Homophones: Affect vs. Effect

Homophones can be confusing. Luckily, there’s an easy way to remember affect vs. effect.

I see it all the time: affect and effect mixed up as if they were completely interchangeable.

But they’re not.

These two homophones may sound exactly alike, but they don’t even belong to the same parts of speech! If you’ve ever been typing along and come to one of these words, and scrunched up your eyebrows wondering whether to spell it with an a or an e, then this grammar lesson is for you!

Affect vs. Effect

In the ongoing wars between homophones, affect vs. effect is one of the most brutal fights on the battlefield. One is usually a noun (but not always) and the other is usually a verb (but not always). So the war wages on, and in the meantime misspellings and typos run rampant whenever one of these two words appears in print.

To Affect

Affect is almost always a verb. It is something that happens. You are affected or you affect. This word is never preceded by an article such as an or the because it’s not a thing, it’s an action. When writing, or speaking for that matter, and unsure of the spelling, ask yourself if the word is being used as an action. If it is, then go with affect.

a = action
a = affect

An Effect

Effect is a noun, and that is a thing. It’s not something you do, it’s something you have, or give, or something that just is. We hear this word most commonly in reference to fancy film making — you know — special effects. “The special effects in that movie were groundbreaking!” Note the use of the article, the, as in the effect. See that? Easy!

the = article
effect = noun

Also note that if used with an adjective or noun phrase, it’s effect (with an e):

• After effect
• Special effect
• Greenhouse effect
• Sound effect
• Effects of alcohol
• In effect…
• Adverse effects
• Positive/negative effects
• Cause and effect
• Side effects

More Homophones?

That’s all for today! Do you think the battle of affect vs. effect can be won? Will we eventually learn how to spell these two homophones correctly or will they someday merge into a single word?

Do you have any homophones that you need clarified? Or are there any homophones out there that you just can’t seem to remember? Leave a comment and I’ll try to come up with a clever mnemonic device just for you! If you’re too shy to leave a comment, go ahead and use the contact form!

And if you have any tips or tricks for remembering how to spell affect vs. effect, then please share your knowledge. Or, if you are stuck on any homophones, drop a comment. There’s a good chance your grammar question will be answered in an upcoming post.

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in January, 2008, but has been updated with new information and therefore republished for your reading pleasure.

Punctuation: The Difference Between Dashes and Hyphens

To the passive reader, it’s a short horizontal line that appears somewhere in a text, usually joining two words together. To a writer, it’s something else entirely, but what? Is it a dash, a hyphen, or a minus sign? More than once, I’ve been pecking away at my keyboard and stopped suddenly when confronted with this versatile and confounding punctuation mark.

When you use this mark, do you know whether you’re using it as a dash or hyphen?

Many people use dashes and hyphens interchangeably, which is understandable, since most of us use the exact same keyboard character for both dashes and hyphens. However, they are technically two completely different punctuation marks.

Dashes also come in a couple of different formats: the em-dash (long) and the en-dash (short).

This post looks at the following punctuation marks:

• Hyphens
• Dashes
• Em-dashes
• En-dashes

Hyphens

A hyphen is used to connect words in order to form a compound. It was also used commonly during the typewriter era to show that a word was broken at a carriage return, but that usage is rarely seen these days. Examples include:

• ten-year-old
• merry-go-round
• editor-in-chief
• co-worker
• e-mail

Hyphens are also used to denote prefixes and suffixes when they are not affixed to a base word. Also, certain modifier combinations call for hyphenation.

Hyphenated Modifiers

When two modifiers together modify another word, they are often hyphenated. For example, in the phrase “real-world situations,” the words “real” and “world” are connected with a hyphen. Note that “real” modifies “world” (the world is real) and as a single unit (a hyphenated modifier), the two words together modify “situation.” This is standard practice when one modifier modifies another to form a single modifier to a noun or verb.

Note, however, that adverb-adjective combinations are not normally hyphenated. For example, a “well understood concept” is not hyphenated (“well” is an adverb modifying the adjective “understood”).

In a future post, we’ll take a more detailed look at hyphenated modifiers.

Dashes

There are two types of dashes: the em dash (–) and the en (-) dash.

The Em Dash

This is also called the double dash–and rightly so–because it actually consists of two dashes presented without spacing before or after, and used to evoke emphasis (note that the spacing is up for debate as some style guides and writers include a single space before and after the em dash). This kind of dash is often used to “set off an element added to amplify or to digress from the main clause” (Publication Manual of the APA, 2001, p. 291).

