncesi imamlar, Gül’e kazan kaldırmaya karar verdi.
Before the meeting in March 2018, the imams made a decision to pander to Gül.
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