The vocabulary of ethnicity identity is fraught with peril. It is unfortunate that humans must at times distinguish between various subgroups, but it’s best to keep up-to-date on which descriptions are considered valid or acceptable among those belonging to those populations. Here’s a guide: 1. African A person of African descent. Some people so described … Read more
While I was studying English in college (I later opted for a more practical course of study, and graduated with a degree in theater arts), one of the classes I took dealt with grammar. The professor’s pedagogical approach? Pass out mimeographed copies of his manuscript for a grammar textbook — do you care to carbon-date … Read more
An elliptical construction is one in which a word or phrase implied by context is omitted from a sentence, usually because it is a repetition of a preceding word or phrase. The three principal types of elliptical construction, with the omitted text enclosed in brackets, follow: Noun ellipsis: “I went swimming, and John went [swimming], … Read more
What is it about hyphens that strike such abject fear in the minds of those in the advertising realm? An oft-cited justification for omitting this eminently useful linkage sign in marketing and packaging copy is that its absence enhances a clean, uncluttered visual design. What this means is that, for example, “fast acting cleanser,” especially … Read more
Do you ever think about giving up writing? You’ve been working on a novel, but you’re afraid it’s never going to be good enough. Your short stories never win competitions. Your poetry hasn’t been published. Even your blog only has a handful of readers. It’s easy to feel disheartened – especially if you don’t have … Read more
Let’s talk about the dos and don’ts of contractions, ’k? (But first, this note: This punctuation mark is the same as the one used for apostrophes. However, if you use smart, or curly, quotes, your word processing program will probably incorrectly render an apostrophe not preceded by a letter — as in the last word … Read more
The following rhetorical tools enrich writing by eliciting a primal emotional response in readers: 1. Alliteration Alliteration, the pattern of two or more words within a phrase or sentence that begin with the same sound, is an effective form of emphasis that adds lyricism to even straightforward prose and influences the mood. Alliteration can be … Read more
An interjection is one or more words uttered or written as an exclamation or an expression of emotion. I already provided a lifetime supply of them in a previous post, but here are some additional notes about one of the most ubiquitous of them all: oh. Whether this all-purpose exclamation is followed by a comma … Read more
When I wrote for my college newspaper, one of the assignments I enjoyed most was writing film reviews. And I was terrible at it, as I soon realized. Why? I was writing the equivalent of book reports: movie reports. Fortunately, I came to my senses and realized that evaluating films and plays and the like … Read more
When I’m not at my mountaintop hermitage, contorting myself into a lotus position in my capacity as a grammar guru, I do freelance copyediting. I accept just about any project offered to me, but today I rejected an assignment — perhaps the first time I’ve ever done so. What was so heinous about the project … Read more
Several DailyWritingTips.com posts have focused on, for example, phenomena and ideas named after people, and concepts or objects identified by the names of historical figures. This entry specifically suggests mythological, literary, and historical eponyms that may inspire you to employ such terms in fiction writing as cloaked allusions to characters or things. Think of these … Read more
Think of a pronoun. Chances are, you will come up with a personal pronoun, such as he, she, it, them, they, us, and the like. But note that I modified pronoun with the adjective personal, which implies that there are other types of pronouns. As a matter of fact, eight classes of pronouns exist. Here’s … Read more