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Pam Nelson: The Grammar Guide

 

Archive for March 2009

Number of comments in parentheses

26: Back from hiatus: Triangle Grammar Guide quiz

I’ve been thinking about how people learn English as a second language and studying inflection, including the way we make plurals and possessives. So here is a short quiz on possessives for native speakers as well as for those who have learned or are learning English as a second language. Click here or on the question mark icon to begin. This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity; and is copyright © 2011 The News & Observer Publishing Company, which reserves the right to[.....]

14: Word watch: detainee and combatant

A headline from today’s newspaper, "U.S. drops ‘enemy combatant’ label; detainees remain," made me curious about the suffixes in "combatant" and "detainee." The meanings of the suffixes play This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity; and is copyright © 2011 The News & Observer Publishing Company, which reserves the right to remove this post.

7: Pronouns without gender

Some have long lamented that English has no gender-neutral pronoun to use in a construction such as this: Everyone needs his or her breakfast. In regular, everyday speech, we might say "their" instead of "his or her." But "everyone" is singular, so the pronoun following it should be singular."His or her" is rather clunky, though. Back in the olden days (my youth) we’d just use "his." But feminism helped us see the problem with that approach. This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity;[.....]

4: Happy National Grammar Day

This is National Grammar Day. Perhaps this is a good day to try the Triangle Grammar Guide quizzes, if you haven’t. You can find links to them here. Most of them are short. Strictly speaking, they aren’t about grammar. Some parts deal with usage or word choice. Have fun! This article was originally posted by the Raleigh News & Observer, a subsidiary of The McClatchy Co.; is posted here to provide continuity; and is copyright © 2011 The News & Observer Publishing Company, which reserves the right to remove this post.

1: Get ready for National Grammar Day

National Grammar Day is Wednesday (March 4). A day set aside for promoting correct (or, at least, standard) English grammar and usage is the brainchild and pet cause of Martha Brockenbrough, who founded the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar (SPOGG) and writes the SPOGG blog. National Grammar Day could unleash our pedantic impulses. Indeed, some people might take metaphorical red pens in hand to delete errant apostrophes and chastise those who would say, "Please tell Mary or myself …" But we don’t have to become Miss Thistlebottom, Theodore M. Bernstein’s mythical promoter of outmoded and bogus rules[.....]