The En Dash

An en dash is really used more like a hyphen because it connects words. This connection forms a compound adjective where each individual word has equal weight. Here are two examples: Did you receive the July-August issue of the publication? Will you be on the San Francisco-New York flight?

Why are they called em and en dashes?

In typesetting, the em dash is the same width as the letter m, while the en dash matches the width of the letter n. It’s interesting to note that technically, a hyphen should be a tad bit shorter than the en dash. However, typewriters and computers only have the one punctuation mark (right above the p key) which must do triple duty (hyphen, em dash, and en dash), so unless you’re a professional typesetter, there’s no need to worry about measuring your marks.

How do you use dashes and hyphens in your writing? Do you have any questions or thoughts to add? Leave a comment.

Parts of Speech: Adjectives

Understanding the different parts of speech is essential for writers who want to craft prose intelligibly.

A basic understanding of language and mastery of grammar helps writers understand the craft from a mechanical standpoint, and can result in superior writing abilities.

Parts of speech make up the fundamental building blocks of language. Do you know an adverb from an adjective? A conjunction from an interjection?

If you’re a writer, you should.

In a post titled “Parts of Speech,” we identified adjectives as follows:

Adjective: An adjective is a word that modifies a noun or pronoun. Often, adjectives are descriptive as in comfortable or red. Traditionally, adjectives included determiners, words that indicate definiteness as in articles a vs. the, or quantity as in one, some, or many. Linguists are increasingly separating determiners as unique parts of speech.

This definition only scratches the surface.

Interesting Facts About Adjectives

Did you know that not all languages have adjectives? Most do, though. And those that don’t use alternative parts of speech (such as verbs) to modify nouns and pronouns, thereby fulfilling the same role that adjectives play in English.

Also, words that are adjectives in one language may not be adjectives in another language. According to Wikipedia: “English uses “to be hungry” (hungry being an adjective), French uses “avoir faim” (literally “to have hunger”)…”

Adjectives lend themselves particularly well to derivation, which is the linguistic alteration of a word by adding a suffix (such as -ness, -ise, -al). Add -ize to the adjective glamor and you get glamorize.

Adjectives vs. Determiners: Separate Parts of Speech?

Determiners are a subclass of adjectives, which modify nouns by limiting their meaning. Determiners may precede descriptive adjectives.

Articles (a, an, the) are determiners as are words such as some, each, many, and few (to name a few). Other determiners are demonstratives, possessive determiners, quantifiers, and cardinal numbers (first, second, third, etc.). Many determiners are listed as pronouns, such as your or their.

Linguists increasingly regard determiners and adjectives as two separate and distinct parts of speech. However, that is not usually reflected in grammar references material. For example, most dictionaries still classify determiners as adjectives.

Types of Adjectives

There are several types of adjectives. Here’s a quick look at a few of them.

• Attributive adjectives – normally precede the nouns that they modify and are considered part of the noun phrase.
  
• Predicative adjectives – are linked to the nouns they modify, usually with a predicate (e.g. “the car is fast” rather than “the fast car”).
  
• Absolute adjectives – modify either the subject of a sentence or a nearby noun, and are best demonstrated by example: “The car, fast and sleek, sped through the intersection.”
  
• Substantive adjectives – are still modifiers, but used as freestanding nouns. Example: “There are two cars, a fast one and a red one. I’ll take the fast one, you take the red.”
  

Each of these types of adjectives warrant an entire study. This is just a brief overview so you understand how diverse the part of speech can be.

Adjectival Phrases

Most parts of speech team up with other words in a sentence to form phrases, and adjectives are no exception. In an adjectival phrase, the ajective is at the head. A single adjective in a sentence constitutes an adjectival phrase.

More often, adjectives that are modified by other adjectves or by adverbs make up an adjectival phrase (such as glaceing very in front of any adjective). More than one adverb or complement can be used to modify an adjective within an adjectival phrase.

Modifiers and Writing

Modifiers are essential to writers. They are the words that help us describe characters and scenes, but they are not meant to be crutches. They should be used conservatively for the greatest impact. Consider the following two sentences:

She quickly ran to the other side of the field.

She sprinted to the other side of the field.

