Commas to refresh you!

Try this quiz about commas. Remember we ALL struggle with commas - it would be a good idea to refresh your skills: http://www.dailywritingtips.com/a-10-point-comma-quiz/

Grammar quiz

Try your hand at this grammar quiz. Feel free to post your results or other grammar games you find in comments!

http://www.dailywritingtips.com/grammar-test-1/

A Quiz About Misplaced Modifiers

Posted: 30 Jan 2012 08:17 PM PST

Modifying phrases intended to provide clarity can be counterproductive if placed in the wrong position in a sentence. Repair the improper installation of modifiers in the following sentences, then compare your solutions with my revisions at the bottom of the page:

1. “Joseph Priestley began to suspect that air was not a simple substance while he was at Leeds.”

2. “It was under these conditions that Protestantism was introduced to Europe, a branch of Christianity that declared public festivities sinful and vulgar and convinced large numbers of people that their lives should be spent on disciplined labor and worship.”

3. “He had accumulated millions of dollars there that couldn’t be taken out of the country according to rules established after the war ended.”

4. “I already had a number of books and comics under my belt I had drawn with my brother.”

5. “A list of states with the highest past-year rates of driving while under the influence of alcohol among adults ages 18 or older follow.”

Answers and Explanations

1. As organized, this sentence implies that the scientist limited his doubts about air’s composition to the time he spent in Leeds, rather than stating that his suspicion began during his time there. To clarify the sentence, move the modifying phrase to the head of the sentence, and, for good measure, change the tense of the second verb, because air’s substantive nature has not changed since Priestley’s lifetime: “While he was at Leeds, Joseph Priestley began to suspect that air is not a simple substance.”

2. Because Europe is the noun immediately preceding the gloss, a reader might assume that the gloss defines Europe, rather than Protestantism, the correct subject of the definition. To eliminate that ambiguity, move the reference to the continent to the end of the sentence so that the definition is a mid-sentence parenthetical: “It was under these conditions that Protestantism, a branch of Christianity that declared public festivities sinful and vulgar and convinced large numbers of people that their lives should be spent on disciplined labor and worship, was introduced to Europe.”

3. This sentence is not egregiously incorrect, but the phrase beginning with according seems to modify country. It would be easier to read — and the most essential information would effectively be reserved for the end of the sentence — with the phrase inserted as a parenthetical: “He had accumulated millions of dollars there that, according to rules established after the war ended, couldn’t be taken out of the country.”

4. As constructed, this sentence implies that the writer and his brother had collaborated on drawing a belt, under which a number of books and comics were kept. The phrase “under my belt” should be shifted closer to the head of the sentence: “I already had under my belt a number of books and comics I had drawn with my brother.”

5. This painfully contracted sentence needs to be relaxed. The impetus to avoid a weak “to be” form of a verb is admirable, but it is awkward for that verb to be located at the very end, after a confusingly extensive subject. It would be better to immediately state the location of the list, then uncoil the tightly wound phrase identifying the subject of the list: “The following is a list of states with the highest rates of adults ages 18 or older who drove within the last year while under the influence of alcohol.” This is a rare instance in which the modifying phrase (in this case, the subject of the list) is more effectively placed at the end of the sentence, rather than inserted somewhere in its midst.

English 11 week of January 30

We will be

1. wrapping up self evaluations on Reading Strategies

2. reading about common mistakes when writing persuasion

3. reading Dr. Martin Luther King, jr Letter from a Birmingham Jail

4. reading Paul Roberts How to Say Nothing in 500 words and working on activities related to that essay.

A Quiz About Clarity

Posted: 25 Jan 2012 08:56 PM PST

Writers usually don’t mean to be duplicitous when they write one thing when they mean another; it’s just that what they intended to communicate is not what they communicated. The following sentences demonstrate some of the types of misunderstandings that result from careless composition. Try your hand at repairing the damage, and then take a look at my solutions at the bottom of the page:

1. “The postwar suburban ideal was a Cadillac and a fur coat like a movie star.”

2. “His legacy was also one of social revolutionary, humanitarian, and artist.”

