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Writing/Grammar Guide

Last updated: 6/21/10
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Background

Writing can be divided into four areas:

• Content. This means what the writing is about.
• Form. This means how the writing is organized.
• Mechanics. This means the details of the writing, such as spelling and grammar.
• Extra. The three categories above leave out the "music", or areas such as: does the writer seem interested in the topic, and is the writing interesting or fun or worthwhile to read. Depending on the type of writing, carefully bending or breaking the rules can be part of the music. Only bend or break the rules if you are sure that it will be acceptable to your readers, or if you don't care if your readers disapprove. Also, demonstrating that you can follow the rules can give you more leeway in bending or breaking them, and even heighten the effect of breaking the rules.

The context of the writing is also important. This includes:

• What is your stance as a writer? For example, are you presenting yourself as an expert, as a neutral observer, as an advocate for a point of view, or are you writing from some other point of view? Deciding who you are going to be this time can be an enjoyable part of writing and can help you get involved and interested in your topic.
• What is the intended audience for the writing? Are you making a formal presentation to experts in the field, are you writing informally for friends, are you trying to entertain or amuse an audience, are you writing for a general audience of people you don't know, but whom you can assume have a general interest in your topic, or for some other audience?

If the writing is for a class or job assignment, the context may be assigned also. Pay careful attention to any clues about the context. On the other hand, if the writing is on your own, you will decide the context. In either case, have a clear idea of the context, at least before your final version.

This guide does not have much to say about Content and Extra, and what is does say is right here.
Content. What content is necessary varies with the type of writing. For a research paper, you need to find the content in other sources, while for a short story, the content can be the plot that you create by yourself. In all cases, though, you need to think through the content, at least before you finish your final version. In classes, writing is often assigned at least partially to push you to think about the content area. But, if you change your thinking from one paragraph to the next, this is a dead giveaway that you have are still thinking about the content, and therefore that you may not have finished thinking about it. If you are writing a play or a script, you will need a clear concept for each character, and if a character will develop, how she will develop. So, if you find yourself changing your mind, that is a clear signal that you should rewrite your present version. (If you have thought through your content, presenting or contrasting several different viewpoints is often perfectly acceptable, if you signal the reader that this is what you are doing.)
Extra. We all have a lot to read, and writing that is interesting makes the reading less of a chore and more rewarding. If your writing is interesting, your readers will thank you, either consciously or unconsciously. The best way to make your writing interesting is for you to be interested in it. If you can choose your topic, choose one that interests you. If all else fails, pretend to be interested. It works!

Some people ask the question, "In the age of the Internet, why do I need to write at all? Can't I just copy and paste? Other people write so much better than I can, after all." I (David Bowen) feel that the most important reason for being able to write well, is that it is a valuable tool in thinking well. Of course, once you have organized your own thoughts, then you are ready to present them to others in a convincing way, so it's not that there aren't other reasons, but those other reasons all start with writing for yourself.

Organization

In writing fiction, you may want to surprise or startle or even scare the reader. In informative writing, such as essays and memos, this kind of surprise does not work. For writing that is meant to inform, there are two general organizational schemes:

• General to specific. Start with a general statement and overview of the topic, and work your way down to the details. This is more appropriate if you are writing for an expert audience.
• Specific to general. Start off with a specific case to "hook" your audience, and work your way up to the topic statement and overview at the end. This is more appropriate for non-expert audiences, as a way to show why your topic is interesting.

These schemes can be combined. Specific-to-general-to-specific starts off with a specific case to interest the reader, develops the general topic or conclusion, and then ends with a series of specific cases to illustrate the range of practical applications,   mare than can be done with the single specific case at the start. General-to-specific-to-general starts with the overall topic and overview, works down to a series of specific cases to illustrate practical application, and then restates the overall topic and overview now that the practical significance is clear. Obviously, you can also create other combinations.

Other organizational schemes include:

• Historical order, usually from oldest to newest but sometimes the reverse
• Logical order, with fundamental items first, followed by items derived from the first ones, then items derived from those derived items, and so on.