Which of these sentences creates a more distinct image in your mind?

Highly descriptive verbs and nouns will always carry more impact that flat verbs and nouns that are modified with fancy adverbs and adjectives. Keep this in mind with your own writing, and try not to lean on modifiers as a crutch to enhance your writing.

Do you have anything to add? Do you have any questions about adjectives of any other parts of speech? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.

Good Grammar! It’s National Grammar Day

Sometimes being creative means breaking the rules. Like using sentence fragments. And starting a sentence with a conjunction. Or ending it with a preposition.

It’s been said a million times: you have to learn the rules before you break them.

Using good grammar may not make or break your writing career. In fact, if you get too attached to the rules of grammar, your writing might come off sounding uppity or old-fashioned and readers will have a hard time relating.

However, learning the rules of grammar will only make your writing stronger, more professional, and may even become a source for fresh creative writing ideas.

National Grammar Day

Good grammar is a serious matter for many people. Teachers, copyeditors, linguists, and other writing and publishing professionals have strong ties to proper grammar usage. I think it’s fantastic that there’s an entire day dedicated to recognizing and celebrating proper use of our language.

National Grammar day is a day to “Speak well! Write well! And on March 4, march forth and spread the word. We want people to think about language and how it can be used best”

Take some time today, in honor of good grammar, to visit the National Grammar Day website, which is a lot of fun and provides plenty of excellent tips and resources as well as articles about good grammar (and not so good grammar).

The Good Grammar People

National Grammar Day is hosted by The Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar (SPOGG), which is “for pen-toters appalled by wanton displays of Bad English.”

SPOGG is for people who crave good, clean English — sentences cast well and punctuated correctly. It’s about clarity. And who knows how many of the world’s huge problems could be solved if we had a little more of that?

It’s free to join and you get entertaining newsletters about grammar, so do check it out.

Do you have any good grammar resources that you’d like to share or do you have any ideas for grammar topics that you’d like to see covered in future posts here at Writing Forward? Share your thoughts, knowledge, and suggestions in the comments.

Poetry Writing and Grammar

Good writers respect grammar the way an acrobat respects the tightrope. Grammar might be intimidating and complicated, but we need it in order to perform.

Grammar lends structure and clarity to our craft and gives us common ground rules that we can use to communicate clearly and effectively.

Good Grammar in Poetry Writing

Just as the acrobat uses the tightrope to traverse great heights, writers use grammar to traverse language. But is poetry writing the exception?

Many poets demonstrate grammatical expertise, neatly parking periods and commas in their designated spaces and paying homage to proper capitalization.

Consider the following poem and how it follows the rules of grammar. Note that in poetry writing, the traditional rule is that the first letter of each line is capitalized regardless of whether or not it starts a new sentence.

Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers

Aunt Jennifer’s tigers prance across a screen,
Bright topaz denizens of a world of green.
They do not fear the men beneath the tree;
They pace in sleek chivalric certainty.

Aunt Jennifer’s finger fluttering through her wool
Find even the ivory needle hard to pull.
The massive weight of Uncle’s wedding band
Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer’s hand.

When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie
Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by.
The tigers in the panel that she made
Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid.

-Adrienne Rich

Poetry Writing Without the Grammar Safety Net

Poets don’t always follow the rules, which is why poetry is attractive to writers who are extra creative and enjoy coloring outside the lines.

Grammar rules, particularly spelling and punctuation, are nothing more than a creative tool for many poets who choose to dismiss these rules altogether or use the them to decorate and add aesthetic elements to a piece.

Many poets have skirted grammar with great success. Many more have failed. E.E. Cummings is well known for giving grammar the proverbial finger, but he takes his anarchy one step further and actually alters basic sentence structure, and manages to do so quite effectively.

anyone lived in a pretty how town

anyone lived in a pretty how town
(with up so floating many bells down)
spring summer autumn winter
he sang his didn’t he danced his did.

Women and men (both little and small)
cared for anyone not at all
they sowed their isn’t they reaped their same
sun moon stars rain

children guessed (but only a few
and down they forgot as up they grew
autumn winter spring summer)
that noone loved him more by more

when by now and tree by leaf
she laughed his joy she cried his grief
bird by snow and stir by still
anyone’s any was all to her

someones married their everyones
laughed their cryings and did their dance
(sleep wake hope and then)they
said their nevers they slept their dream

stars rain sun moon
(and only the snow can begin to explain
how children are apt to forget to remember
with up so floating many bells down)

one day anyone died i guess
(and noone stooped to kiss his face)
busy folk buried them side by side
little by little and was by was

all by all and deep by deep
and more by more they dream their sleep
noone and anyone earth by april
with by spirit and if by yes.

