Passive voice. Never use it, right? Passive voice schlocks up your writing and kicks off all kinds of warnings in MS Word’s grammar police function. Doesn’t it? No. Passive voice is not taboo, and many excellent writers use it effectively. You have to know the rules and know what you want to say. I completely enjoyed an online lesson at NewsUniversity’s www.newsu.org school, operated by …(there’s more) Continue reading
If you want to sound like a knucklehead, the best thing to do is to mismatch your verbs and nouns. Here’s the rule from grammar police – plural nouns need plural verbs and singular nouns need singular verbs. There’s no option involved, and collective nouns are singular, not plural. I read junk every day – from authors or writers who claim to be experts – …(there’s more) Continue reading
A communications professional’s pet peeves By Gail Sideman I’m a journalist and publicist so it should come as no surprise that I’m picky about the way words are used. The number of media outlets has grown tenfold in the last quarter century, and as a result, so have misuses of words in almost every arena. I admittedly cringe when I hear or read the simplest …(there’s more) Continue reading
A vocabulary interlude today from the Grammar Police. My husband and Yosemite Sam, of Warner Bros. cartoon fame, expostulate frequently with a word I adore. “Ah been, I say, Ah been hornswoggled!” Yosemite Sam used the expletive when dealing with Bugs Bunny’s con-rabbit ways. My husband, Dan, uses it when my daughter and I nudge him into doing something and then make him think it …(there’s more) Continue reading