3. “A letter can be mailed via the Pony Express reenactors for the 1860 price of $5.”

4. “That established history is being challenged by a rare book collector and author, John Doe and Jane Smith.”

5. “Although DNA testing is highly effective, those involved in criminal investigations do not always use it because of its high cost.”

Answers

1. The sentence implies that the ideal was ownership of two things: a Cadillac, and a fur coat that resembles a movie star. We know it means possessing a Cadillac and a fur coat, as movie stars were wont to do, but the sentence fails because it doesn’t explicitly state that. This revision does: “The postwar suburban ideal was driving a Cadillac and wearing a fur coat, like a movie star.”

2. The subject’s legacy cannot be that of someone with these identities, but it can be associated with that of such a person: “His legacy was that of a social revolutionary, humanitarian, and artist.”

3. The final phrase of this sentence lacks clarity. The point is that in 1860, sending a letter by Pony Express cost $5, and that today, for the same amount — a more modest total than it was about 150 years ago — one can send a letter on a commemorative ride carried out by reenactors. The sentence should be revised to make this relationship clearer: “A letter can be mailed via the Pony Express reenactors for the same fee it cost in 1860: $5.”

4. As written, this sentence suggests that the challenger is a book collector and author who is rare, and that the person’s name is John Doe and Jane Smith. Hyphenating rare and book to demonstrate that they team up to modify collector, and recasting the sentence to join each single epithet to the respective name, makes all clear: “That established history is being challenged by a rare-book collector, John Doe, and author Jane Smith.”

5. DNA testing is not always used of its high cost? Then why is it always used? Back up a little bit — the sentence means that DNA testing’s high cost restricts the frequency of its use. This important distinction is conveyed with the simple reversal of two phrases and the insertion of a comma between them: “Although DNA testing is highly effective, because of its high cost, those involved in criminal investigations do not always use it.”

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Original Post: A Quiz About Clarity
Your eBook: Click here to download the Basic English Grammar ebook.

Four Powerful Ways to Bring Your Writing Goals Closer

Posted: 25 Jan 2012 10:52 AM PST

Do you wish you could get further with your writing?

Perhaps you want to:

• Finally finish that novel that you started ten years ago
• Improve your spelling and grammar
• Make money from your writing
• Have a popular blog with lots of readers
• Publish a non-fiction book to support your business
• …or something else entirely.

Whatever your writing goal is, follow these four steps and you’ll find yourself making much faster progress.

#1: Write More Frequently

You don’t have to write every day, but you do need to write regularly. Be honest: how often do you write? If it’s less than twice a week, you’ll probably find yourself struggling to make any meaningful progress.

The great thing about writing frequently is that small steps really do add up. For instance:

• If you write 500 words three times a week, you’ll have 78,000 words after a year.
• That’s a whole novel.
• If you write two blog posts every week, you’ll have 104 blog posts after a year.
• If you write just 200 words every single day (about two paragraphs), you’ll have 73,000 words after a year. That’s enough for three non-fiction ebooks.

Do it: Decide on a time and place for your writing. Aim for at least two sessions per week, and a total of 1,500 words every week.

#2: Edit After You Write

There are two traps that writers fall into with editing, and both cause problems:

• Editing while writing
• Not editing at all

If you edit while you write, you’ll struggle to get anywhere. You’ll write a paragraph or two and immediately delete them because you think they aren’t good enough. It’s much more efficient to simply write until you’ve finished the article, chapter or scene that you’re working on. You can edit later.

If you don’t edit at all, your work won’t be as good as it could be. Nobody can write a perfect first draft. Your writing might need just a quick polish, or it might need a radical overhaul: either way, editing is essential – after you’ve written.

Do it: Next time you write, don’t stop to edit. Keep moving forwards. When you do finish, print your work out and read it through on paper: this makes it easier to spot mistakes and things that you want to change.

#3: Learn New Techniques

Whatever type of writing you do, there’ll always be something new to learn. Great writers aren’t born that way: they become great through conscious practice and through deliberately developing their craft.

