Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with writing and grammar

That is the question.

ageispolis — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:43:50 -0800

What is a good heuristic for the usage of 'that'? I am not referring to the distinction between 'that' and 'which', but its broader conjunctive and connective use.

I find myself overusing the word, and instead of deciding whether I should omit it or not in the editing process, it'd be great if I could learn to only use it when necessary.

Any ideas?

Difficulty of writing and speaking English?

ragtimepiano — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 14:25:53 -0800

Is English much more difficult than most languages to speak and to write? I have a good friend who is a high school English teacher. He is frustrated by the many errors in the papers he grades. Some common errors: "Your" for "You are"; misuse of the apostrophe, such as "apple's for sale"; improper grammar such as "Me and him went to the game".
We are wondering if students in other countries speak and write incorrectly as much as American students do? I speak a little Spanish, and I realize Spanish is an elegant, easily pronounced and spelled language, with a grammatical structure that maybe makes more sense than that of English. But French? And how about the convoluted syntax of German?
Multi-linguists of the hive mind, what do you think?

Tell me about this sentence construction

peep — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 09:23:06 -0800

Tell me everything you know about this sentence construction: "Are you finished your lunch?" In the past few months, I've heard the following three sentences while watching cartoons with my son.

1. "Are you finished your lunch?"
2. "I'm all finished my book."
3. "I'm finished the decorations."

At first I thought the sentence must have been misdubbed or something - like it was written "Have you finished . . ." and there was an error in recording the voice and they just left it. But three times (and on different shows)?

I'm in the US. Is this a regional thing, or common in English speaking countries other than the US? I'm 33, and I had never before heard this construction, nor seen it in print or noticed it in anything I've read on the web.

Have you heard this? Do you use it? Where are you from and what languages do you speak? Any details appreciated.

Help me design a writing guide for undergraduates

philosophygeek — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 01:10:02 -0800

I'm putting together a writing guide for my undergraduate philosophy course. What information should I put in the guide? My goal is to give students a useful reference for writing papers in philosophy, since this course is likely the first course they have had in this field. I would like to do something more than a grammar cheat sheet or style guide. For instance, I am including discipline-specific examples of how to reconstruct an argument, how to effectively use a quotation, and how to adequately explain a central claim. But, I also want to cover at least some of the major grammar issues my students have: e.g. vs. i.e. vs. viz., its vs. it's, and so forth.

In addition to what I should include, I would also appreciate feedback on how much is too much. The guide will definitely be at least two pages, but it could be substantially more. At what point does it become overwhelming rather than helpful? I don't want to create my own book, but I could imagine a 10-page guide. Is that size intimidating rather than helpful?

Looking for writing software which can parse my stories..

ceberon — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 14:39:06 -0800

When I was in high school, we had a writing lab with some type of mainframe-ish type terminals setup, where there was writing software available which would list frequently repeated words, point out large paragraphs, spelling errors, document complexity, punctuation errors, etc. This was awhile ago, is this type of thing freely available anywhere these days? I did find one piece of software online which had some of the functionality I remember, but it didn't list them all. I was hoping since this software must be well over 15-20 years old, that it must have been open sourced by now?

So I'm preferring free, love open source (would like to be able to tweak, put online, etc), etc. Suggestions?

How do I use footnotes properly?

Badmichelle — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 09:11:12 -0800

Footnote experts/writers: Please help me decide the best way to use footnotes in my document. I'm writing a document (it's a guide, not an academic paper) that contains a number of footnotes - 11, in a 34-page document.

What I'm facing now is an almost-finished document with a really odd system of footnoting. Some pages have numbered footnotes, some use symbols (asterisks). What I want to do is get rid of the numbers, and use asterisks on each page to refer to the footnotes on that page only (as in, I'll start over with * on each page there is a footnote).

Is there any reason I shouldn't do this? Are there rules of footnoting that I need to know? I googled use of footnotes, but what I've found is academic advice to students re: using footnotes or endnotes. That's not helpful to me. I'm definitely using footnotes, and it isn't academic, so I'm not tied to a style guide.

I know I'm making this more complicated than it should be, but I'd like to get it right. I've also read this document so many times that I'm starting to question every single part of it. Suggestions?

Help me improve an employee's writing skills.

bartinpc — Thu, 15 May 2008 12:29:15 -0800

Looking for recommendations for English grammar workbook(s) designed for adults who did not finish high school years ago. I have an employee of mine, who's progressed from a bottom rung employee to a shift supervisor over the course of almost 20 years. The guy knows the facility inside and out, he's a great day-to-day supervisor, and I want to see him be able to progress up the management ranks in the future.

