Download Grammar Mechanics, Style, and the Rules of Language

Grammar
Mechanics,
Style, and
the Rules of
Language
The Rules of Language Change
• There used to be a law in the UK in the 15th
century called “For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge”
(from serious law to slang curse).
• Economy of language (they are= they’re)principle of least effort (lazy).
• Archaic (old- thee or thou or whom) and
borrowed words from other languages with travel
/ immigration or from invention (iPod).
• Many changes are to vocabulary and format (ie:
change between typing / word processing /
texting)- not the structure of language.
Does Punctuation Matter?
A panda walks into a café. He orders a sandwich,
eats it, and then draws and gun and fires two shots
into the air.
“Why?” asks the confused waiter, as the panda
makes towards the exit. The panda produces a
badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over
his shoulder.
“I’m a panda,” he says, at the door. “Look it up.”
The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure
enough, finds an explanation.
“Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal,
native to China. Eats, shoots, and leaves.”
The goal of grammar is:
• Make strong clear sentences so you can be
understood by others.
• Write clearly so you look smart.
• Standardize language so we all understand
each other.
• Provide a similar language so we can all
teach & learn how to improve writing /
speaking (ie: is your participle dangling? Your
noun needs modification)
8 Parts of Speech
• Noun: person, place or thing
(common= regular, proper =
specific name)
• Pronoun: takes the place of
a noun.
• Verb: action word or state of
being
• Conjunction: joins words and
phrases
• Adverb: modifies and verb
• Adjective: modifies a noun
• Article: specify number of
nouns
• Preposition: shows
relationships, direction,
placement
The blue car was driving wildly down
Oak Street and almost hit Susan.
Capital Letters
• A sentence begins with a capital.
• Proper nouns require capitals (specific names
of people, places, things)
• Words derived from the names of places or
languages (English muffins, French fries).
• Major words in titles: The Lord of the Flies.
• No matter how cool it looks- no random
capitals- juLiA (huh?)
Spelling
• Canadian vs. American (no spell-checker)
• Color / colour theater / theatre
• Silent letters & spelling demons:
government telephone Wednesday
• I before E except after C or when it
sounds like “ay” in neighbour or?
• achieve chief weird weight seize
Homonymns & Usage
• Words that sound the
same but mean different
things and are used in
different circumstances
are often spelled
differently- big problem
for non-readers or
phonetic language
learning.
• Problems with
contractions & usage.
• Mis-using these ones
shows you are illiterate:
• They’re = they are
• Their= belongs to them
• There= a place
• Your = belongs to you
• You’re = you are
• To = direction
• Too = more than enough
• Two= 2
• Than= comparison
• Then= time
More usage issues
• Accept= to receive
• Except = but for,
exclude
• Affect = verb
• Effect= noun
• Choose= present
choice
• Chose= past choice
• Its = belonging to it
• It’s = it is
• Principal= leader of
school
• Principle = morals
• Hear= with your ear
• Here= place
• Allowed= given
permission
• Aloud= spoken
Plurals
Singular= 1
Plural = more than one
Ends in Y with consonant?
remove Y and add “ies”
activity= activities
Ends in Y with a vowel?
Just add s
monkey = monkeys
Words that sound like they end in EZ
with an extra syllable must have “es”
Church = churches
• day =
days
• copy=
copies
• candy=
candies
• dress =
dresses
• branch=
branches
Punctuation
• End marks: only three types of punctuation
can end a sentence, exclamation or
question. Commas don’t work.
•Period.
Ends most simple sentences
•Exclamation!
Looks childish unless
it really is a warning, surprise, or yelling
•Question?
Only use for a proper question
Apostrophes
• Possession: shows
that someone owns
something.
• John’s book
• Chris’ car
• The teachers’ staff
room
• Contraction:
replaces removed
letters in a
shortened phrase/
not spacing of words
• Do not = don’t
• They are = they’re
“Quotation Marks”
• Used to show dialogue
or words spoken aloud.
• Used to show direct
quotes borrowed from
another text.
• Punctuation connected
to the quote goes inside
the quotation marks.
• Never used as air
quotes.
• The teacher said,
“Do not write your
answers in pencil.”
• “Why?” asked John.
• “In the event of a
strike,” the teacher
said, “please do
your homework.”
Commas
• Used to separate items
in a list of three or
more, including the
conjunction and.
• Separate introductory
words, phrases, or
extraneous words not
part of the main
sentence.
• Interruptions of thought
or parenthetical
comments.
• John wore a hat,
mittens, a toque, and
boots.
• No, John you may not
go to the bathroom.
• As usual, Richard lied.
• My sister, who has red
hair, never wears pink
clothes.
Other marks
• Ellipsis… shows
interruptions in
thoughts, speakers
trailing off, edited
quotes.
• Hyphen- splits
words at the end of
a line, reverse order
words (bear-like).
• Parentheses
(brackets) used for
citing sources in
MLA format,
sometimes
examples, rarely
used in standard
writing.
• Emoticons = NO!