Women and men (both dong and ding)
summer autumn winter spring
reaped their sowing and went their came
sun moon stars rain

-ee cummings

Cummings has dismissed capital letters altogether and he uses punctuation seemingly at random. Yet the poem works. Imagine it with the proper grammar rules applied and you’ll quickly realize that his way is more effective for the piece.

Poetry Writing – Where Good Grammar and Creativity Meet or Collide

As the poetry canon grows beyond measure, poets increasingly reach for creative devices to make their work stand out.

Toying with grammar is one such device, but it is not something that can be approached carelessly. If you choose to forgo grammar because you don’t know it rather than as a creative method, your lack of knowledge will show and the poem will present as amateurish. Of course, that’s true for all types of writing. Learn the rules, and only after you have learned them, go ahead and break them.

I salute anyone who breaks the rules in the interest of art and great poetry writing just as much as I admire poets who craft meter and verse within the confines of good grammar. So for this poetry-loving writer and blogger, either way is the right way. Walk the tight rope or jump from it and see if you can fly.

What are your thoughts on the use of grammar in poetry writing? Are you a stickler for good grammar, even in your creative work, or do you like to bend and break the rules? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Homophones: Accept and Except

The English language is fraught with sound-alike words that look nothing alike on the page, or the screen. These homophones have given many students headaches as they agonize over word choice while composing essays and even short stories.

Accept and except are two such words. Though not among the most commonly confused homophones, these two words do occasionally find themselves getting mixed up and used incorrectly.

Here’s a quick way to remember the difference between accept and except.

Accept

Accept means to take or receive, agree or consent, undertake responsibility, or reconcile oneself to something. In a sense, it means to acknowledge. You can’t really accept something without acknowledging it, except in some very far out circumstances. Since both words start with ac, it should be easy to remember whether accept belongs in your sentence.

I accept your proposal.

I except your proposal.

Is the proposal acknowledged? Then choose accept.

Except

You know what’s special? The letter x. It’s special because it’s so rarely used. Wouldn’t you agree? We could almost say that the letter x is an exceptional letter. Remember this letter and these words together: x, exceptional, except. Because except always indicates something that is special, or different from the others. It means with the exclusion of, with exception, or otherwise. It marks something unique.

Everyone accept me had read the book.

Everyone except me had read the book.

Does this sentence indicate something or someone that is unique, like one person who didn’t do something that everyone else did? Mark it with an x and use except.

Accept and Except, and Other Homophones

What other homophones can you come up with besides accept and except? Are there any that you find especially perplexing? Share them in the comments!

Parts of Speech: Nouns

To be a decent writer, one must be familiar with the building blocks of language. The most fundamental of those building blocks are the parts of speech.

Nouns are just one of the eight parts of speech in the English language.

Etymology

The word “noun” comes from the Latin word nomen, which means “name,” and this is fitting, since the main purpose of nouns is to name things.

Definition of Noun

The formal and traditional grammatical definition of noun as a part of speech in the English language may vary from definitions in other languages. Noun is commonly defined as a word that refers to a person, place, thing, event, substance, quality, or idea.

However, this definition may be limited in scope.

According to Wikipedia:

Contemporary linguists generally agree that one cannot successfully define nouns (or other grammatical categories) in terms of what sort of object in the world they refer to or signify. Part of the conundrum is that the definition makes use of relatively general nouns (“thing,” “phenomenon,” “event”) to define what nouns are.

For example, green is both a color (and therefore could be seen as a noun) and a descriptive word (which would be considered an adjective). In this sense, the person-place-thing definition of noun is lacking and fails to address the complexity of a noun as one of the parts of speech.

Many nouns double as other parts of speech. A good example of this is the word run. You can run (verb) or you can go for a run (noun).

Parts of Speech and Sub-classes

Many parts of speech can be separated into various sub-classes. There are a number of different sub-classes of nouns.

Proper and Common Nouns

Proper nouns identify unique or specific entities. Many proper nouns are the names of people or places. For this reason, an alternative term for proper nouns is proper names.

