Ithy - Unpacking Nominalization: How Turning Verbs into Nouns Shapes Legal Language

Highlights

Nominalization Defined: It's the process of transforming verbs (actions) or adjectives (descriptions) into nouns (things or concepts), like changing "decide" to "decision."
Why It's Used in Law: Often employed for formality, abstraction, focusing on legal concepts over actors, precision in terminology, and due to tradition.
Key Effect on Lawyers: While sometimes useful, overuse frequently leads to wordy, unclear, less energetic, and potentially less persuasive legal writing, impacting efficiency and communication.

What is Nominalization?

The Basics: Turning Words into Nouns

Nominalization is a fundamental linguistic process where a word that is typically not a noun—usually a verb or an adjective—is converted into a noun or noun phrase. Think of it as taking an action word or a describing word and packaging it as a "thing," concept, or event. This transformation is sometimes referred to as "nouning."

For instance:

The verb decide becomes the noun decision.
The verb investigate becomes the noun investigation.
The adjective intense becomes the noun intensity.
The adjective legal becomes the noun legality.

This conversion often requires changes to the sentence structure. When a strong verb is replaced by its nominalized form, other words, such as helping verbs (like "make," "provide," "conduct") and prepositions, are frequently needed to convey the original meaning. This can lead to longer, more complex sentences.

Consider this example:

Verb form: "The court analyzed the evidence." (Direct and concise)
Nominalized form: "The court provided an analysis of the evidence." (More words, less direct)

Morphological vs. Syntactic Nominalization

Nominalization can occur in different ways:

Morphological Nominalization: This involves changing the form of the word, often by adding suffixes. Common suffixes include -tion, -sion, -ment, -ance, -ence, -ity, and -ness. Examples: legalize → legalization, argue → argument, interfere → interference, happy → happiness.
Syntactic Nominalization: This occurs when a word or phrase functions as a noun in a sentence without necessarily changing its form structurally. For example, using an infinitive phrase like "To investigate is necessary" where "To investigate" acts as the subject (a noun role). Sometimes, the verb form and the noun form are identical (zero derivation), such as in words like change, increase, request, study, or claim.

Common Examples in Legal Contexts

Legal language is replete with nominalizations:

Agreement (from agree)
Application (from apply)
Conclusion (from conclude)
Determination (from determine)
Enforcement (from enforce)
Jurisdiction (related to judging/law)
Obligation (from oblige)
Provision (from provide)
Settlement (from settle)
Termination (from terminate)

Why is Nominalization Used in Legal Contexts?

Despite potential drawbacks, nominalization persists in legal writing for several reasons, ranging from stylistic choices to functional necessities.

Achieving Formality and Abstraction

Nominalizations tend to create a more formal, impersonal, and abstract tone. In fields like law, academia, and science, this abstract quality is sometimes valued because it shifts the focus from specific actions or actors to broader concepts, principles, or procedures. This can lend an air of objectivity and authority to the writing.

Focusing on Concepts, Not Actors

Lawyers may use nominalizations to emphasize legal concepts, events, or processes themselves, rather than the individuals performing the actions. For example, discussing "the execution of the contract" places the focus on the event, whereas "X executed the contract" highlights the actor. This depersonalization can be a deliberate rhetorical strategy in objective legal analysis or when the actor is unknown, irrelevant, or intentionally downplayed.

Creating Precision and Specialized Terms

Nominalization allows for the creation of precise legal terminology. Complex actions or concepts can be encapsulated into single nouns (e.g., arbitration, litigation, jurisdiction, restitution). These terms function as conceptual units within legal arguments, allowing for dense and specific discussion of established legal ideas.

Tradition and Habit

Legal language has deep historical roots, with significant influence from Latin and Norman French, languages where nominalized forms were common. Many established legal terms (e.g., testimony from Latin testimonium) are nominalizations. Over centuries, this style became ingrained, and its use is often perpetuated through tradition and habitual language patterns within the legal profession. It can simply be the way lawyers are taught to write and the style they see in existing legal documents.

Understanding Nominalization in Law: A Mindmap

This mindmap provides a visual overview of nominalization, covering its definition, the reasons for its prevalence in legal writing, and its significant effects on lawyers and their communication.

mindmap root["Nominalization in Legal Writing"] id1["Definition"] id1a["Process: Verb/Adjective -> Noun"] id1b["'Nouning' an action or quality"] id1c["Types"] id1c1["Morphological (Suffixes: -tion, -ment, -ity)"] id1c2["Syntactic (Phrase as Noun)"] id1c3["Zero Derivation (e.g., change, request)"] id2["Why Used?"] id2a["Formality & Objectivity"] id2b["Abstraction (Focus on concepts)"] id2c["Precision (Specialized terms)"] id2d["Depersonalization (Downplay actors)"] id2e["Complex Sentence Construction"] id2f["Tradition & Habit"] id3["Effects on Lawyers & Legal Writing"] id3a["Negative Impacts"] id3a1["Wordiness & Complexity"] id3a2["Reduced Clarity & Readability"] id3a3["Weakened Sentence Energy (Less dynamic)"] id3a4["Obscured Agency (Passive voice risk)"] id3a5["'Stuffy' / Bureaucratic Tone"] id3a6["Hinders Persuasion"] id3b["Practical Implications"] id3b1["Inefficiency (Longer drafting/reading time)"] id3b2["Challenges with Word Limits"] id3b3["Potential for Misunderstanding"] id3b4["Impact on Client Communication"] id3c["Potential Positives (If used judiciously)"] id3c1["Conciseness for technical terms"] id3c2["Achieving desired formal tone"]

The Double-Edged Sword: Nominalization's Impact on Lawyers

While nominalization has its place, its overuse—a common critique of traditional legal writing—carries significant consequences for lawyers, affecting the clarity, persuasiveness, and efficiency of their work.