There are all sorts of things you can learn, either from books or from taking a writing course. For instance:

• Freelancers: How to write great sales copy for clients
• Novelists: How to write dialogue
• Bloggers: How to write guest posts to bring in more readers
• Poets: How to use different formal structures

Do it: Pick ONE new writing skill that you want to gain, in order to take your writing further. Look for a book or course that could help you. You’ll need to set aside time to learn and time to put what you learn into practice.

#4: Get Help and Support

Writing can feel like a very lonely activity at times – but it doesn’t have to be that way. Help and support from other writers will make a huge difference to your chances of success: it’s much easier to write regularly when you’re part of a supportive community.

Your local area may well have a writers’ group that meets regularly: try looking for adverts in your library or in bookstores, or search on Meetup.com. If there isn’t a group nearby, how about starting one yourself?

If it’s not easy for you to meet up face-to-face with other writers, you can find hundreds of different writing communities online. As well as giving you the opportunity to ask advice and share tips with other members, these also often allow you to share your writing and get feedback.

Do it: Look for a writers’ group locally or online, and consider joining. If you’re not sure about joining a formal group, try searching for other writers on Twitter.

Ali Luke is a writer and writing coach, and has just launched a new community and teaching site, WritersHuddle.com. The doors are open until 31st January. Inside, you’ll find mini-courses to help you learn new skills, forums where you can interact with other members, and lots of other goodies too. Make sure to check it out.

Exams results

If you checked your Applied Reading Strategies portion of the English 11 exam before Wednesday evening after 4:30 pm, YOUR GRADE MAY HAVE CHANGED.

There was an error with the answer key. All test were reevaluated and recalculated after Wednesday at 4:30.

Sorry about the confusion.

A Quiz About Parallel Structure

Posted: 22 Jan 2012 08:05 PM PST

Many writers are thwarted by unsuccessful efforts to express equivalent ideas in phrases that clearly identify the hierarchy and relationships of those ideas. Here are five sentences in which syntactical structure fails to communicate these concepts. Try your hand at resolving the confusion, and then compare your results to my solutions at the bottom of the page:

1. “Learn to use this art form not only for performance but also to collaborate, exercise, and respect the differences of others.”

2. “Children enrolled in high-quality preschool programs are more likely to graduate from high school, hold down jobs, and less likely to be on welfare or end up in jail.”

3. “She will be returned to the same, or a substantially similar, position to the one held prior to the leave of absence, as required by law.”

4. “They pulled him from his vehicle, beat him, robbed him of his money and equipment.”

5. “Dedication, hard work, flexibility, a sense of humor, and the interest and ability to learn and improve professionally are some of the positive qualities the company seeks in all employees.”

Answers

1. This sentence isn’t strictly incorrect, but it would be clearer if it didn’t lead the reader to infer that the additional benefits of the art form are that participants can collaborate the differences of others, exercise the differences of others, and respect the differences of others. That implication is eliminated if the preposition to is inserted before the second and third items in the list: “Learn to use this art form not only for performance but also to collaborate, to exercise, and to respect the differences of others.”

2. This sentence has contrasting “more likely” and “less likely” phrases, but includes two of one and one of the other, and the second “more likely phrase” is confusingly cordoned off by commas, leaving it bereft of context. To make the sentence correct, the brace of commas must be omitted and a conjunction added: “Children enrolled in high-quality preschool programs are more likely to graduate from high school and hold down jobs and are less likely to end up on welfare or in jail.”

3. This type of error is distressingly frequent, considering that it seems obvious that if the parenthetical phrase is removed, the sentence is awkward, therefore the original sentence is awkward. One of several possible fixes is to get the trailing phrase out of the way immediately by moving it to the head of the sentence, then presenting the fully expressed basic statement followed by the alternative: “As required by law, she will be returned to the same position held prior to the leave of absence, or a substantially similar one.”

4. Here’s another common error — the omission of a conjunction before a concluding compound list item. As written, the sentence implies that there were four stages to the crime: 1) They pulled him from his vehicle, 2) they beat him, 3) they robbed him, and 4) equipment. Huh? That’s wrong. Only three things occurred; items 3) and 4) are one step. Because that one step is the final list item, it should be preceded by a conjunction: “They pulled him from his vehicle, beat him, and robbed him of his money and equipment.”

