Posts Tagged ‘pronoun’
Monday, December 27th, 2010
When to hyphenate and when not to. This is a common issue. Here is a sentence from an article about an art show:
Artists that make their living this way generally end-up with pieces that have been nicked or otherwise damaged in the constant load and unloading that they do.
In this example, END is a verb, and UP is an adverb. They should not be connected by a hyphen. END UP should be treated the same as TWO YEAR OLD. The hyphen would only be used if you were creating an adjective to go in front of a noun, as in A TWO-YEAR-OLD CONTRACT or AN END-UP something or other (I cannot think of a good example for this usage!).
BONUS COMMENT #1: I would suggest changing THAT to WHO when referring to the ARTISTS. (Use WHO for people and THAT for "non-people" things.)
BONUS COMMENT #2: Because UNLOADING ends in ING, I would use parallel structure and use LOADING as well.
Here is my edit for this sentence:
Artists who make their living this way generally end up with pieces that have been nicked or otherwise damaged in the constant loading and unloading that they do.
If you would like additional information about correct hyphen usage, run a Search (lower right corner) for "Hyphen," and see all the posts that come up. Among them should be my posts for November 23, 2010 and March 5, 2009 and October 30, 2008. This is definitely at least an annual issue.
Tags: grammar, hyphens, Parallel Structure, pronoun
Posted in Parallel Structure, pronouns, Punctuation | 1 Comment »
Friday, November 19th, 2010
The article "Smells Like a Polecat" in the current issue of Senior Living is a fun read. Inez McCollum writes about the skunks that were attracted to her husband's parents' property. (And yes, she does get both those pesky apostrophes in the correct locations!) I enjoyed the read, but one sentence bothered me:
 Skunks were always getting into the well house and would have to be gingerly shooed away so as not to trigger release of its foul smelling liquid.
- The writer refers to SKUNKS (plural), so the pronoun used to refer back to THEM should be THEIR, not ITS. (Yes, the possessive ITS without the apostrophe because that foul smelling liquid definitely belongs to those skunks.)
- The writer uses the past tense WERE when writing about skunks getting into the well house, so I think HAD TO BE (not conditional) is the better verb choice than WOULD HAVE TO BE.
- This is not an absolute rule, but I have always thought it better to avoid separating parts of the verb with LY words. I would move place GINGERLY after AWAY.
Here is my edit of this sentence:
Skunks were always getting into the well house and had to be shooed away gingerly so as not to trigger release of their foul smelling liquid .
Tags: agreement, apostrophe, pronoun, verb form
Posted in pronouns, verbs, wording | No Comments »
Monday, October 18th, 2010
Here is one more post full of suggestions from this month's issue of Shop280.com & Beyond. This post covers punctuation errors that need correction in the ad for Issis & Sons Furniture Gallery. The first problem deals with the old question of where the period goes in relationship to the quotation marks:
Issis & Sons Furniture Gallery's story began with a single desire and focus, "take care of the customer".
In the United States in 2010, the absolute rule is that the period ALWAYS goes inside the quotation marks. This is not necessarily true in other English-speaking countries, but then we Americans don't follow suit on metric measurements either! I would also capitalize "Take" in order to make the comment stand out as a single statement. The sentence should read this way:
Issis & Sons Furniture Gallery's story began with a single desire and focus, "Take care of the customer."
The second problem has to do with that pesky apostrophe. This statement refers to the Issis family taking care of "their family and friends flooring needs." For correct grammar, there should be an apostrophe AFTER the S on FRIENDS to show that the flooring needs belong to the FAMILY AND FRIENDS. However, in this instance, I think it sounds more professional to turn it around and leave out the apostrophe:
Over thirty years ago, Steve Issis and his family began taking care of the flooring needs of their family and friends.
Finally, there is this sentence, which has verb form, pronoun identity, and semicolon/comma problems:
Long term friendship lead to lifetime clients, therefore they believe that without people taking care of people there would be no Issis & Sons.
