US v UK punctuation

Grammarian: UK v US punctuation...worlds apart! Full stop (or period)

British English (BrE) is used in the UK, whereas American English (AmE) is used in the United States, and that goes for punctuation as well as grammar and vocabulary.  BrE v AmE Punctuation differences We’ll concentrate solely upon punctuation…
The dangers of omitting punctuation

It's no use crying over spilt milk....or 'Why the Oxford comma is not dead'

That comma would have sunk our ship -David G. Webbert, a lawyer representing the dairy drivers I'm often dismissed as a pedant for using the Oxford comma in my writing and book editing. I like the fact it makes sentences complete whilst…
Style Guides

Style Guides for Business Writing

Different publications have different rules for the articles they publish, but they all have one thing in common - a Style Guide.  Style Guides may run to many tens of pages (e.g. for a book publisher), or they may be able to be summarised…
Business Latin

The Grammarian - Business Latin

Latin is still taught to millions of students around the world, and will continue to be for a very long time to come. Fundamentally this is because: Latin is the main and most recent root language for many major world languages …
Latin abbreviations
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The Grammarian - Latin abbreviations to be cut short

The GDS (Government Digital Service) has announced that it is set to abolish Latin abbreviations on its websites, to avoid confusing non-English speakers. So, in the near future: e.g. (exampli gratia) = will be replaced by 'such as' …
The dangers of omitting punctuation
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George Orwell, Newspeak

Don't you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? Newspeak was George Orwell's fictional language, invented for the book 1984. It was created by the totalitarian state Oceania, and allowed only a narrow range…
Banjaxed
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Banjaxed - Wogan's favourite word

The great maxim at the BBC is, if it ain't broke, break it Dear old Terry - the man who introduced 'banjaxed' into the English vocabulary (or at least popularised it) - was a wordsmith of heroic proportions, and hence somewhat of a hero of…
Humorous example of punctuation

The Grammarian: Punctuation - It's all Greek to me

"Proper punctuation is both the sign and the cause of clear thinking. If it goes, the degree of intellectual impoverishment we face is unimaginable” - Lynne Truss Punctuation through the Ages Punctuation is a relatively modern affair. In…
Grammar (O)

The Grammarian - How English words reinvent themselves...

Where Do Words Come From? New words have entered (and continue to enter) the English language in many different ways. Here are some of the most common: Borrowing Although most of our vocabulary comes from Latin and Greek (often by way…
The dangers of omitting punctuation
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The Grammarian - text speak and the reluctant comma

"I'll never date an apostrophe....the last one was just too possessive" 3 comma-related reasons to fear the absence of punctuation Writing is a dying art and emails are becoming passé, but text speak is taking over the world. 1.Commas…