5. Interest and ability take different prepositions, so they need to be separated into parallel phrases where each word is supported by its own preposition: “Dedication, hard work, flexibility, a sense of humor, and the interest in learning and improving professionally and the ability to do so are some of the positive qualities the company seeks in all employees.”

A Hyphenation Quiz

Posted: 17 Jan 2012 08:23 PM PST

Yes, I hype correct hyphenation, but proper treatment of the little line enables clear communication, so on this site, I repeatedly attach importance to the attachment tool. In the following sentences, excessive or insufficient use of hyphens clouds rather than clarifies. Correct the connective calamities below, then check my answer key at the bottom of the page:

1. “The program offers student-directed and student-initiated research- and discovery-based learning opportunities.”

2. “The plan includes accidental death and dismemberment coverage.”

3. “The businessman-turned-candidate spoke about his religious beliefs.”

4. “Maybe the country just doesn’t want a my way or the highway Texan in the White House again.”

5. “Travel to near-space in a 400-foot diameter balloon.”

6. “He all-but-lectured the lawmakers assembled.”

7. “The rainbow flag flew at half-staff to honor Elizabeth Taylor, the Hollywood-star-and icon to gays who died in March.”

Answers

1. This hyphen-saturated sentence, though technically correct (though to be fair but awkward, the second mention of the word student should be elided), reads better when it is relaxed: “The program, based on research and discovery, allows students to direct and initiate their own learning opportunities.” “Student-directed and -initiated” and “research- and discovery-based” are proper examples of suspensive hyphenation, but the double-suspension string “student-directed and (student)-initiated research- and discovery-based” is excessive.

2. As written, this sentence implies that the coverage is accidental. But the coverage presumably protects against two possibilities: accidental death, and dismemberment, so the phrase “accidental death” should be hyphenated to signal that the constituent words combine to modify coverage, and because the insurance also applies to nondeliberate dismemberment, that word should be preceded by a suspended hyphenation.

However, because no insurance company hyphenates this phrase in its literature, I’m inclined to request, as in the previous example, at least a relaxed rewrite that obviates hyphenation: “The plan includes coverage in case of accidental death and dismemberment.”

3. When the verb turned stands between a word describing a former state and one referring to a current state, unlike as is the case with the similarly employed conjunction cum (“with”), no hyphenation is necessary: “The businessman turned candidate spoke about his religious beliefs.”

4. The word string defining what kind of Texan the subject is must be corralled into one group, either with quotation marks that imply that the sentiment is literally or figuratively stated, or with multiple hyphens: “Maybe the country just doesn’t want a my-way-or-the-highway Texan in the White House again.”

5. This sentence manages two hyphenation errors within its ten-word length. Near is often erroneously attached to the following noun; hyphenation is correct only when near and the following word form a phrasal adjective modifying a third term, as in “near-space tourist travel” (where the open compound “tourist travel” is an noun phrase).

Also, the half-hearted hyphenation that follows implies the existence of an odd item referred to as a diameter balloon; this one apparently has 400 five-toed appendages. The phrase should be revised to correctly reflect that the balloon is 400 feet in diameter: “Travel to near space in a 400-foot-diameter balloon.”

6. The modifying phrase “all but” needs not be attached to the verb, nor do the two words in that phrase require connection: “He all but lectured the lawmakers assembled.”

7. Half-staff, like its synonym half-mast (often erroneously used in nonmaritime contexts), is correctly hyphenated. The hyphenation error occurs later in the sentence, when the writer, confused about how to construct the gloss of Elizabeth Taylor, loses steam near the end. The phrase “Hollywood star and icon to gays,” however, requires no connective tissue: “The rainbow flag flew at half-staff to honor Elizabeth Taylor, the Hollywood star and icon to gays who died in March.”