For writing that is meant to inform, there are other important aspects of organization:

• Title. It is easy to downplay the title, especially for assigned writing. For example, "Just call it Essay 2 and get on with it." However, the title is probably the section where you have the greatest freedom to have fun with the writing and to present your own unique personality and point of view. For example, the title does not even have to be a complete sentence. Where else can you get away with that, scot free? An interesting and informative title can put the reader on your side right from the start. A good title gives a picture of what the writing is about, and even why the reader should be interested.
• Introduction. This is a preview or road-map to the content, to focus the reader on what to expect. Note that, if you are using a specific-to-general organization, the specific case at the beginning will often be the introduction to the writing. This makes the first specific case or cases very important. It (they) are also your introduction.
• Body. This is mainly where the organization scheme is used, and, if your stance as a writer is an expert or good observer, where your knowledge is demonstrated. Detail helps to establish your stance for the reader. A logical, topic-to-topic flow helps to communicate your information. When you move from one topic to the next, include a transition to let the reader know that the immediate topic has changed.
• Conclusion. A good conclusion can summarize the content, drive home any main points that you want to make, and in general, bring the writing to an end. Using the words "conclusion" or "summary" can make this explicit. You may also want to put the topic in a larger content, or point out further relevant questions.

We have all seen enough lawyer shows and movies that at least the last three parts of this organization should be familiar. In a court case, there are opening arguments (the introduction), the case itself (the body) and the closing arguments (the conclusion). Would you want a lawyer that didn't make the point during her closing arguments that you were innocent, or at least that you didn't really deserve that awful penalty that the prosecutor was demanding? No! And your conclusion should be just as definite. Of course, in order to be definite, the case (or for writing, the body) has to have the information to back this up.

For some types of writing, such as research papers, other sections, such as footnotes and bibliographies, can be very important.

For fiction, or for more informal writing, you can play around with the logical organization above. But that doesn't mean that organization is unimportant for fiction or informal writing. For example, if you want to surprise the reader, or scare the reader, you must set the stage very carefully. That makes the organization of what you tell the reader and when you tell it even more important.

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Mechanics

Writing mechanics includes spelling and grammar. Spelling is something for you to fix on your own. If you don't use a computer for writing, rely on a current dictionary. There are many current dictionaries on the market in paperback form at reasonable prices, so there is no excuse. If you do your writing using a computer, use spell-check. Back this up with a current dictionary for words that you are not sure of. Many computer word-processors now have built-in grammar checkers also. At this point (Winter, 2005), grammar checkers are not as well-developed as spell-checkers, and they can only be a guide, not an authority.

Do grammar and spelling matter? The spelling and grammar rules are changing, and have always changed, so one possible attitude is, "who says so?" which easily morphs into "why should I care?" I (David Bowen) believe they do, and here are two brief responses:

1. While the rules are changing, without some agreement on what words mean and how to interpret writing, we would not be able to communicate with each other. In other words, if you get too far away from the current rules, you lose your audience. In fact, the best available evidence today (2005) suggests that reading is not something automatic like copying a recording from person A to person B, but instead involves person B actively building up the meaning from the writing of person A. Spelling and grammatical errors cumulatively interfere with building up that meaning. A few errors can be easily tolerated, but add more and the reader increasingly runs into difficulty, makes more mistakes in figuring out what you are trying to say, and will eventually just give up.
2. On a more "political" note, writing well is very much like dressing well when you go to a job interview. If you want to present an educated and professional image, writing well is very much a part of "the package." While teachers of writing will often emphasize the "large scale" concerns such as voice, organization and actually having something to say, from the point of view of presenting a desirable image, writing mechanics may very well be more important than the large-scale concerns.

Many grammar checkers are especially hard on the passive voice; every instance is flagged as a problem. This, however, is not always the case. See the section on "excessive use of passive voice" below.

So, that's it for spelling here, except for words commonly mistaken for each other. Now on to grammar. We will cover only the common problems for common types of writing that are listed below.

