10 Grammar and Punctuation Rules to Always Remember - Freewrite Store

10 Grammar and Punctuation Rules to Always Remember - Freewrite Store The English language, cobbled together over centuries from Germanic, Scandinavian, Latin, French and Greek sources, is a minefield of confusing (and often contradictory) rules. So it’s no wonder that writers frequently struggle with the correct use of words and punctuation. However, most readers will agree that writing littered with errors comes across as sloppy and unprofessional, damaging their trust in the message and the author. To help you improve your writing, here’s a list of some of the most common mistakes that writers make, and tips on how to avoid them.   1. Apostrophes Apostrophes have two main uses – in contractions and to show possession. They’re quite different, so we’ll cover each one separately. Contractions: A contraction is where you take two words and combine them, missing out a letter or two along the way. Should not = shouldn’tI have = I’veWe will = we’ll Generally, wherever the missing letters are, that’s where the apostrophe goes. You can also apply this rule if you’re writing dialogue where someone cuts off the beginning or end of a word, like ‘ello, or nothin’. Possessives: A possessive apostrophe is used to show ownership. It’s done by placing ‘s after the noun. I am walking Pete’s dog this morning.I need to buy a gift for my sister’s birthday.The children’s bus was late again. Things get slightly more confusing, however, if the noun already ends in an s. In this case, you need to consider how you would say it out loud. If you would add an es sound to the end of the word, then you write it with ‘sat the end. I was summoned to the boss’s office.The bus’s tire was completely flat.Dennis’s parties were legendary. However, if you wouldn’t add an es sound to the end of the word, then a lone apostrophe is appropriate. I am walking my parents’ dog this morning.The kids’ hamster had five babies.The Hastings’ roses are magnificent this year. When not to apostrophize Don’t forget that apostrophes have no place in ordinary plural nouns, like bananas, toys, or megabytes. An apostrophe in an ordinary plural is sometimes called a â€Å"greengrocer’s apostrophe† because it could often be found on signs in fruit and vegetable shops. Apostrophes also don’t need to be used in dates or acronyms. I was born in the 1970s.Nobody uses CDs anymore. The exception is if you’re omitting letters or numbers or using the apostrophe possessively. The ‘80s produced some amazing music.Landing a probe on Mars was one of NASA’s greatest achievements. You also never use an apostrophe in a possessive pronoun. Theybecomes theirsHerbecomes hersItbecomes its 2. Semicolons Much confusion surrounds the use of the semicolon, but it’s actually quite simple to utilize. It only has two functions. The first is to join two related clauses in a sentence. There are three conditions of use: both parts of the sentence must be able to stand alone, they need to relate to each other somehow, and they need to be of equal weight. For example: I love Hawaiian pizza; the pineapple tastes amazing.I burned my tongue on the pizza; the pineapple was too hot. If you put a coordinating conjunction between the two clauses (and, but, for, nor, or, so, yet), then you would replace the semicolon with a comma. The other use of a semicolon is when you’ve got a long sentence, and you’re listing groups of items. To prevent reader confusion, you can use a semicolon between each group. For example: My son needs a lot of things for his first day of school: pens, pencils and markers; exercise books, writing pads and binders; and erasers, paperclips and a calculator. 3. Oxford Commas The Oxford comma (aka serial comma or Harvard comma) is the comma that occurs before the and in a list. The second comma in the list below is the Oxford comma. I like pizza, cake, and chocolate. For such a small piece of punctuation, it has generated a lot of debate. Many style guides now prescribe that the Oxford comma should be omitted. At the same time, it has a lot of very vocal fans who insist it should be retained. If you don’t have a set style to follow, there’s no definitive rule beyond being consistent with whichever method you choose to follow. Most of the time, taking out the Oxford comma has no detrimental effect on the structure of a