5 Confused Word Pairs

Posted: 16 Jan 2012 08:50 PM PST

The similarity of the letters e and i leads to frequent confusion between similar-looking and similar-sounding pairs of words. Here are five such word pairs with their respective meanings and tips for keeping each word in its place:

1. Elicit vs. Illicit

Elicit, meaning “draw forth,” comes from the Latin term lacere, “to entice or lure.” Illicit means “unlawful”; the root word stems from the Latin term licere, “to be allowed,” from which license also derives. To keep them separate in your mind, connect elicit with exit and illicit with illegal.

2. Emigrate vs. Immigrate

To emigrate is to leave one country and live elsewhere; to immigrate is to move to a country. To maintain the distinction between the two, associate emigrate with embark and immigrate with immerse.

3. Eminent vs. Imminent

Eminent means “prominent” or “conspicuous” and is generally associated with accomplished people; imminent means “about to happen,” often with the sense of something of import or involving danger. To help you remember which is which, think of an eminent person as one who emits greatness, and connect imminent with immediate.

4. Emulate vs. Imitate

Emulate can be directly synonymous with imitate but often has the sense of an effort to try to be equal to, whereas to imitate is to try to match an example, or to resemble. To keep them straight, think of emulating as something to do to become eminent, whereas imitating involves mimicking.

5. Explicit vs. Implicit

Something explicit is something fully developed or revealed, and something implicit is not expressed directly, though it can also mean “potential” or “without questioning.” Remember the difference between the two by thinking of explicit in regard to something X rated and implicit as referring to something implied.

Exercise Your Editing with This Exercise

Posted: 10 Jan 2012 08:18 PM PS

It takes more than a quick spell check to finesse a piece of writing.

Editing is as much an art as writing is. Whether you’re finessing your own writing or revising the work of another, the process requires simultaneous attention to multiple issues: spelling, grammar, style, accuracy, formality, and the subjective aspect of substance: providing context, assigning meaning and conveying value, and more.

When I was a copyediting instructor, one of my favorite activities was creating error-ridden editing exercises for my students. (Sadistic, I know — but they got their money’s worth.) Here, I inflict one such compositional concentration of calamity of on you — free of charge. But before you read beyond the following paragraph, copy and paste it and give it your best editing effort, then come back and compare your revision with mine:

“On Jan. 20th, 1960 then-President John Kennedy delivered his notorious Ask Not What You Can Do for Your Country Speech. Kennedy launched not only America’s Space Program that sent men to the moon, but stood up to Russia when they threatened the free world during the missile crisis. During his Presidency, Peace Corps was formed; the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty was signed by the Soviets; and the Civil Rights Act was passed. (However, he stumbled when, in a speech in Berlin in 1963, he told the Germans, “Ich bin ein Berliner.” He intended to communicate “I am a Berliner,” but the way he said it meant, “I am a jelly doughnut.”) Only 42-years-old when elected, the youngest president, his legacy is a less than three year presidency compared with Camelot.”

Here’s my quick fix, followed by annotations:

“President John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address on January 20, 1961, is memorable for the statement “Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country,” and he answered his own challenge. During his administration, he not only pressed for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to achieve a manned landing on the Moon by the end of the 1960s but also confronted the Soviet Union over that country’s plan to install nuclear weapons in Cuba that would be aimed at the United States.

Also, during Kennedy’s presidency, tragically abbreviated when he was assassinated on November 22, 1963, the Peace Corps was formed; the United States, the Soviet Union, and the United Kingdom signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; and Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The legacy of Kennedy, only forty-two years old when he was elected, is of a brief period of peace and prosperity; indeed, his administration was compared to the glory of King Arthur’s Camelot.”