• Basic sentence structure
  • Verbs
    • Active and passive
  • Subject and object
    • Pronouns
  • Adjectives and adverbs
• Sentence Fragments
• Improper Compound Sentences
• Excessive pronouns
• Excessive use of passive voice
• Subject-verb agreement
• Inconsistent tense
• Inconsistent punctuation
• Using the most common punctuation marks
• Words that are commonly mistaken for each other

Basic Sentence Structure

A normal English sentence has a verb, which describes an action, and a subject, which describes who or what does the action. A sentence also:

• expresses a complete thought
• begins with a capital letter
• ends with a period (or a question mark)

You will often need to decide what the verb and subject are in order to check that a sentence is correct. Usually it is easiest to find the verb or action first, and then the subject. For example, "John drives", the verb is "drives and the subject, the person of thing that does the action, is "John." For a slightly more complicated example, in the sentence, "John hit the ball", the verb is "hit" and the subject, the person or thing that does the action, is "John.

The subject of a sentence can be either a noun or a pronoun. A noun is the name of a person, place or thing, and says exactly which person, place or thing we mean. On the other hand, a pronoun is a substitute for a noun, and the noun that it is substituting for must be in an earlier sentence. In the two sentences, "John hit the ball. Then he ran to first base.", the subject of the first sentence is the noun, John, and the subject of the second sentence is the pronoun, he. We know that the pronoun refers to John, because John is also the subject of an earlier sentence, and is the only noun that "he" can refer to.

Many sentences also have an object, which receives the action, but this is not necessary. In "John hit the ball", the action of hitting is received by "the ball", so "the ball" is the object of the sentence. The object of a sentence can also be a noun or pronoun. In the sentences, "John hit the ball. It went into the stands.", the pronoun "it" has to refer to "the ball."

Pronouns are useful, because they can prevent the awkwardness and boredom of having to use the noun repeatedly. However, you need to be sure that your readers will not be confused about which pronoun refers to which noun. In the sentences, "John hit Jim. Then he fell down.", "he" could refer to either John or Jim, so case you cannot use a pronoun in the second sentence. The chances of an unclear pronoun reference increase if you use a lot of pronouns.

So far all our verbs here have been active, but verbs can also be passive. A verb is active if the subject of the sentence also carries out the action, and passive if the subject receives the action. In the sentence, "The ball was hit by John.", the verb (action) is "was hit." Who or what was hit? The ball was hit. So "the ball" is the subject of the sentence. But in fact, the ball received the action, so "was hit" is a passive verb.

Most writers prefer the active voice because it is more, well, active, and hence more interesting, and we always want our readers to be interested. Also, some use of the passive voice varies your writing and helps to make it interesting. A common rule of thumb is that no more than one-third of your sentences should use passive voice.

Sentences can also contain adjectives and adverbs. We will discuss adverbs first, because they are usually easier to recognize. An adverb is a word that usually ends in "ly" and modifies (gives more information about) a verb. For example, "John quickly hit the ball." Quickly ends in "ly" and gives more information about "hit" -- it was quick. "Quickly" is an adverb.

On the other hand, adjectives modify nouns. For example, "John quickly hit the white ball." Here, "white" describes the noun "ball" and is an adjective. There can be several adjectives modifying a noun. The ball could be described as both white and round, for example.

Now, one last wrinkle about adjectives and adverbs. Adverbs can also modify (give more information about) an adjective or another adverb. Adjectives cannot modify adjectives, only adverb as can. For an example, consider the sentence "John perfectly hit the perfectly round ball." Perfectly ends in "ly" and modifies (gives more information about) the verb "hit", but it also modifies (gives more information about) the adjective "round." So, adverbs modify (give more information about) verbs and adjectives.

Sentences can have many more elements in them, but the parts that we have covered account for many common writing problems.