First of all, FRIENDSHIP is a singular abstract noun, so it takes the singular form of the verb LEADS. Second, there are two correct ways to use a word like THEREFORE. The first more traditional form is to place a semicolon in front of it and a comma after it. The second more contemporary form is to capitalize THEREFORE and begin a new sentence, still placing a comma after THEREFORE. Then there is the pronoun THEY. Because the words FRIENDSHIP and CLIENTS have been used in this sentence, it is not at all clear that THEY is supposed to refer to Nancy and Steve Issis, so the pronoun does not work. Finally, when you use an introductory phrase of more than three words (like WITHOUT PEOPLE TAKING CARE OF PEOPLE–6 words), this phrase should be set off with a comma before the main part of the sentence. I would reword this as follows:
Long term friendship leads to lifetime clients. Therefore, Nancy and Steve Issis believe that without people taking care of people, there would be no Issis & Sons.
I hope you agree that this statement is now much clearer. It also has more impact, which is important in advertising.
Tags: apostrophe, commas, Grammar Glitch, pronoun, verb form
Posted in Punctuation, verbs | 24 Comments »
Thursday, October 14th, 2010
 Joe Kruse writes an interesting and informative golf tips column for Shop280.com & Beyond. I love golf, and I enjoy his tips. However, as a grammar pro, I do find his writing frustrating. Here is one example sentence:
For all of you, like me, who demand perfection especially on the putting green its time to relieve the stress of putting.
The Grammar Glitch in this sentence is ITS. Here, it could be replaced by IT IS, so the contraction needs the apostrophe. The other problem is punctuation. In my opinion, the phrase that needs to be set off by commas is ESPECIALLY ON THE PUTTING GREEN. I also don't like the way LIKE ME is dumped in. I would rewrite this sentence as follows:
For all of you who (like me) demand perfection, especially on the putting green, it's time to relieve the stress of putting.
There is also the question of the word PROS. If you read this blog often, you know that one of my pet peeves is the use of an apostrophe to create the plural. Joe's column is titled "Why You Need to Putt Like the Pro's." WHOOPS. The column also includes these two sentences:
What do the pro's practice?
Go ahead and putt like the pr o's .
I checked the Internet to be sure I was correct about this one. If you Google PROS, you will find a number of sites about PROS (plural). If you Google PRO'S, you will find sites like THE PRO'S TABLE or THE PRO'S CLOSET (possessive), so I am not just being picky here. These should read as follows:
Why You Need to Putt Like the Pros.
What do the pros practice?
Go ahead and putt like the pros.
In another part of the column, Joe talks about the importance of practicing Alignment and Distance Control. I had to read part of this several times to figure out what he wanted me to learn:
The most important of the two is Distance Control. Because distance controls direction example if you hit too hard or long it will go through the break and if you hit it too soft or short it will break too much.
Great advice, but very difficult to decipher. First of all, if you are talking about TWO things (Alignment and Distance Control), use the comparative form MORE rather than the superlative form MOST. Second, the first part of the sentence that begins with BECAUSE should be part of the previous sentence. The example illustrations should be a separate sentence with clarifying punctuation. I would rewrite it this way:
The more important of the two is Distance Control because distance controls direction. For example, if you hit too hard or too long, the ball will go through the break, and if you hit too soft or too short, it will break too much.
Where I live, this is great golf weather. Hope my golfing readers get to enjoy the links this fall. If you'd like to view Joe Kruse's Putting Video Tip, go to www.timberlinegc.com.
Tags: apostrophe, Grammar Glitch, pronoun
Posted in pronouns, Punctuation, wording | 1 Comment »
Wednesday, October 6th, 2010
Today's local newspaper carries an article about an agreement with a suspended football coach. The following sentence has a pronoun problem:
Craig said Shores' duties still have to be worked out between he and Shores.
First, let's get the grammar corrected. BETWEEN is a preposition, and that means that a pronoun used with it should be in the OBJECT case (HIM rather than HE in this case). The grammatically correct sentence would read this way:
Craig said Shores' duties still have to be worked out between him and Shores.
I do think this sentence can be improved a little more, perhaps by eliminating the "between" phrase altogether. I would suggest something like this:
Craig said he and Shores still need to work out what Shores' duties will be.
The following Grammar Glitch rule applies in the above example:
RULE #1: IF YOU CORRECT THE GRAMMAR OF SOMETHING YOU HAVE WRITTEN AND THEN DON'T LIKE THE RESULT, FIND ANOTHER CORRECT WAY TO MAKE THE SAME STATEMENT.
Tags: Grammar Glitch, pronoun
Posted in pronouns | 8 Comments »
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