Examples of proper nouns include names of people (John, Jane, Fluffy, American) and places (Mexico, Paris, Antarctica, Jupiter). These differ from common nouns that simply refer to people in general (person, people, individual, group) and places in general (country, city, continent, planet).

In most sentences, a common noun requires an article or limiting modifier:

• I see a person.
• This is for the people
• That individual is writing.
• Two groups are reading.

Conversely, proper nouns don’t normally take articles and limiting modifiers.

• I’ve been to Mexico.
• Are you going to Paris?
• Where is Antarctica?
• Can you see Jupiter in the sky?

Proper nouns may also be used to refer to the names of important items, such as the U.S. Constitution.

Proper nouns are almost always capitalized in English.

The Internet is often capitalized because it is seen as a specific place or location. However, capitalization of Internet is a style, not a grammar, issue.

Finally, some proper nouns are homophones with common nouns. For example, God (capitalized) refers to a specific deity whereas god (not capitalized) would indicate some or any deity.

Countable and Uncountable Nouns

Some nouns can be pluralized and others cannot. Those nouns that can be counted are countable nouns. The ones that can’t be counted are uncountable nouns.

Countable nouns can also be connected with quantifiers that indicate quantity.

• There is one person.
• I have five apples.
• He ate some bananas.

Uncountable nouns are also called mass nouns or non-count nouns. They never take plural form and cannot be connected to quantifiers that indicate quantity. Examples of uncountable nouns include the following:

• Love (as emotion or feeling)
• Music
• Advice
• Luggage
• Electricity

Collective Nouns

Collective nouns are easy to identify because they refer to groups (thus, collective). The following are examples of collective nouns note that they include pluralized, countable nouns):

• Gaggle (of geese)
• Colony
• Board (of Directors)
• Cars

It’s important in writing that there is agreement between a collective noun and any connected predicates.

Ex: The colony traveled with each other.

In the sentence above, colony is a collective noun so the predicate must take a plural subject (each other). You cannot say “The director talked to each other” because “director” is not collective but “each other” is.

Concrete and Abstract Nouns

Concrete and abstract nouns are talked about frequently. To put it simply, concrete nouns have physical bodies. We can interact with them with at least one of our senses (see, hear, taste, smell, touch).

On the other hand, abstract nouns identify things that we cannot see, hear, taste, smell, or touch. Examples of abstract nouns include feelings and ideals – love, hate, freedom.

Differentiating between concrete and abstract nouns is harder than it sounds. For example, is art concrete or abstract? Does it depend on how it’s used in context?

Many abstract nouns end with suffixes such as -ness, -ity, and -tion. In some cases, these suffixes can be added to concrete nouns to form abstract nouns.

Learning Parts of Speech

It can take time learn all the parts of speech, especially when, like nouns, they have so many sub-classes, which should also be learned. However, developing an understanding of the language from a technical perspective will help you become a better writer because you’ll have a more thorough knowledge of the tools at your disposal and you’ll better understand how to use them.

Homophones: Which witch?

Recently, Kris of no known web site commented:

I have trouble with witch/which (and even so, I am not sure I have those right) and weather/wheather [sic]. any good ideas on how to keep them straight???

Well, Kris, I do have an answer for you, and some tips to help you remember how to toggle comfortably between these two pairs of homophones. For today, we’ll start with which witch.

First, We Spell Our Homophones

All too appropriate, since we are discussing witches (Get it? Spell.). The first step is to memorize the correct spelling of both words:

which
witch

Which witch?

Which witch? These two words sound exactly alike but they are totally different. In short, one of these is a person who casts spells. The other is not a person at all; in fact it is merely a pronoun. How to remember?

• Who, what, and where are also pronouns that start with the letters wh — just like the word which as in which pronoun do you like best?
• A person may itch but a pronoun may not, and like the word itch, the witch that is a person has a t in its spelling.
• If you can memorize the phrase which witch itches?, it may help you to remember since each witch will belie its meaning in context. The itch doesn’t hurt either, considering the previous tip.

Homophones are challenging for lots of people but you can find easy tricks that will help you remember the difference between words that sound alike but are spelled differently.

Next time someone asks which witch? You’ll know exactly what to tell them.

Why Great Writing (and Good Grammar) Matters Online

A recent and somewhat shocking post over at Skelliewag attempts to convince web writers that quality writing, good grammar, and spelling do not matter online.