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Sentence Fragments

A sentence fragment is an incomplete sentence. Here is an example: "John swung at the ball. Because his coach signaled him to hit." The first part of the quotation, "John swung at the ball," is OK. The second part of the quotation, "Because his coach signaled him to hit," is a fragment. This part has a verb ("signaled") and a subject ("coach"), but "Because" signals very clearly that this part is describing something else, and so this part cannot stand on its own - it is not a complete thought, but is dependent on another thought or sentence. Many fragments can be corrected simply, by attaching them to another sentence, often the preceding sentence. Here, "John swung at the ball because his coach signaled him to hit" is a good, complete sentence. One good way to detect a fragment is to consider it all by itself, in isolation. "Because his coach signaled him to hit." Something is missing, isn't it?

A sentence fragment can be a good use of bad grammar if it is used for the purpose of a delayed reaction, for a humorous or sarcastic effect. (Before you make this use, you should always understand whether your audience will accept its use.) Here is an example: "John tried to steal home plate while the pitcher was still going into his windup. Because - who knows why?" In other words, John tried a boneheaded play here. Two good things about this are: (a) you have made a joke, and (b) you have gotten away with something. Don't overuse this; it is the novelty that makes it work.

Improper Compound Sentences

If two sentences are joined together into one, that is often called a compound sentence. Here is an example: "John hit the ball; it flew over the fence." This could perfectly well be written as two separate sentences; "John hit the ball" and "It flew over the fence." A compound sentence is always formed by joining with a semicolon (;), never with a comma (,). Many beginning writers will use a comma to make a compound sentence, and the error will often be marked as a "comma splice." Too many compound sentences can make your writing seem overly abstract and uninteresting, but a compound sentence is a good idea if the second sentence is a consequence of the first. then the compound sentence indicates the causality; the ball flew over the fence because John hit it.

On the other hand, an explanatory phrase is always joined with a comma, if it needs any punctuation at all, but not with a semicolon, as shown in "Sentence Fragments" above. For example, "Because his coach signaled him to hit, John swung at the ball."

Excessive Pronouns

Pronouns (words such as "he", "she" and "it" that substitute for definite nouns such as "John", "Sue" or "the ball") can make sentences shorter, and vary the wording to make writing more interesting. Both of these help your writing. But this is not a case of "more is better." Since each pronoun must refer to a specific noun, if you use too many pronouns, the references can become too confusing for the reader to keep track of, even ambiguous. An ambiguous reference happens when it is impossible to decide which noun a pronoun refers too, even if you are very good at this and willing to work at it.

Often it is possible to vary the nouns to keep down the number of pronouns and still have variety. For example, in writing a letter of reference for Susan Jones, you can use "Susan" when you want to emphasize how well you know here, and "Ms Jones" when you want to show how much respect you have for her abilities.

Adjectives can also introduce variety. For example, "large house", "spacious house" and similar variations all say essentially the same thing in different ways, without using pronouns.

So, if you find yourself using several pronouns in a row, stop and think.

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Excessive Use of Passive Voice

Normal sentences are in the active voice. For example, "John hit the ball." The same thought can also be expressed in the passive voice as in "The ball was hit by John." In the passive voice, the action is not as direct and forceful as in the active voice. The subject, which in the passive example if "the ball", receives the action, while in the active version, John initiates the action. In other words, in the active version the action is more active. This makes it more interesting. Passive voice can help to vary sentence structure and maintain the reader's interest, but too much of it will bore your readers.

The passive voice is necessary sometimes, and useful at some other times, and it is not grammatically wrong. Some circumstances in which you should use the passive voice are:

• You do not know who carried out the action, and you cannot use an indefinite subject. For example, "John was killed last night" is in the passive voice. You could say something like "A killer murdered John last night", but if your intention is to focus on the pain that you and others feel because your friend John is dead, John should be the subject of the sentence.
• You know who carried out the action, but you do not want to say this. This is the case, for example, if your boss carried out an unpopular action, and you want to avoid embarrassing your boss because you would get into trouble. So, you might write that, "The personnel reviews were completed late so we are not getting pay raises this year." This would avoid pointing out that your boss made a very bad mistake.

The primary problem with the passive voice is that it is indirect, and therefore weak and less interesting. But if you use a little of it to vary your sentence structure, that can add variety and make up for the weakness.

