Stewart Clark (Assistant Professor) May 2003
Tel
work: +47 73 59 52 45,
fax +47 73 59 52 10 E-mail: stewart.clark@adm.ntnu.no
References are to Getting Your English Right, Tapir, Trondheim
2001
APOSTROPHE (')
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, pages 19, 93)
Use an
apostrophe to indicate the possessive form of nouns:
... The group's proposals were discussed at length ... (singular
group)
... The groups' proposals were discussed at length ...
(plural groups)
Always use an
apostrophe and an s to mark a
possessive. Beware of the ambiguity created by the omission of both:
... this connects to
Contractor terminating equipment ...
(intended meaning: the Contractor's terminating equipment)
If the noun you
wish to make a possessive already ends with an s, you have the option of adding just an apostrophe or an
apostrophe and an s:
EITHER ... to one of the chassis' galvanized upper arms ...
OR ... to one of the chassis's galvanized upper arms ...
Preferably
re-write the statement to remove the awkward grouping of letters:
... to one of the galvanized
upper arms of the chassis ...
Just a
reminder: its is
the possessive form of it. No
apostrophe is needed. It's is a
contracted form of it is. See advice
below concerning the use of contractions in formal English
Usually, form
plurals of letters, numbers, symbols, acronyms, or words you are discussing as
entities, by simply adding a small s:
... found more difficulty
with a single A than with the four Bs ...
... failed to recognize that
2665 contained two 6s ...
It is
especially important to distinguish clearly whether acronyms are plurals,
possessives, or both:
... are connected to
the CPUs that have a ...
... are connected to the
CPU's processors by ...
Apostrophes are
correctly used to form contractions like don't, shan't, what's, and it's.
Contractions are not suitable for formal writing in business, industry and
research. Only use contractions in informal writing, such as hand-written
internal memoranda.
CAPITAL LETTERS
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, pages 39, 93, 142)
Beginning a sentence. Use a capital letter at the beginning of the first
word to signal the beginning of a sentence.
Proper nouns or adjectives. Use initial capitals (capitals for
the initial letters of words, but not throughout the words) to signal proper
nouns or adjectives, and words derived from proper nouns (a proper noun is the
name of a specific person, a place, a country, a month, a day, a holiday, a
journal title):
... the volt is named after
Count AllessandroVolta ...
... the Darwinian theory of
evolution ...
... discovered in
... manufactured in
Use capitals
throughout for acronyms or for words used as commands in computing documents:
... belong to NATO and
therefore ...
... use the SAVE command to
...
If you wish to
use the plural form of an acronym, add the "s" in lower case:
WRITE: CPUs
NOT: CPUS or CPU's
Typical
Norwegian error:
De and Dem are never You and
Your in mid-sentence.
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, page 45)
Use a colon to
indicate that material is to follow. The material that follows may be a
summary, a list, a complete sentence, a question or a quotation:
... Three factors play a major role: time, money and
manpower.
If you wish to
show that the items in your list are in a sequence or hierarchy, use numbers: 1. ...........
2. ...........
3. ...........
or letters:
a)
...........
b) ...........
c)
...........
If you wish to
show that the items in your list are separate and parallel, but in no
significant order or hierarchy, use "bullets":
• ...........
• ...........
• ...........
or dashes:
- ..........
- ...........
- ...........
Division
of a sentence:
Use colon as a
stop within a sentence.
The colon, when
used within a sentence, is a "lighter" stop than a full stop, and
joins two statements that are grammatically independent but logically closely
related. Usually, the material after the colon is supplementary or reinforcing.
Begin the clause following the colon with a lower-case letter, not a capital
letter:
... Take care when using this solvent: it may dissolve
certain synthetic materials ...
COMMA (,)
(refer to Getting Your English Right, pages 46,
209)
Use a comma to mark the boundary of a
"preliminary" unit at the start of a sentence.
Frequently, we
begin sentences with a single word, a link word or a longer word-group to
indicate time, place, manner, reason, or other information relevant to the main
statement that is to follow:
... Tomorrow, ...
... Immediately, ...
... Before reacting, ...
When you are
speaking, you help your listeners by signalling the boundary of such
preliminary units with a change in intonation and a pause. (Try reading that
sentence - and this sentence - aloud. You will hear the changes of tone and
timing.) When you are writing, give your readers similar help by signalling the
boundary of preliminary units with commas.
Omission of commas
in preliminary positions is one of the commonest ways to confuse your readers.
MEANT ... Frequently, adjusted prices for new cars
need to be watched
WROTE ... Frequently adjusted prices for new cars
need to be watched.