sentence. However, there are occasions where omitting the Oxford comma leads to ambiguity and, in those cases, it should always be used. For example, here’s a real-life quote: Amongst those interviewed were Merle Haggard’s two ex-wives, Kris Kristofferson and Robert Duvall. Without the final comma, the sentence appears to suggest that Merle Haggard was married to both Kris Kristofferson and Robert Duvall. The use of an Oxford comma would have made it obvious that this was a list of four separate interviewees. So, if you have no set style guide to follow, the choice to deploy the Oxford comma rests with you – but if you prefer not to use it, make sure its omission doesn’t change the meaning of your sentence. Next, let’s look at commonly mixed-up words. Most of these are words that sound the same but have different applications. 4. Your/you’re Your = it belongs to you. Your library book is overdue. You’re = the shortened version of ‘you are’. You’re welcome. When in doubt: Try replacing the word with you are. If it doesn’t fit, then use your. 5. There/they’re/their There = a place. Put it over there. They’re = the shortened version of ‘they are’. They’re going to be late. Their = belongs to them. The couple enjoyed their pizza. 6. To/too To is a preposition with many meanings, including â€Å"towards† and â€Å"until†. Let’s walk to the bus. It should get here at five minutes to midday.Too is an adverb that means â€Å"also† or â€Å"very†. I want to catch the bus, too, but I am too tired to walk there. 7. Who’s/whose Who’s = the shortened version of â€Å"who is†. Who’s that? Whose = belonging to who? Whose bag is this? When in doubt: Try replacing the word with who is. If it doesn’t fit, use whose. 8. It’s/its It’s = the shortened version of it is. It’s a beautiful day. Its = belonging to it The cat swished its tail. When in doubt: Try replacing the word with it is. If it doesn’t fit, use its. 9. Less/fewer Both less and fewer mean the same thing, but they are not interchangeable. There’s a fairly simple way to work out which one you should be using. Less is for situations when you’re using words that don’t normally have a plural, aren’t made plural by adding an s,and cannot be counted. Examples of this include water, rain, and traffic. There was less water in the bath than I expected.I had hoped for less rain today.If more people caught the bus, there would be less traffic. Lessis also used when referring to numbers, either on their own or in measurements of time, distance or weight. The bus will arrive in less than five minutes.It is less than a mile away.The pizza recipe uses less than 12oz of flour. On the other hand, fewer is used for items that can be counted or made plural by adding an s, like cats, jobs, and roses. There are fewer cats in the neighborhood since the dog moved in.The rise in automation means there are fewer jobs available.This summer we have fewer roses in our garden. When in doubt: See if you can add a number to the word. You can’t say â€Å"there is five traffic,† so you would use less. You can say â€Å"there are three pizzas,† so you would use fewer. 10. Everyday/every day People tend to write this as one word. However, that changes the meaning. Everyday = common, usual. I’m wearing my everyday clothes. Every day = each day. The Queen doesn’t wear a tiara every day. When in doubt: Replace everyday with each day. If the meaning of the sentence remains intact, then you need to write everyday as two separate words. Given the complexity of the English language, there are exceptions to most of these rules. However, the ones we’ve outlined here will apply to most instances where you need to use these punctuation marks and words.  Are there any writing mistakes we've left out that drive you nuts?   Let us know in the comments section below!  Ã‚      About the author: Claire Wilkins is a freelance copywriter and editor from New Zealand. She loves to write about travel, health, home, and proper punctuation. After a career in financial services spanning almost three decades, Claire left the corporate world behind to start Unmistakable - her writing and editing business. She creates website copy, blogs, and newsletters for creative agencies and small businesses, and  specialises  in polishing existing content until it shines. In her spare time, Claire enjoys cloud-spotting, singing in the car and editing video.