In a post titled, “Why Great Writing Doesn’t Matter Online,” Skellie declares that web writers do not need to adhere to the same level of standards as other writers.

While the Internet is notorious for its lack of great writing, and for it’s abundance of low-quality content and complete disregard for good grammar, there is no need to encourage producing anything less than one’s best writing – especially when someone is paying you for your work. And let’s face it, the better your writing, the more it’s worth.

Forget About Great Writing

Here are a few statements pulled from Skellie’s post:

• People don’t read online. Nor do they scan.
• Good writing, clever writing, beautiful writing — all of these things are unnecessary in the creation of great web content.
• Clarity is the only necessary characteristic of good web writing.
• Good ideas will shine through ‘bad’ or just ‘OK’ writing… Good writing can’t save bad ideas (or a lack of ideas).
• In truth, though, truly bad writing is rare.
• Average writing abilities are more than enough to write great web content. Average ideas are not.
• Shelf The Elements of Style. You don’t need it.
• Your readers aren’t looking for great writing — if they were, they’d look inside a broadsheet newspaper, a well-loved magazine or a Pulitzer Prize winning novel.

Who Needs Good Grammar?

In other words: Hey everyone, since the Internet is already so jam-packed with inferior writing, why bother putting out great writing? Just be average. Here on the web, that’s more than enough.

As I read this post, I found myself in a complete state of disbelief. I was literally speechless, and it was all I could do to muster up a comment in response. Turns out I need an entire post to respond in a manner that I feel is adequate. It’s unfathomable that a person who has set herself up in a leadership role advising bloggers and other web professionals, and who offers professional writing services, would publicly declare that great writing — online or anywhere else — is unnecessary. Since Skellie shows more skill in writing than the average blogger, the post was especially hard to digest. In fact, I had to check my calendar to make sure it wasn’t April 1st.

Perhaps I simply operate from a different set of ethics, a different philosophy. I believe in encouraging people to be the best they can be, to constantly grow and consistently improve. Can an average writer become a huge success? Of course, but an above average writer has far better chances and will enjoy a better level of credibility and respectability. Does web writing have its own special set of rules? Yes, of course. Every type of writing, whether it’s fiction, technical, or copywriting, has its own style and standards. But writing is writing, and for it to be considered great, online or off, it has to be a lot more than just clear.

Here’s what I think:

Great Writing Matters and Good Grammar Does Too

• People do read online. They also scan.
• Clever and beautiful writing is not a requirement for any type of great writing. Sometimes, simple and direct gets the job done. Whether it’s web content or an erotic romance novel, great writing is great writing. Period.
• There are very few writers who have truly immaculate grammar. People with good grammar skills and flawless spelling are called editors. Still, anyone who calls herself a writer should have a firm grasp on spelling and grammar, and should understand that poor spelling and grammar can alter the meaning of an entire concept. Don’t believe me? Read Eats, Shoots & Leaves. Hell, just read the back flap.
• All good writing requires clarity. A writer’s duty to her readers is to make sure that her words make sense. However, clarity alone does not make for good web writing. There are sites with pages and pages of information about products and services. There are blogs about every subject under the sun (including literature), and there are millions of articles, essays, and even books being written and published online. Saying that web writing only needs to be clear is like saying all I need in a car is good gas mileage. It’s just wrong. I need that and a whole lot more.
• If writing is bad, or just average, good ideas will not always shine through. There are plenty of readers (I among them) who will click away as soon as it becomes apparent that the quality of the writing is poor. This is one of the reasons that many people believe that the Web as we know it is going to collapse under its weight of low-quality content.
• Conversely, good writing can and has saved many bad ideas. Readers like to be entertained, so if a writer has a humorous, witty, or sarcastic voice, there’s a good chance that she’ll build up a decent sized readership regardless of the ideas that are presented.
• Truly bad writing is prevalent all over the Web. It’s everywhere and it’s annoying. The good news is that this gives average or good great writers an edge.
• Average writing abilities produce average web content because average writing is… well, it’s average. Can you succeed with average writing? Yes you can, but the content is and will always be average, no matter how much money you make from it. If you have a truly stellar idea, you’d be smart to publish it in a truly stellar writing style. Don’t have the chops? Hire a writer or an editor.
• Do not shelve The Elements of Style. Keep it handy, and add to it: The Chicago Manual of Style and The Gregg Reference Manual.
• There are two types of readers: those who care about good writing and those who do not. Here’s the thing: if you produce great writing, you can appeal to both types of readers. But if your writing is sub-par, you’re only playing to half the crowd.

