New Year's Resolution #3

I will not arbitrarily capitalize.

CAPS CAPS CAPS!

There’s been a rash of arbitrary capitalization in recent years.  Maybe it’s because there are so many official designations floating around, and people have taken to assuming things should be capitalized that should not. Or they want to err on the side of caution. Or they feel capitalization bestows importance or emphasis.

Check yourself before you wreck yourself. The following, no matter how many times you see them capitalized in print, are lower cased in the body of your text.*

federal

civilian

defense

government

department

Those are just a few of the most common cases of incorrect case - they're everywhere. In my mind, there are four situations in which it is acceptable to use nonstandard capitalization:

1. You are J.D. Salinger and are going for a touch of irony.

2. You are Paul Krugman and are going for a touch of irony.

3. You are an 18^th century essayist writing about things like Beauty and Intellect.

4. You are writing nouns in German (in which case, it would be standard capitalization, because, you know, it’s German).

For the full rules for capitalization, consult a style guide. The University of South Carolina has a pretty straightforward one here, and it’s always a good idea to invest in a copy of the AP Style Guide.

*Unless they're part of an official title: the Department of Defense, the State of Alaska, the Government Accountability Office, or the UC Berkeley Department of English, for example.

Happy New Year: Recap and Resolutions

Happy New Year from Active Voice LLC, the DC region's premiere writing and editing service (at least as far as our mothers are concerned) serving businesses small and large, agencies, nonprofits, and professionals.

We are going to try not to sound like your sister-in-law's annual holiday newsletter (because, honestly, do you need another real-time report on this year's junior high choral extravaganza?) or even look like it (who does those portraits anymore; isn't Sears closed? How does she even find a family-worth of matching argyle vests?). But we need to brag a bit.

In 2011, we wrote and edited columns that appeared in major newspapers and magazines across the country and online; speeches that were intoned at universities, in front of Congress, and to crowds in the thousands; proposals, capabilities statements, reports, resumes, brochures, and web content for people and businesses each and every one of whom we are convinced is the next Steve Jobs or Apple.

We updated our website and dipped our collective toe (gruesome image) into the social media stream. About that, by the way: we find ourselves not as friended or followed as we believe our charming personalities and amusing musings warrant. And though we have yet to see begging identified as an effective social media strategy, we are going to try: Please friend us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, comment on our blog (even if just to say, would you please shut up). You will save us no end of "if a tree falls onto our Twitter account" philosophical debates around the water cooler.

Most of all, though, in 2011, we didn't go broke. And we choose to interpret that as confirmation of our strongest belief: good writing matters. No matter how you wrap your language in flash animation, online polls, and YouTube videos of chipmunks dancing in teeny underwear, if you do not, in the words of demigods William Strunk and E.B. White, "make every word tell," then all you have at the end of the day is chipmunks dancing in teeny underwear.

For this affirmation, we thank you - our wonderful clients and supporters. And thank you in advance to those of you with whom we will work in 2012 (because we know that after you read this, you will think, oh what a clever bunch, and immediately click over to our web page and check out our services).

Our resolution in 2012 is to try, for each person with whom we work and meet, to live up to the soubriquet E.B. White bestowed on Charlotte in Charlotte's Web: "It is not often that someone comes along who is a true friend and a good writer."

New Year's Resolution #4

I Will Use I, Me, My and Mine Correctly

It's easy to use personal pronouns correctly when you're only talking about yourself, but as soon as more than one person is involved, it seems like it all falls apart. Today I read this sentence in the blogosphere:

I've been working on and off on a scrapbook of Joe and I's relationship.

Huh? I's relationship?

Often, mistaken pronouns are a symptom of overcorrection.  In school, we're taught to change our colloquial "me and Joe" to "Joe and I."  And that is correct -- when it's appropriate to use a nominal, non-possessive pronoun.  But that's not always the pronoun you need.

So forget about "Joe and I." Instead, say the sentence as if you were the only person involved in it.  You would never say "I's relationship." You would say "my relationship." The same pronouns apply, whether or not that Joe guy is around.