Parenthetic information:
Use commas to
enclose parenthetic words, phrases and clauses (parenthetic information means
explanatory or qualifying information added to a sentence as an extra comment):
The number of new female computer science
students, as we hoped, has risen dramatically.
When deciding
whether or not to put a comma before a clause, you may find it useful to
compare the following examples and remember that:
Commenting
clauses need a comma, defining clauses do not.
Funding will be allocated to the new ring road project,
which is a major traffic bottleneck on the E6.
(this is a commenting clause: it shows why the ring road has
the most pressing need for funds)
Funding will be allocated to the new ring road project
which is to the north of the city.
(this is a defining clause that indicates which project we
are considering. No comma is required.)
The presence or
absence of a comma before a relative pronoun signals to your reader what you
mean: The authorities should keep the centre clear of cars, which
will lead to noise and pollution.
This is a
commenting clause and needs a comma as it applies to all cars.
If a defining
clause is used and there is no comma, it is understood that this ban applies to
only certain types of cars: The
authorities should keep the centre clear of cars which will lead to noise and
pollution.
Adjectives in a series
Use commas to
separate two or more adjectives in a series, when you want each to qualify the
final noun separately: a rapid, quantifiable, temperature increase.
Using commas
emphasizes that each adjective separately qualifies the noun increase.
Comma before and and other
conjunctions
The basic rule
is to use commas in a list of items and insert "and" before the final
item:
Our office equipment consists of a photocopier, a fax,
three PCs, a printer and six filing cabinets.
However, this
form of punctuation leads to trouble if the final item in the list contains
"and":
The fax has the following function messages: error, out of paper, repeat and send and receive.
The solution is
to use a comma before the final and, to ensure that the meaning is always
absolutely clear:
The fax has the following function messages: error, out of paper, repeat, and send and receive.
Numbers
In general, do
NOT use a comma to indicate thousands or millions when you are writing numbers.
WRITE: 3000
30 000 30 000 000
NOT: 3,000 30,000
30,000,000
These rules
should be applied consistently on both sides of the decimal marker:
WRITE: 54
321.123
NOT: 54,321.123
By not using
the comma in English you do not risk confusing English and Norwegian customs. A
price of
NOK 15 000 per
km. only has one meaning.
The latest
Norwegian standard recommends omitting the stop in thousands,
millions etc. and recommends the use of a space, as in English.
EXCLAMATION
MARK (!)
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, page 77)
Generally, an
exclamation mark is used to express astonishment or surprise. In scientific and
technical writing, you are unlikely to find many appropriate occasions to use one.
But it can sometimes be used to reinforce a warning:
... note that cyanide gas can cause severe
poisoning.
Always
avoid inhaling the gas!
FULL STOP (.)
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, page 90)
Marking
the end of a sentence
The principal
use of the full stop is to signal the end of a sentence.
Marking
titles, abbreviations and acronyms
Do NOT use full
stops: after titles, headings and sub-headings;
after units: WRITE: cm, in, kg, Hz,
NOT: cm., in., kg., Hz.
within capitalized abbreviations or acronyms:
WRITE:
NOT: V.D.U.
Use full stops
between letters if you form and use lower-case abbreviations:
... the
e.s.r. spectrum (electron-spin-resonance spectrum)
In general,
however, lower-case abbreviations are not used in scientific and technical
writing.
Use full stops
after abbreviations formed by cutting off the end of a word, such as:
No. Nos. Fig. Figs. Sun.
In
correspondence, a useful rule is to use a full stop after an abbreviation of a
personal title, except (in BE) when the abbreviation contains the first and
last letters of the abbreviated word, examples:
Dr,
Mr, Mrs, Co.,
Ltd.
NOT: Dear Mr. Jones (in BE)
Full
stop as a decimal marker
In
This can be an
expensive misunderstanding:
The services of 6 specialized engineers from XYZ
consultants to
perform the above contract specification are available at a
total of
NOK 750.000 per month.
(This means NOK
750 per month, cheap at the price?)
HYPHEN (-)
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, pages 39, 50, 93, 105 142)
The hyphen is a
joining signal (as distinct from a dash, which is a separator). Its main use is
usually to link two or more words together to form a compound adjective to
describe the following noun.
.. is made of
plastic-coated metal ...
...
uses a state-of-the-art solutions ...
...
a trial-and-error technique
But note that
if these are reversed, there are no hyphens:
... these
solutions are state of the art.
When the number
or colour is intended as a part of a compound, a hyphen is vital:
... two-part
polyurethane compounds ...
...
an unaffected silver-backed plate ...
Use
"suspended" hyphens to create compounds in which two or more
adjectives or numbers are attached to one or other word:
WRITE:... 20-, 80-, and 100-ml containers ...