I’d like to note that great writing and great content do not always equal success. Achieving success involves many additional factors, such as marketing, networking, and more than a little luck. Poor quality writing has earned millions of dollars for many a writer but producing great writing means having standards and creating something that you can be proud of, regardless of how much money it makes.

And let’s face it, quality has longevity. Do you want to be a disposable writer? Web writers need to do exactly the opposite of what Skellie proposes. I for one, am tired of the way that traditional writers and journalists look down on blogging and other types of web writing as sub-standard. I’m not interested in being a B movie. I want to be a blockbuster, an Oscar winner, and you should too. So instead of shelving your grammar guides, and settling for being average, reach for the stars and be the best writer you can be.

After all, bloggers are writers too.

Writing Resources: Grammar Girl

As a writer, it’s only natural for me to pay attention to the mechanics of my craft, which is why I’m always out the lookout for new and useful writing resources.

I’m especially on the lookout for grammar-related writing resources, since good grammar is essential to the craft that is writing.

So last spring, when I discovered the Grammar Girl podcast, my interest in good grammar piqued, and I started writing more consciously than ever before. Sure, I still break the rules of grammar now and then. That’s what creative writing is all about, right?

But if you don’t know the rules, then you shouldn’t break them or your writing will come off as amateurish. Good news: there’s a quick and dirty grammar resource out there that will only cost you a few minutes each week, and it will fine tune your grammar skills quickly and easily while rounding out your own collection of writing resources.

Meet Grammar Girl

Grammar Girl provides short, useful tips on grammar that are easy to remember and easy to put into practice. The information is available in audio format as a podcast, and it’s also available in writing, so if you don’t like listening to podcasts, you can visit the Grammar Girl blog and read the tips instead.

New Grammar Girl episodes are published a few times a week and each one lasts about five minutes or less. You’ll gain a wealth of information in that small amount of time. No matter how acute your grammar skills are, they’ll become even sharper!

You’ll get:

• Grammar Girl proofreading and editing tips and suggestions for writing resources.
• Clarification on homophones and word pairs (accept vs. except, less or fewer).
• Information about language and words that relate to writing and grammar.
• Details about proper sentence structure, writing formats, and word usage.
• The straight facts about good grammar.

Grammar Girl was created by a writer named Mignon Fogerty, and the show has received much critical acclaim, with appearances and mentions on The Oprah Winfrey Show, The New York Times, and USA Today, to name a few. In fact Grammar Girl is highly credited with sparking a fresh interest in grammar throughout our culture.

Meet Grammar Girl’s Mignon Fogarty

Not only is she the creator of Grammar Girl, Mignon Fogarty is also the founder of Quick and Dirty Tips. She has written for magazines, worked as a technical writer, and is an entrepreneur. Much of her writing experience has been in health and science, and she holds B.A. in English from the University of Washington and an M.S. in biology from Stanford.

Get Interested in Grammar and Writing Resources

Since discovering Grammar Girl, I’ve acquired plenty of fresh knowledge about grammar, much of which I’ve shared here on the Writing Forward grammar posts.

For today, I thought I’d pay homage to the source of my revived appreciation for good grammar. I encourage all you writers out there to head over and subscribe to Grammar Girl. You can do so through iTunes for the audio podcast or through RSS.

Do you already listen to Grammar Girl, or do you have any other writerly podcasts or writing resources that you enjoy? Leave a comment and let me know!

Parts of Speech

Mastering language can be a very technical process. Never mind the artistic skill that goes into being a good writer — understanding things like parts of speech, sentence diagramming, and other grammatical terms are paramount for writers who want not only to produce concise text, but who want to be able to communicate effectively with other writers and editors about content.

Parts of speech explain how words are used in context. Each word in the English language can be categorized into one of the eight parts of speech. According to Wikipedia:

Parts of speech: In grammar, a lexical category (also word class, lexical class, or in traditional grammar part of speech) is a linguistic category of words (or more precisely lexical items), which is generally defined by the syntactic or morphological behaviour of the lexical item in question.

However, many words fit into more than one category, depending on how the word is used. For example: dance can be used as a noun or as a verb:

Noun: I am going to the dance.