The Meaning Behind West African Kente Cloth

The Meaning Behind West African Kente Cloth Kente is a brightly colored, banded material and is the most widely known cloth produced in Africa. Although kente cloth is now identified with the Akan people in West Africa, and particularly the Asante Kingdom, the term originates from the neighboring Fante. Kente cloth is closely related to Adinkra cloth, which has symbols stenciled into cloth and is associated with mourning.​ History Kente cloth is made from thin strips about four cm thick woven together on narrow looms - typically by men. The strips are interlaced to form a fabric which is usually worn wrapped around the shoulders and waist like a toga - the garment is also known as kente. Women wear two shorter lengths to form a skirt and bodice. Originally made from white cotton with some indigo patterning, kente cloth evolved when silk arrived with Portuguese traders in the seventeenth century. Fabric samples were pulled apart for the silken thread, which was then woven into the kente cloth. Later, when skeins of silk became available, more sophisticated patterns were created - although the extortionate cost of the silk meant they were only available to Akan royalty. Mythology and Meaning Kente has its own mythology - claiming the original cloth was taken from the web of a spider - and related superstitions - such as no work can be started or completed on a Friday and that mistakes require an offering to be made to the loom. In kente cloth colors are significant: Blue means loveGreen means growth and energyYellow (gold) means wealth and royaltyRed means violence and anger,White means goodness or victoryGrey means shameBlack means death (or old age) Royalty Even today, when a new design is created, it must first be offered to the royal house. If the king declines to take the pattern, it can be sold to the public. Designs worn by Asante royalty may not be worn by others. Pan-African Diaspora As one of the prominent symbols of African arts and culture, Kente cloth has been embraced by the broader African diaspora (which means people of African descent wherever they might live.) Kente cloth is particularly popular in the United States among African-Americans and can be found on all types of clothing, accessories, and objects. These designs replicate registered Kente designs, but are often mass-produced outside of Ghana with no recognition or payment going to the Akan craftsmen and designers, which Boatema Boateng has argued represents a significant loss of income to Ghana. Sources Boateng, Boatema, The Copyright Thing Doesnt Work Here: Adinkra and Kente Cloth and Intellectual Property in Ghana. University of Minnesota Press, 2011.Smith, Shea Clark. Kente Cloth Motifs, African Arts, vol. 9, no. 1 (Oct. 1975): 36-39.

Comment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Comment - Essay Example The post further states that we should begin to be mindful of the waste we dump into our environment and stop giving much thought to the big cars we want to drive without caring about the effect it has in our environment (Kasting and Seifert 123). The importance of caring for our natural resources like the water catchment areas and reducing the rate of using fossil fuels to help restore our environmental sanity is also highlighted in this post. The industrial revolution increased the need for more raw materials and this prompted the increased degradation of our natural resources to help feed the demand for industrialization but at the expense of destroying our environment. Technological growth has also not had any significant impacts on the fight to end global warming but has created avenues for people to have shortcuts and cheats in accomplishing their tasks (Kasting and Seifert 123) In conclusion, I want to concur with the post that all the blame of the environmental damage so far done on our environment is on human beings due to the activities and inactivity towards preserving God’s gift to

Morality in Humanities Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Morality in Humanities - Essay Example An obvious question that would crop up in the restless mind of man would be, â€Å"Why are we born; and what is our purpose in life?† Religion ideally answers this question and hence has been a pivotal factor for determining the transitions in the standards of morality. A striking example of this is the authority of the clergy till some centuries ago in all parts of the world. All major decisions on judging or defining morality, whether social or personal had some or the other influence of the priesthood. However, religions as practised by the masses have also undergone various changes. It is no more as rigid and sacrosanct today as it was earlier. People now tend towards applying critical and rational thinking. For instance, a comparatively larger percentage of today’s population is more concerned and observant about animal rights, than about personal salvation. (The rise and activities of various animal rights groups can attest this fact.)Hence, animal sacrifices for religious reasons are close to hitting nadir in the American society. Thus it can be argued that relaxation of religious dogmas have led towards new moral standards, those of eco-sensitivity and freedom from religious restrictions, the degrees varying according to the demographics. Today’s man is far-more free-thinking and tolerant and considers it below his moral standards to deny the rights of living to others for personal gains. Therefore, at least in the west religion is gradually losing its hold over morality since most of those nations are secular and statistics suggest that more and more people are turning towards atheism and agnosticism there. For example in the U.S. the figure is 15% in 2008 compared to about 8.2 in 1990. (Kosmin, Keyser, Highlight) Another prominent factor governing the transitions in morality is family. Man spends most of his life with his family adhering to its needs, demands and laws since it is the same family