The Beatles demonstrate their mastery of pronouns.

New Year's Resolution #5

Hemingway

People admire Hemingway for his concise style, but the real strength in his writing is that he's also precise: the first facilitates the second.  (You've also got to admire Woody Allen for writing the best impersonation of Hemingway around in Midnight in Paris.)

Precision isn't easy.  Forming one truly complete thought -- let alone all the thoughts that go into one complete piece of writing -- isn't easy.  That's why most of us have trouble being concise.  If we can't nail down an idea with one word (or phrase, or sentence), we try to do it with three, hoping they'll circumscribe the point we want to make.

I resolve -- and I hope you will, too -- to cut out the redundant words and sentences.  Like in that Talking Heads song, "Say something once, why say it again?" Just be sure to say it well the first time around.

New Year's Resolution #6

I Will Match my Pronoun to its Antecedent

How pleasant it is to match one's pronouns to one's nouns.

It's believed that goldfish have five second memories.  It's a fact that most writers do.  Within the course of one sentence, many of us lose track of the noun to which we're referring.  We end up with an "its" that refers to a plural noun or series of nouns, or more commonly, a "they" that refers to a singular noun.

It doesn't help that there's no informal gender-neutral pronoun for "a person" in English.  Instead, we're stuck dealing with this "one" or "his or her" business.  And then we sound like Miss Bingley in Pride and Prejudice:

"How pleasant it is to have one's house to oneself again."

She's grammatically correct, but ugh. Who wants to sound like that?

But I digress.  The reality is, we're operating in a language that does not have a convenient gender-neutral pronoun for the third person singular, and we have to work with what we've got.  Check pronouns against their antecedents,  k?

New Year's Resolution #7

I Will Not Splice

You're probably not going around splicing genes left and right; it's best not to do it to sentences, either.  A comma splice occurs when, rather than separating two independent clauses with a period (or at least a semicolon), you join them with a comma and no conjunction.  (The exception to this rule is when the clauses are alike in form, in which case, lo! you have a rhetorical technique.  For example: I came, I saw, I conquered).

Potions Master, Notorious Splicer

I was rereading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix last night.  Evidently, one of Snape's most dubious behaviors is his tendency to splice.

"We are continuing with our Strengthening Solutions today, you will find your mixtures as you left them last lesson, if correctly made they should have matured well over the weekend..."

Sorry, Snivellus, but those are all independent clauses.  10 points from Slytherin, and if that wasn't dialogue, I'd make it detention.

New Year's Resolution #8

I Will Not Use a Fragment as a Sentence

We call them fragments because they're incomplete on their own, like jelly or gravy or Taylor Swift.  Or like Renee Zellweger in the opening credits of Bridget Jones' Diary. Lacking a subject or a predicate, a fragment can be made complete when attached to a sentence.  Unless you do it for stylistic reasons, don't leave a fragment hanging.

Alas, too often fragments are made to stand on their own.  Here's an example I came across today:

"This is one of my favorite books [That was an independent clause.]. Written by the author of The Time Traveler's Wife [Arghhh! That's not a sentence!]."

Lonely fragments: just another everyday tragedy.

New Year's Resolution #9

It Is A Wonderful Life

I Will Not Mistake "It's" and "Its"

If editors had a nickel every time they saw this one...that'd be a pretty substantial pay raise.

Quick test #1: Does something belong to "it?" Use "its."
Quick test #2: Can you replace the word with "it is?" Use "it's."

New Year's Resolution #10

I Will Not Place the Comma After the Conjunction

Uh-oh.

Remember that segment in Planet Earth about the polar bear being displaced as the Arctic Circle shrinks?  Pretty harrowing story, right?  So, too, it goes for the comma.

Today the comma is showing up increasingly in places it was never meant to exist.  One of the worst of these unnatural habitats: after the conjunction.  Observe the migration of this comma out of its proper environment:

Parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme.

Parsley, sage, rosemary and, thyme.

Let's all do our parts in 2012. Save the commas!