Several BizWritingTip readers have commented on the news story regarding the decision of a city in England to ban apostrophes from street signs. Apparently, the politicians in Birmingham have decided apostrophes on signs are dated and confusing. The decision was the result of decades of debate and confusion surrounding punctuation on signs for local landmarks, […]
Connie’s question: “I was wondering what you thought the correct abbreviation for continued would be? Is there a standard?” BizwritingTip response: Some words have set abbreviations, e.g., Mr., Sr., and Inc. You will find official abbreviations in the dictionary. Other words are abbreviated by leaving out letters and inserting an apostrophe, e.g., can’t or it’s. […]
BizWritingTip reader: “French being my first language, I am having difficulty figuring out when I should use ‘into’ versus ‘in’ and ‘onto’ versus ‘on.’ As of today, I am almost exclusively using ‘in’ and ‘on’ since I am not quite sure when I should use ‘into’ and ‘onto.’ ” BizWritingTip response: The nuances of these […]
BizWritingTip reader: “How do you punctuate a list of things, such as your job responsibilities? Also, does the tense of the verb have to be the same in each line? How do you show something that you have done in the past, but you do not do on a regular basis?” BizWritingTip response: First, there […]
BizWritingTip question: “In our organization, we have a department called Children’s Services. Is this correct? I thought the apostrophe indicates ownership. In this case, the children do not own the services. The department provides the services for children.” BizWritingTip response: Your question is not a simple one to answer. There are a couple of points that […]
Mary’s question: “My current pet peeve is the use of the word instantaneously rather than instantly. It seems rather cumbersome and the words, to me, are synonymous.” BizWritingTip response: Both adverbs are derived from the noun instant (Medieval Latin word instantāneus). And although they tend to overlap, the nuances are different. Instantly means immediately. It implies promptness. Example We phoned for the […]
BizWritingTip reader: “I am not sure when to use ‘could’ as opposed to ‘would.’ For example, I often write: ‘Would you be able to send me the figures?’ It seems more polite, but is it grammatically correct?” BizWritingTip response: Yes. It is grammatically correct. “Would” and “could” are similar words with slightly different meanings. It […]
BizWritingTip reader: “In my line of work, I often write letters to committee members and physicians something like this: ‘We are pleased to hear that you accepted Gayle Sawyer into the Internal Medicine Program.’ “My question is should the word program have a capital letter? We have noticed on occasions that program was typed with […]
BizWritingTip reader: “When vacationing in Mexico last week, I went to a restaurant called Carlos’n Charlie’s. Is the name grammatically correct? I don’t think you need two apostrophes.” BizWritingTip response: An establishment has the right to call itself anything it wishes. However, you are right. Carlos and Charlie’s would be the grammatically correct way to name this well-known […]
Kathleen’s question: “Recently, I have noticed replies to me with ‘Thanks, Kathleen.’ The comma annoys me and just looks and sounds wrong. Is this the correct way of writing this?” BizWritingTip response: Grammatically, Thanks, Kathleen means Kathleen is thanking someone else. Thanks, Kathleen is a shortened version of Thanks, Kathleen On the other hand, Thanks Kathleen (no […]