Alternatives to Live-Action Fictional Films :: Film, Documentary

Is there an alternative to live action fictional films? And if there is an alternative is there a chance it could be entertaining? Who doesn’t enjoy a good fiction film? In Film: An Introduction by William H. Phillips, we learn that the alternative to such films can be both enlightening and entertaining (299). What type of film could be both enlightening and entertaining? Documentaries are. There is potential in a documentary film, also referred to as non-fictional films, which fictional films cannot grasp. According to Jack C. Ellis, a known documentary film critic, documentaries â€Å"(1) communicate insights, achieve beauty, and offer understanding.† They also â€Å"(2) improve social, political, or economic conditions† (qtd. in Phillips 299). In ways documentary films are similar to fictional films. Both types of films have infinite possibilities of topic choices to choose from and have a crew to influence and manipulate the film so that it can be accepted the way they want it represented. However, documentary films are created to be works of informative and factual art. Fictional films, although they may stem from the ground of truth, they branch into the realm of unrealistic entertainment (316). But why is there a big market for documentaries? The answer is simple. Each person alive; whether they are young, old, intelligent, undereducated, black, white, Baptist, atheist, everyone has an interest in something and documentaries can inform an audience about that particular interest (316). There are two types of documentaries, the narrative and the non-narrative. The majority of documentary films are made up of non-narrative films, meaning that there isn’t an actual story being portrayed in the film rather just a list of information that make an argument (301). Narrative documentaries create and develop a story, normally following a person and their ambitions. This type of documentary is more comparable to fictional films versus non-narrative films because the information presented does not have to be sequential as long as it is factual (302,303). Both types of documentaries use artifacts, such as photographs, that pertain to the subject in their film and are spliced from one frame to another in the editing process, to force the point of view that the director wishes to portray onto the viewer (301 & 306). This is the reason that Phillips refers to documentaries as ‘Mediated Reality’. A documentary film is biased and cannot be objective. It may be perceived as truth by viewers, but there is a difference between the genuine footage that was recorded and the censored scenes that were developed in editing.