Verb: I dance every day.

Nouns and verbs are the most common parts of speech, but there are several more. Here’s a complete list, including definitions:

Eight Parts of Speech

Adjective: An adjective is a word that modifies a noun or pronoun. Often, adjectives are descriptive as in comfortable or red. Traditionally, adjectives included determiners, words that indicate definiteness as in articles a vs. the, or quantity as in one, some, or many. Linguists are increasingly separating determiners as unique parts of speech.

Adverb: Adverbs are like adjectives in that they are modifiers, but they modify any other type of word or phrase except for nouns. For instance, they modify verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, etc. Examples include quickly, and dark (as in dark red where the adverb dark modifies the adjective red).

Conjunction: A small group of words that form connections between words, phrases, or clauses. The most common are and, or, but, and yet. Others include because and however.

Interjection: According to dictionary.com: any member of a class of words expressing emotion, distinguished in most languages by their use in grammatical isolation, as Hey! Oh! Ouch! Ugh!

Noun: Often taught as person (girl), place (island), or thing (car), a noun is a word that can function as the subject or object of a sentence, either independently or as part of a phrase.

Preposition: A preposition is used to introduce a prepositional phrase. Normally, a preposition is found before a noun or pronoun, and often indicates placement. Common prepositions include to, in, at, over, under, by, since.

Pronoun: A pronoun is a word used to substitute another word. Common pronouns include you, they, we, he, she, and it.

Verb: Indicates action (walk), including occurrences (begin), states of being, or relations between things (button activates computer).

Now that you know all the parts of speech, the next step would be to identify them in sentences, which would take us into sentence diagramming. That’s beyond the scope of this particular article, but it’s something you should try on your own. Take a look at a few sentences and try labeling different words by identifying which parts of speech they belong to. With a little practice, you’ll be able to name the parts of speech in any sentence with ease.

Homophones, Homonyms, and Homographs

They perplex us, confuse us, and make our heads spin. If you thought learning how to correctly spell words that sound alike was difficult, wait till you try to learn the terms for describing those words.

Homophones

Homophones are words that are pronounced alike but have different meanings. Some examples are accept and except, affect and effect, and triplets too and to and two, along with they’re and their and there.

Homophones may also refer to words that are spelled and pronounced the same, but differ in meaning, for example lie (lie down) and lie (an untruth).

These words are a major source of frustration for many writers, students, and professionals who struggle to memorize variant spellings for words that sound alike but have different meanings. English teachers and other spelling perfectionists wince when homophones are written incorrectly.

Worst of all, spell check won’t catch the error when incorrect homophones are used because alternative spellings are legitimate.

Homonyms

And to confuse matters further, there are other words called homonyms, which are spelled and pronounced alike but have different meanings. Examples include words like stalk, which could refer to the stem of a plant (a stalk of corn), or the act pursuing or approaching prey (the cat stalked the mouse).

Another example of a homonym is lie – as in lie down or telling a lie or untruth.

That’s right, some homophones can also be classified as homonyms – if they’re spelled the same.

Confused yet? Wait. There’s more.

Homographs

Homographs are words that are spelled the same but have different meanings. They may be pronounced the same or they could be pronounced differently from one another.

This means that some homographs are homophones and homonyms.

A good homograph example is record (a disc that plays audio) and record (to save or register something – in writing, audio, video, etc.).

How To Remember Homophones, Homonyms, and Homographs

It’s not easy but it can be done. You can remember the difference (what difference there is) between homophones, homonyms, and homographs by breaking each word down and recalling the meaning of its root suffix and prefix. Also, try remembering each term separately to start, and don’t worry about which homophones are homonyms and which homonyms are homographs.

The root homo means “the same.” For all of these words something is the same – the spelling or the pronunciation.

• Homophones sound alike. That’s the only rule and you can remember by the suffix phone, a word you can surely relate to sound. They may be spelled alike or not but they must sound alike.
• Homonyms are spelled alike. Same name. Name = nym. Like the words “same” and “name” they also sound alike.
• Homographs look alike (same spelling). Like graphs, they are visual. With the prefix homo, they are visually the same.

Easy enough? Sure it is!

Do you have your own tricks for remembering homophones, homonyms, and homographs? Do you find any of them especially confusing? Share your tips, ideas, and questions in the comments.

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