NOT: ... 20, 80, and 100 ml containers ...
Use hyphens to
create compounds that could be confused with other words spelt similarly, but
with different meaning:
re-form :
reform
re-collect : recollect
re-cover : recover
Use hyphens to
create compounds in which misleading or awkward combination of consonants would
be formed by joining the words, particularly if there are two similar
consonants.
de-stabilize
animal-like
water-repellent
Hyphenation and capitalization
Hyphenation shows that two words belong together. Consider a Third World War (all the world at war) and a Third-World War (a war only in the
Note that only some words
in the titles of books, reports and similar publications are capitalized. Let
us consider what to do when there are hyphenated words in such a title.
The general rule is to only
capitalize the first element in the hyphenated phrase:
"Low-pressurized
Aircraft Design"
"Near-critical Values"
This general rule also
works when the second element in a hyphenated phrase modifies the first word or
both elements are parts of the same word:
"
"Assessment of Hydropower-based Energy Trading"
"Measures to Stop E-mail Abuse"
There are a couple of
exceptions to this general rule:
1) Capitalize both the first and second elements in a hyphenated phrase
in a title when they have equal force:
"Vapour-Liquid
Compounds"
"Regional-National
Legislation"
2) Capitalize the second
element in a hyphenated compound in a title when it is a noun or proper
adjective:
"Non-American Election Principles"
"Anti-Christian Thinking"
INVERTED COMMAS
Inverted commas are used in three ways in English:
1. Enclosing direct quotations:
... the standard states: "Upper-case letters in diagrams
should be at least
1.6 mm high"...
2. Indicating an 'unusual' use of a word or phrase
Use inverted
commas to emphasize that a word or phrase is unusual, or is being used in a
special or noteworthy way in the text you are writing:
Bill Gates was
rather embarrassed when his Windows 98 crashed, resulting in the infamous
"blue screen".
3. To enclose the title of a
book, article or recording:
Apart from "The New
Fowler's"…
Two differences between BE and AE:
First, the
typographical signs are different. In BE ' …' or "..." are used. In
AE, they use << ...>>.
Second, they
are called quotation marks in AE, not inverted commas.
BRACKETS
(PARANTHESES)
(refer to Getting Your
English Right, page 31)
Variations
in terminology:
There are
variations of terminology used to discuss this topic. Most differences are
between usage in British English and in American English.
In
In the
One solution is
to use parentheses for (...), and square brackets for [...].
Enclosing
parenthetic remarks
The principal
use of parentheses is to mark the boundaries of an 'aside' or extra remark
within a statement. (Parenthesis comes from the Greek word meaning 'word or
words added within or beside your main thesis'.
WRITE: ... the glass content
of this material is low (10 % by weight)
for this application ...
NOT: ... the glass content
of this material is low, (10 % by weight),
for this
application ...
Explaining
acronyms
Use parentheses
to enclose explanations of acronyms formed from groups of words, if you are
going to use the acronyms throughout your text:
... the decision was taken to
use finite element modelling (FEM).
Two research
units working in FEM have been ...
QUESTION MARK
(?)
Indicating
the end of a direct question
The principal
use of a question mark is to indicate the end of a direct question. Direct
questions are particularly effective in documents that hold a 'dialogue' with
readers: ... Does the software install in 10 seconds?
-
Yes: .....
-
No: .....
Expressing
doubt
A question mark
can also be used to express doubt in lab. notes:
... results suggest that
these phases are normal (?) and that ...
...
requires an increase of 40 % (or more) before ...
However, in
scientific and technical writing, it is better to use words such as perhaps or possibly, or re-word the statement completely.
SEMI-COLON (;)
Coordinating
related statements within a sentence
Use a
semi-colon to link statements that are grammatically independent but are too
closely related in meaning to separated by a full
stop.
The semi-colon
is a heavier stop than a comma, but lighter than a full stop. It is a
coordinating mark, and can often be used instead of a coordinating conjunction
like and or but:
... in the first 11.0 km of transport, there is a time
lag; then, the flow settles to steady velocity ...
Separating
main items in a list
Separate the
main ideas in a row of commas by semi-colons:
Aurby, 1995, pp.
10-11; Jones, 1998, pp. 211-213;
SLASH (/)
Signalling 'or'
The slash
(sometimes called slant, solidus, oblique or virgule)
signifies an alternative, 'or', NOT 'from-to':
... the prices at finished/non-finished levels
...
... The model may need tuning and/or revision ...
Signalling
'per'
Use a slash to
show when a unit for a physical quantity is divided by a unit for another
physical quantity:
... m/s = metre(s) per second ...
... rev/min =
revolutions per minute ...