Use some passive voice for variation -- less than thirty percent is a common guideline -- but also find other ways to vary your sentences.

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Subject-verb agreement

The verb -- the action -- and the subject -- the person, place or thing who does the action -- are the only two parts of a sentence that must be present in order to have a complete sentence. Because the subject carries out the action indicated in the verb, in a correct sentence the subject and verb must agree with each other. Both the subject and the verb can be either singular or plural. Here, "singular" means one person, place or thing, while "plural" means more than one. In language, the quality of being singular or plural is called "number". Compared to counting, this "number" is pretty easy; the only two numbers are "one" and "more than one." The hard part is that both the subject and verb must agree in number. If one is singular, the other must be singular. If one is plural, the other must be plural.

Generally, the plural form or version of a verb is the same as the singular form, with an "s" or "es" at the end. The plain s is used if the singular form of the verb ends in a vowel (the vowels are the letters a, e, i, o and u, and sometimes y) or a consonant (all the other letters in the alphabet are consonants). So, "run" is the singular form and "runs" is the plural form.

With subjects (nouns) it is the opposite; "s" on the plural, no s on the singular.

So, an easy way to remember about subject-verb number agreement is that only one of them should have an s on the end. Note that, for number, neither the s on the subject nor the s on the verb have an apostrophe ('). The apostrophe on a noun indicates possession. Verbs do not have apostrophes, ever.

An example of subject-verb number agreement is: "John Smith laughs a lot." (singular) compared to "The Smiths laugh a lot." (plural).

There are several exceptions to all of this:

• Two singular subjects connected by "and" become a plural subject, so while "John Smith laughs a lot" (singular), "John and Sarah Smith laugh a lot" (plural).
• Only the third person singular form of a verb (for he, she and it subjects) has the s/es ending. The first and second person singular (for I and you subjects) are like the plural form, with no s/es. On the other hand, all of the plural verb forms (first, second and third person for we, you and they subjects) are the same, with no s/es ending.
• The verb "to be" works differently, as follows: I am; you are; he, she or it is; we, you or they are.
• Compound subjects can be tricky. An example is, "The group of people is laughing." The verb in this sentence is "is laughing." To find the subject, we ask, "who or what is laughing?" The answer tells us the subject. In this case, the answer is that "The group" is laughing. Since "group" is singular (there is only one group here), the verb is also singular, "is." This is the case even though the group obviously has a plural membership, all of whom are laughing. In this case, it is not the fact that several people are laughing, but the fact that the sentence treats the people as a single thing, the group. If we didn't treat the people as a single group, we would say "The people are laughing." We can also say here, without any fear of contradiction, that this is a very common mistake. Even sources that are models for other writers, such as newspapers, make this mistake commonly.

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Inconsistent tense

In language, "tense" refers to when the action takes place: present, past or future. Your writing should not change tense without a reason. Changing tense because of carelessness confuses your readers. Sometimes a narrative will have to change tense, if the content takes place at different times. At other times, you will want to use the future tense to show how a possibility could work out in a specific case. So it is not that all tense changes are incorrect. There should be a reason for changing the tense, and you as the writer should make sure that the reason is known to your readers.

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Inconsistent punctuation

Be consistent with capitalization and other punctuation, especially with new words that do not yet have standards. For example, "Internet" is commonly capitalized, but not necessarily so; "internet" is also used. But within a document, such as an article or essay, you should be consistent, so that your readers do not have to figure out that you are not writing about a single thing, and not different things. Another example is the various forms of "email." Common forms are "E-mail", "e-mail", Email" and "email". As is common with new compound words, the hyphenated forms ("E-mail" and "e-mail") are more common, but as this ceases to be so new, the hyphen will probably disappear. But, whatever form you choose, be consistent within a document.

Suppose you are writing for an editor or you are writing for academic credit, and your editor or faculty member insists on a certain form? This is a well-known problem for writers, and most writers adopt a flexible attitude -  just accept what the editor or faculty member says. While they may just be exercising power, they may also in fact be more in touch with current usage than you are.