The Downsides: Challenges for Clarity and Persuasion

Increased Wordiness and Complexity

Nominalizations almost invariably make sentences longer and more convoluted. Replacing a single, strong verb often requires adding auxiliary verbs (like "make," "give," "provide," "conduct") and prepositions, inflating word count. For example, "The parties reached an agreement" is wordier than "The parties agreed." This contributes to the infamous density of legal prose.

Attorney reviewing dense legal paperwork

Excessive nominalization contributes to the density and complexity often found in legal documents.

Reduced Clarity and Energy

Verbs inject action and energy into writing. Nominalizations, by contrast, turn dynamic actions into static nouns, often "sapping the energy" from sentences. This makes the writing less direct, less engaging, and harder for the reader (be it a judge, client, or opposing counsel) to process quickly and easily. Clarity suffers when the core action is buried within a noun phrase.

Obscured Responsibility (The Passive Voice Problem)

Nominalizations often go hand-in-hand with passive voice constructions, making it unclear who is performing the action. "A decision was made to terminate the contract" avoids stating who made the decision, unlike the active "The committee decided to terminate the contract." While sometimes intentional, this lack of clarity can obscure responsibility, weaken arguments, or lead to ambiguity in crucial documents like contracts or judgments.

The "Stuffy" Bureaucratic Tone

Legal writing is often criticized for its "stuffy, bureaucratic odor," and excessive nominalization is a major contributor. This impersonal, abstract style can make legal documents seem inaccessible, intimidating, and outdated, potentially alienating readers, including clients.

Hindered Readability and Persuasion

Ultimately, wordy, unclear, and passive writing is less persuasive. Lawyers rely on clear and powerful prose to advocate for their clients. When nominalizations bog down sentences and obscure meaning, arguments lose their impact, and the lawyer's ability to effectively persuade the reader is diminished.

Efficiency and Professional Implications

Navigating Word Limits and Drafting Time

In many legal contexts, such as court filings, lawyers face strict page or word limits. The inherent wordiness of nominalization makes it harder to stay within these limits without sacrificing substance. Furthermore, writing and revising overly nominalized text takes more time, impacting a lawyer's overall efficiency and productivity.

Impact on Client Communication and Trust

Clear communication is vital for building trust with clients. Legal advice or documents filled with dense, nominalized language can be difficult for non-lawyers to understand, leading to confusion, frustration, and potentially undermining the lawyer-client relationship.

Comparing Writing Styles: Nominalization vs. Verbs

This radar chart visually compares the typical characteristics of writing heavy with nominalizations versus writing that prioritizes strong verbs. The axes represent key qualities of written communication. Note how verb-focused writing generally scores higher on clarity, conciseness, energy, and readability, while nominalized writing tends to emphasize formality and abstraction, often at the expense of the other qualities.

Striving for Balance: Best Practices

While complete avoidance of nominalization is impractical and sometimes undesirable (especially for established legal terms), legal writing experts strongly advise minimizing unnecessary nominalizations to enhance clarity, conciseness, and impact.

Transforming Nominalizations

The following table illustrates how sentences laden with nominalizations can be revised by replacing the nominalized noun with its corresponding verb, resulting in clearer and more direct statements.

Nominalized Sentence	Verb-Focused Alternative	Key Improvement
The court made a decision regarding the motion.	The court decided the motion.	More concise, active, and direct.
The defendant made an objection to the evidence.	The defendant objected to the evidence.	Removes weak verb ("made"), uses stronger action verb.
Consideration should be given to the plaintiff's argument.	We should consider the plaintiff's argument.	Clarifies actor ("We"), uses active voice.
The company undertook an investigation of the complaint.	The company investigated the complaint.	More direct and uses fewer words.
There was an intervention by the regulatory agency.	The regulatory agency intervened.	More energetic and concise.

Prioritize Strong Verbs

Look for nouns ending in common nominalization suffixes (like -tion, -ment, -ance) and see if they can be replaced with their verb forms. Choose active, precise verbs that clearly convey the action.

Ensure Clarity of Actors and Actions

Structure sentences so it's clear who is doing what. Prefer the active voice ("The defendant filed the motion") over the passive voice ("The motion was filed by the defendant") unless there's a specific reason to use passive (e.g., the actor is unknown or unimportant).

Aim for Conciseness

Eliminating unnecessary nominalizations is a key strategy for achieving tighter, more readable prose, especially important when facing word or page limits.

Understanding Nominalization in Legal English

The concept of nominalization, particularly the "be + noun" structure, is a common feature in formal writing, including legal English. Overuse can weaken writing by making it less direct and more wordy. The following video discusses this specific type of nominalization and how awareness can help improve plain English writing, a valuable skill for lawyers aiming for clarity.

This video explains how constructions like "is an indication of" instead of "indicates" or "was a violation of" instead of "violated" contribute to nominalization. Recognizing these patterns allows writers, including lawyers, to convert them back into stronger verb forms, leading to more dynamic and easily understood text. While the video focuses on the 'be + noun' pattern, the principle applies broadly to many forms of nominalization that can obscure action and add unnecessary length to legal documents.