Category: Usage
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Using full-date (day-month-year and month-day-year) styles in running text is subject to a publisher’s preferred house style. Both day-month-year and month-day-year formats are commonly used and equally valid, even if one may make more intuitive sense than the other. However, regardless of the format being used, there are some punctuation and style standards to keep…
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With the midterms coming up in the United States, several people are talking about highly competitive gubernatorial elections. A gubernatorial role is that of a governor, so what is up with the guber part in the adjective form? Again, we’ll explore why English makes no sense until we look a bit closer at some word…
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You are probably wondering what kind of knowledge could possibly be gleaned from such a pedestrian and “easy” topic as time—we all know this boring stuff from primary school. However, bear with me a moment as several nuances emerge when we look at things more closely. For example, did you know that AM (with capital…
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Today’s post is about how to include currency and money values in your documents. Included here are a handful of practices based on five reputable style manuals used internationally. Notes are available at the end for further research and reading. Using Symbols When setting body text with currency symbols ($, ¢, €, ¥, £, p,…
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Today’s topic is on subjects, not royal ones but grammatical ones. Using the tips here can help you create more clarity in writing, which is especially important when writing to diverse audiences who may not be highly fluent in English.
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A common tip for cutting wordiness is to delete in order in phrasings like in order to. I’ve given that advice myself, but it rarely comes with much of an explanation. Today, I expand on that recommendation, including when not to follow it.
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The other day, I was listening to The Beatles, and the song “I Me Mine” came up in the song mix. The grammar goblins in my head nudged me a bit, whispering, “Do it as a topic. Do it as a topic. Do it as a topic.”
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Style manuals are sometimes at odds when it comes to usage, but there is a surprising amount of agreement on some matters. Using and in different contexts is one topic where there is a considerable amount of agreement, even if there are some differences in the details. And this is what I will explore today.…
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A little while back, I wrote an article on cannot and can not. After posting it, I got to thinking about several other open and closed forms and how the little space (or lack of space) between words can change meanings or introduce errors. Today, I’ll be writing about a few other open and closed…