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Using the most common punctuation marks

The most common punctuation marks, which we will review here, are the period (.), comma (,), apostrophe ('), semicolon (;) colon(:) and hyphen (-).

The period (.) is the simplest. It ends a sentence. Three periods in a row (...) are called an ellipsis and indicate that there is more to be said, but it is being taken for granted. Example, perhaps to someone who has just said something that is incredibly foolish: "I just don't know what to say..."

The apostrophe (') is next simplest. It has two uses. First, it is used to indicate that one or more letters have been dropped in a contraction, such as when it "is is" contracted to "it's." The other use of the apostrophe is to show possession. For example, if the ball belongs to John, then it is John's ball. Note: the apostrophe is not used for making a plural form of a noun. Mr. and Ms. Smith are the Smiths, not the Smith's. If the ball belongs to John Smith, then it is John Smith's ball, but if it belongs to both of them it is the Smiths' ball. If the ball belongs to the Joneses (Mr. and Mrs. Jones), then it is the Jones's ball.
NOTE: The apostrophe leads a third life. This third life is the single quotation mark. In the situation in which a quotation contains a quotation (inner and outer quotes), either (whichever you wish) the inner or outer quotation should be a single quote. Example: Mom yelled at me, saying, "When I said, 'go to your room,' I meant it."

The comma, semicolon and colon are used to join parts of sentences together, each under different circumstances. The comma marks off of phrases, where you as the writer want to emphasize that a shift is occurring. In many cases, the use of commas is discretionary. That is, there are many places where a comma can be used, but does not have to be used. One mistake that you can make in using commas is to use them everywhere that you can. This results in writing that is broken up and hard to read, whether the reading us silent or aloud.

Specifically, the comma is used to separate items in a list, for example, a list such as nouns, verbs, adjectives and adjectives. Instead of "and", the next to last word in the list could be "or." Whether or not there is a comma before the "and" or "or" seems to be a matter of individual preference. Some writing teachers insist on having it one way or the other, and in such a case you should do as directed. Using the comma before the "and" or "or" in a list can be interpreted as emphasizing that the items have a greater degree of difference than if that comma is not used.

Like the apostrophe, the semicolon has two uses. First, it can be used to join two complete sentences together to emphasize a connection between them. The second sentence does not start with a capital letter. To join to sentences together, use a semicolon; try it, it works!

The second use of a semicolon is to separate parts of a sentence, and you would ordinarily use a comma, but where one of the parts must have commas inside it. A specific example is a list, where at least one of the list items has parts that must be separated by commas. An example of this is: furniture can be made of: wood, including oak;  metal, especially steel for springs; and fabrics, including leather. Even if only a single element in a list uses a comma, every element must be separated by semicolons.

The colon is used to separate large parts of sentences, where the first parts is a complete sentence all by itself, but the second part is not a complete sentence, or where you want more separation of the parts than is indicated by the semicolon. The colon is also used to show the beginning of a list. For an example, see the list in the semicolon section.

The hyphen (-) leads a double life, first as an informal substitute for a comma or semicolon in setting off a phrase ("I'll get back to you this afternoon - I've got an emergency right now.") but more formally in joining two words that are used together as a compound adjective. Here are some examples: "the just-discovered manuscript," "a brightly-colored ball," or "a long-lost friend." Some very common compound adjectives have become joined into a single word that is not hyphenated. Examples of this are "there are my everyday dishes," and "we are nowhere." In the first example, "every" and "day" have been joined; in the second, "no" and "where."

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Words that are commonly mistaken for each other

Many words are commonly mistaken for each other, based on similar spellings and pronunciations. I (David Bowen) used to think that this list of words commonly mistaken for each other would turn out to be a relatively short list, but the list below keeps getting longer and longer, and there are always many examples that I have not yet had time to enter.. Spell-checkers will not catch these errors, because the wrong word is used, but that wrong word is spelled correctly. At this point (Winter 2005), most grammar checkers will not catch these errors either.

Note: This is only a partial list of words that are mistaken for each other.

Note: Only the most common meanings are given for these easily confused words.

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