Finding Neverland Essay

The movie Finding Neverland is about the writer J. M. Barrie and his journey of writing plays about imagination and happiness. Barrie has a close relationship with Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, and her sons, who give Barrie the idea of the well-known play Peter Pan. J. M. Barrie attends the reception of his latest play, ‘Little Mary’ and from this reception he meets Sylvia, who is a widow now. Barrie enjoys spending time with Sylvia and her four sons, and through this proves to be a great playmate and father-figure for the boys. Sylvia’s mother, Emma du Maurier does not like the amount of time Barrie spends with her family. Emma wants to take control of her daughter and grandsons, since Sylvia is becoming very weak from an unidentified illness. As Sylvia becomes more and more ill, she is unable to attend Barrie’s new play production. However, Barrie arranges a mini-version of his new play to be presented at her home. Finding Neverland can be interpreted using the archetypal literary criticism, as it does centre on the idea of the unconscious mind and its ability to hold and create universal symbols and patterns to which all humans can relate to. The archetypal hero character of this movie is playwright J. M. Barrie. Barrie, in the beginning of the movie, does not have any ideas of creating a new play. However, when he meets Sylvia’s four sons; George, Michael, Jack, and Peter, through their imagination, Barrie gets ideas. The imagination starts, when Barrie meets the Llewelyn family at London’s Kensington Gardens, while walking his St. Bernard dog. Ever since that day, Barrie has been spending a lot of time with Sylvia and her sons, creating imaginary worlds of pirates, castles and cowboys. For Barrie to create these imaginary worlds for the children, they cheer up and enjoy the time, since they do not have a father anymore. Apart from all this fun and enjoyment, there is a femme fatale character who is Emma du Maurier, the mother of Sylvia. Emma does not want Sylvia and her sons to be spending so much time with Barrie, because she thinks that he is corrupting their minds. By this, Emma tries to manipulate Sylvia into stopping the amount of time she and her sons spend with Barrie, and more time with the family. However, through all this manipulation and control from the mother, Sylvia and Barrie can be seen as two star-crossed lover, since they both love and care for each other in a close relationship. In Finding Neverland, the archetypal situation is for Barrie to create a new play. Barrie has a quest to complete, which is to get ideas about the next play he should write. For Barrie to meet Sylvia’s four sons, he got his whole idea of writing his next play, from these four boys imagination. Barrie’s has now reached his task, and that is to create a play using the imagination of kids and put it on stage to show to the public. Along with the quest Barrie has to undertake, there is an archetypal symbol of light and dark. The symbol of light in this movie, are the four boys and Sylvia. Without them, Barrie would be in a loss of ideas, since he gets the idea for his new play from his experience with the Llewelyn family. The symbol of darkness in this movie is the mother of Sylvia, Emma du Maurier. Emma, talks behind Barrie’s back and tries to tell Sylvia things about Barrie that are not true. Besides all the back talk, Barrie still is persistent in completing his task and showing the public his new play. Through further analysis of the movie Finding Neverland, Northrop Frye’s Four Story Model can be used to analyze this movie. The movie Finding Neverland can be analyzed as a romance story, since there is a world of innocence. In this world of innocence, the four boys are the ones who joyfully imagine with Barrie all the wonderful stories of pirates and kings and fulfill the desire for order and meaning. The hero, Barrie has an adversary who is Emma, the mother of Sylvia. She tries and stops Sylvia and her sons from playing with Barrie. The theme of this movie, makes use of visions and revelations, by the fact that Barrie gets the visions of his new play from all the imagination that the four kids show. Through these imaginations, Barrie shows a progress toward fulfillment in creating his new play. The basic plot, is Barrie goes on a perilous journey, a struggle follows in which he proves himself in the doing the task. When Barrie completes the quest of creating the new play, which is known as Peter Pan, there is triumph and exaltation of the hero Barrie. The basic imagery seen in this film, are trees and animals that come to life and assist Barrie in completing his quest, from all the imagination and creativity the four kids show to Barrie. To conclude, Barrie has accomplished his main goal, through all the creativity and imagination that was offered with the help of Sylvia’s four sons. Finding Neverland is a story that really emphasizes the importance of imagination and how it can really help someone in times of tragedy and loss. Humans need that creativity to imagine things in another world and use it for the benefit for oneself and other, just as Barrie did for Sylvia and her family.

Gay Marriages Essay - 1644 Words

Gay Marriages Growing up in a heterosexual neighborhood, gay couples were not something that you came across every day as you do in today’s time. At the age of 22, Dawn was introduced to her first gay couple, Mike and Thomas. They were friends of her husband. She had never known a gay couple before or even a gay person. It was extremely strange and uncomfortable for Dawn to be in the presence of two gay men. It was nothing out of the ordinary at first. To Dawn, it was just like two men living together as roommates until they kissed. Dawn felt like she was invading on their privacy as she sat and watched them kiss. She quickly turned her head so she would not be intruding. Now, Dawn is extremely close to Mike and Thomas. She claims†¦show more content†¦Heterosexuals who have been living together for a specific years can be declared to have a ‘common law’ marriage. Common law marriages are not honored to homosexuals who fall under the same situation. The first efforts t o secure state recognition of homosexual relationships in the United States occurred in the 1970s (D’ Emilio). Ministers of the Metropolitan Community Church, organized in 1968, had begun performing wedding for their members. The Metropolitan Community Church is a church for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer spiritual community grounded in the Christian tradition, affirming and exploring many paths to God. It is the first â€Å"gay church† in the United States that will thrive and found branches in many other U.S. cities (Kranz and Cusick). The August 1970 issue of The Advocate proclaimed that America was experiencing a â€Å"gay marriage boom.† During the early 1970s, close to a dozen homosexual couples across the country applied at their local city clerk’s office, which they were denied. Lawsuits were filed by three couples because of the state’s refusal to issue a marriage license to them. 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