• Note the correction of the style of the month and date, and correction of the year itself.
• Our thirty-fifth president’s name is John F. Kennedy.
• If I had retained “then-President” before Kennedy’s name, I would omit the hyphen and lowercase the name of the office, which because of the modifier then becomes an epithet rather than a specific job title.
• Because Kennedy’s inaugural address is notable for other excerpts as well, I chose, in identifying it, to focus on the line — giving it in its entirety — and not on the speech. But if you do refer to a speech, style the reference as follows: “his ‘Ask not what you can for your country’ speech.” (Also, notorious is not an apt description for the address.)
• If I were editing someone else’s work, I would query for the writer’s approval of insertion of “he answered his own challenge,” which I think provides a transition to what would otherwise be merely a grocery list of accomplishments.
• I corrected the erroneous “not only . . . but also” construction.
• There is no such entity as “America’s Space Program,” so the latter two words should not have been capitalized. (And, whenever possible, use the more precise “United States” in place of America in reference to the nation.)
• In this context, moon is the formal name of an astronomical feature, rather than a generic word for such a phenomenon, and should therefore be capitalized.
• Although Russia is an informal alternative to “the Soviet Union,” it should be avoided in such usage. (“The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics” was the official name of the country during this period, but the two-word version is acceptable.)
• A nation is a singular entity and should not be referred to as “they.”
• “Free world” is subjective and provocative in this otherwise neutrally written passage.
• Because of the lack of specificity and capitalization, “the missile crisis” implies a previous reference to the incident. It should be referred to by its capitalized full name.
• As written, the sentence beginning “During his Presidency” (there is no reason to capitalize presidency, by the way) requires only commas, not semicolons. I retained the latter punctuation marks only because I rewrote the list of achievements in a complex form, with internal commas in the second item. I also revised the passive construction to active form.
• I inserted the phrase about his assassination to provide context.
• “Peace Corps,” like the similarly constructed names of most entities, should be preceded by the article the.
• Several nations signed the treaty, and if any are identified, all should be identified.
• The phrase “of 1964” is part of the formal name of the act.
• The “Ich bin ein Berliner” gaffe is a popular myth; residents of Berlin did not, and do not, call jelly doughnuts “Berliner.” (Beyond that, even if the story were true, the incident is minor when compared with the other highlights of Kennedy’s presidency listed here, and the passage provides insufficient context.)
• A person’s age, when not applied as a modifier, should not be hyphenated (except for linking ones-place and tens-place numbers, as in forty-two). Also, I prefer to follow The Chicago Manual of Style in spelling ages out.
• The first phrase of the last sentence is a dangling modifier; “the . . . president” is incorrectly identified as his own legacy.
• “The youngest president” is an awkwardly truncated interjection. My more extended parenthetical is only one of several possibilities.
• The phrase “less than three year,” as a modifier for presidency, should be hyphenated; I deleted the entire phrase because it seemed to distract from the point of the passage. Also, there was insufficient context for the reference to Camelot.

This passage could be edited in as many versions as there are editors, and, given further context, would be further improved by additional changes. My effort attends to the deficiencies in the several categories I listed in the first paragraph of this post. Share in a comment below how and why your edits differ from mine and others.

Reading Record

35 Genres and Other Varieties of Fiction

Posted: 08 Jan 2012 08:49 PM PST

A previous post detailed synonyms for story. This entry defines words identifying various genres — categories of story types — and similar terms:

1. Adventure fiction: stories in which characters are involved in dangerous and/or exhilarating exploits

2. Airport novel: a work of fiction, generally genre fiction, so named because of its availability at stores in international airports in order to provide airline passengers with a light diversion during a flight

3. Allegory: a story using symbolism to express truths about the human condition

4. Bildungsroman: a story detailing the emotional and moral growth of a character

5. Black comedy: a story in which the humor derives from the misfortunes and/or reproachable behavior of characters

6. Comedy: a story with elements and situations intended to amuse

7. Comedy-drama: a story with both humorous and serious elements

8. Comedy of errors (farce): a story involving energetic action revolving around humorous predicaments and coincidences

9. Comedy of manners: a story that mocks class pretensions and/or prejudices

10. Crime fiction: stories based on the commission and/or investigation of wrongdoing

11. Detective fiction: stories in which the protagonist investigates a crime

12. Epic: originally a long poem celebrating the exploits of a factual or fictitious hero, but now applied to prose works on the same theme as well

13. Epistolary fiction: stories constructed as a series of letters exchanged between characters

14. Fantasy fiction: stories involving imaginary beings in the real world or in an alternate reality and assuming suspension of disbelief about magic and/or supernatural powers