One of his annual goals I set for him this year was to work on his grammar/writing skills. He never finished high school (but later attained his GED), but his spelling and writing skills are pretty bad. I am looking for some workbooks that will help him improve his business/technical writing.

Books with titles like "English Grammar for Dummies" don't send the message I'm looking for if I'm handing this to an employee.

Any ideas?

The subject verbs the object

sarahkeebs — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 06:46:51 -0800

Explain tenses to me? Past/present/future, continuous/simple/perfect, and so on, in English. I can use them with fluency, but I need to be able to explain them (when each is used, how to form them). I've tried Fowler's, Chicago Manual of Style, and a number of other resources, but they seem to subtly contradict one another. Is there a simple, go-to reference for this?

I was,were,will be confused!

gilsonal — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 13:47:50 -0800

is there a grammar checker out there that will check my documents for consistent tense? I have a teacher who's a real stickler, and even if I go over my paper with a fine toothed comb, I always miss one or two. Does anybody have a program I could use to save myself some points in class?

The first things you read when you open a book are...what?

soulbarn — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 14:32:32 -0800

I'm writing a book. What's the difference between a prologue, a foreword, an introduction, and a preface?

grammerFilter: present/past tense

allelopath — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 09:52:17 -0800

I am writing a children's book (first time). I can't decide whether to use present or past tense. Here's a sample in present tense: Bobby walks slowly into the water. The waves rush up over his feet, but he is not afraid because the same thing happened last time. He goes a little farther. And a little farther. The water is up to his knees. and past tense: Bobby walked slowly into the water. The waves rushed up over his feet, but he was not afraid because the same thing happened last time. He went a little farther. And a little farther. The water was up to his knees. The present tense seems a little more "active", but past tense has certain story telling quality. Any comments on why I should use one or the other?

Remedial Writing Tools

alms — Fri, 22 Jul 2005 07:33:59 -0800

Are there any resources I can recommend to a coworker who has very poor writing skills? This person isn't dumb. She managed to get an MA from a pretty good college. But her writing is often very bad. At the macro level, it simply isn't organized. She has very poor grammar: she uses sentence fragments, non-grammatical run-on sentences, random punctuation. There's usually one serious malaprop every two or three pages.

I have the responsibility to review this person's work. I need to do something more than rewrite it. I'd like to do something other than recommend she be fired. Unfortunately, we work at a very poor non-profit, so a business-writing class is not something we could pay for (unless it was very very inexpensive).

Can anyone recommend books, web sites, low-cost classes or other resources that could help?

Italics etiquette for CD inserts?

plexiwatt — Mon, 06 Dec 2004 10:57:02 -0800

PunctuationFilter: I'm writing the copy for a CD insert booklet in which the title of a book is mentioned. Typically, I'd italicize it, but the entire piece is already in italics. What's the standard here?

Is it ever OK in prose to start a sentence with "and"?

badstone — Fri, 03 Sep 2004 11:54:10 -0800

Is it ever OK in prose to start a sentence with "and"? The general situation I'm thinking of is when you want to insert a sort of dramatic pause into the middle of a narrative sentence that has "and" (or any conjunction in it). E.g. - "We were so relieved when MetaFiler came back online after being down for several hours. And yet we secretly relished those moments, the reclaimed time during which we visited other web sites long forgotten."

Are semicolons frowned upon stylistically?

PrinceValium — Wed, 02 Jun 2004 14:38:45 -0800

I find that I use a lot of semicolons when I write. Is this okay, or frowned upon stylistically? Strunk & White don't say much about the subject; they recommend semicolons when needed to replace awkward commas and the words while and though. ("Connecticut has a long shoreline; Wyoming is entirely land-locked.") FWIW, my writing pretty much entirely consists of legal memos and blogging. And yes, that was sort of intentional.

"Normative"

grumblebee — Fri, 21 May 2004 09:53:18 -0800

What does "normative" mean? Is it a useful word? I only ever see it used in obscure, academic writing, which makes me suspect it's worthless. How is it different from "normal"? My dictionary says it means, "Of, relating to, or prescribing a norm or standard: normative grammar." That sounds like "normal" to me, so why not just say "normal"? Can someone give me some clear sentences that use the word -- sentences that are not written in post-modern, complit speak? Can one use "normative" meaningfully in a sentence about real-world things, like butter, eggs or bricks?