15. Fictional autobiography: a story purporting to be a first-person account of someone’s life

16. Fictional biography: a story structured to resemble a factual life story

17. Genre fiction: stories intended to appeal to readers because of adherence to a specific formula (such as adventure fiction or detective fiction), rather than on their literary merits

18. Gothic fiction: stories often taking place in an isolated setting and involving strange and/or perilous happenings

19. Horror fiction: stories incorporating supernatural and/or inexplicable elements and intended to arouse fear and dread

20. Melodrama: a story that emphasizes action over characterization and features exaggeratedly dramatic plot elements

21. Mystery fiction: stories that detail the solution of a crime or other wrongdoing

22. Pastiche: a story that imitates one or more established works, or consists of episodes of such works

23. Picaresque: an episodically structured story featuring a rogue or an antihero as the protagonist

24. Parody: a story mocking the pretensions or weaknesses of a particular author,
style, or genre

25. Romance: a love story; also a tale taking place in a distant time and place and involving adventure with often supernatural or mysterious elements

26. Romantic comedy: a lighthearted story detailing a romance and its complications

27. Romp: a boisterously comical tale

28. Satire: a story that pokes fun at human shortcomings such as arrogance, greed, and vanity

29. Science fiction: stories focusing on how science and technology affect individuals and civilizations

30. Screwball comedy: a fast-paced story involving improbable situations and antics from which the humor derives

31. Swashbuckler: an adventure story in which the hero accomplishes great feats to aid a noble cause

32. Thriller: a dramatic story punctuated with action, adventure, and suspense

33. Tragedy: a story with a catastrophic and/or unfortunate outcome

34. Tragicomedy: a story with both humorous and heartbreaking aspects

35. Travelogue: a story with a plot centering on a significant amount of travel

English 11 week of January 9

We will be finish up Reading Strategies. Students will retake the Reading Passage 3 test with unlimited time. I am interested to see if they understand the strategies without a time constraint.

We will begin working on Persuasive Writing. I plan to incorporate grammar as well as we learn and practice effective persuasive writing techniques.

Book Review: “Garner’s Modern American Usage”

Posted: 06 Jan 2012 08:25 PM PST

What is the state of writing today? Pick up any newspaper, magazine, or book, or look at a website, an email message, or a tweet, or examine a newsletter, a brochure, or a report. Want a more useful indicator of how particular words are used? Look them up in a new dictionary.

But these strategies will answer what may be the wrong question, because they provide a descriptivist view of the language — one that describes how writers are using the English language. But perhaps the perspective should be prescriptivist — one that prescribes how writers should use the English language.

An excellent prescriptivist resource for the careful writer — one who strives to produce high-quality prose — is Garner’s Modern American Usage. This nearly 1,000-page book by esteemed wordsmith Bryan A. Garner, first published in 2009 and already in its third edition, is the premier guide for what writers should aspire to.

The tome’s girth is imposing, but just like any other encyclopedic reference work, it is easily digestible. (Though word nerds may find themselves gorging on one entry after another instead of actually, you know, writing.) The entries range in length from curt cross-references and concise confirmations (“gimmickry. So spelled—not gimmickery”) to brief elucidations about words, parts of speech, and types of usage errors and (usually) short essays on topics ranging from “Abbreviations” to “Zeugma.”

These latter entries vary from discussion of parts of speech like adjectives and adverbs to entries on cliches, jargon, and other usage issues to matters of style such as italics and chronological dates.

A glossary of language terms almost fifty pages long — also beginning with an entry titled “Abbreviations” and ending with one labeled “Zeugma” — follows, along with a list of usage books going back 250 years and a bibliography of more than a hundred guides to grammar, usage, style, and more. Another feature of the book is the Language-Change Index, a five-stage system of charting the persistence or introduction of nonstandard language. In addition, erroneous usage is prominently signaled by asterisks.

Garner’s style is authoritative but not arrogant (and occasionally dryly humorous), and he backs his prescriptions up with rigorous scholarship, frequently citing published examples of misuse of one word for another — for example, of cue for queue.

Other usage guides may be more friendly and less formidable, but none matches Garner for thoroughness and clarity. If you have only one such resource at hand, make it this one.