GrammarTip Jan. 19, 2011 -- Do You Believe in Capital Punishment?

If you're looking for information on grammar, punctuation, or word usage, GrammarTip is for you. Whether you're writing marketing brochures, legal briefs, medical papers, website pages, e-mails or business letters and memos, you'll find something in each issue to help. And don't forget to take our Word Challenge!

This Week's Aside
Blogo, ergo sum. 
 
Click here to read our blog.
 
 
 For more information related to grammar, punctuation, editing, and writing, including timely questions raised by customers, readers, and the general public, click here and check out our GrammarPhile blog! We also sponsor cool giveaways to registrants from time to time!

Be sure to subscribe so that you'll be notified whenever we post a new article.
Word of the Month
 

koan

1 19 11 WordPronunciation: 'ko-an
Function: noun
Etymology: Japanese koan, from ko public + an proposition
Date: 1945
Definition:
a paradox to be meditated upon that is used to train Zen Buddhist monks to abandon ultimate dependence on reason and to force them into gaining sudden intuitive enlightenment

 

Example:

"Apple won't as much throw a penny back to stockholders via dividends or buybacks. So far, company executives, including ailing Steve Jobs, have offered only vague, nearly dismissive

koans about possible acquisitions and the need to remain flexible and conservative."
- Dennis K. Berman, Wall Street Journal, 1/18/2011, p. C1.

Definition source: Merriam-Webster's Eleventh Collegiate Dictionary.

Weekly GrammarTip
Do You Believe in Capital Punishment?
1 19 11 Prisoner That's really not the question, by the way. For capital punishment does indeed exist, and that's a fact. If you do not believe in it, you are fooling yourself. But do you agree with it? Do you support it? Do you sanction it? That's the question... But let's return to the matter at hand here at ProofreadNOW.com:

Are you ever confused when it comes to capitalizing certain words? For example, when referring to a certain liquor from Scotland, does one drink Scotch or scotch? Is it Brussels sprouts or brussels sprouts? Is it a Homeric effort or just a homeric effort? Inquiring minds want to know!

Authoritative sources vary. The Merriam-Webster 11th Collegiate Dictionary calls for capping Scotch before you drink it, and cites (but does not rule on) a capital B often for the sprouts. However, our standard here at ProofreadNOW.com is the Chicago Manual of Style, and here's a partial list of words they prefer to see in lower case:

morocco leather, brussels sprouts, scotch whisky, french fries, french dressing, frankfurter, brie, india ink, homeric, herculean, pasteurize, manila envelope, arabic numerals, french windows, venetian blinds, quixotic, roman numerals and roman type, dutch oven, and bohemian, among others. Oh - and there's also italic type (named for Italy, don't you know).

Other examples are mixed.
  • the Bureau of the Census; census forms; the census of 2010
  • the Department of the Interior; the Interior
  • the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the bureau (note lowercase); the FBI
  • the United States (or US) Supreme Court; the Supreme Court; but the court
  • the District Court for Southern California; the district court
  • the Circuit Court of Lake County, Family Division (Illinois); family court
  • the Chicago City Council; the city council
  • administration; the Reagan administration
  • federal; the federal government; federal agencies
  • nazi tendencies; the Nazi Party; Nazi(s); Nazism
  • the African National Congress party (party is not part of the official name); the ANC
  • civil service
  • the Left; members of the left wing; left-winger; on the left
  • the Far Left; the Far Right; the radical Left
  • the New York Stock Exchange; the stock exchange

Share With a Friend

Would you like to share this GrammarTip with a friend?

Click here to Share.

Connect With Us

Word Challenge
Have You a Raven-ous Appetite for Words?

1 19 11 Challenge

On this day in 1809, poet, author, and literary critic Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Whether or not tonight is dreary, or if you are weak and weary, ponder this week's tell-tale words and see if you fall into a pit - with a pendulum swinging o'er you - or if you rise to fame and (fleeting) fortune by way of this one majestic accomplishment.


1. purloin: (a) to influence or lead by deceit, trick, or artifice; (b) to move over a position occupied by an opponent's piece in a board game often thereby capturing the piece; (c) to appropriate wrongfully and often by a breach of trust; (d) to protest, demand, or complain vehemently.

2. masque: (a) a short allegorical dramatic entertainment of the 16th and 17th centuries performed by masked actors; (b) pretense; (c) an often grotesque carved head or face used as an ornament (as on a keystone); (d) a warm coat worn over indoor clothing.

3. mesmeric: (a) insidious; (b) fascinating; (c) not genuine; (d) hard to bear.

4. colloquy: (a) a high-level serious discussion; (b) a customary course of action; (c) a respite especially from a disagreeable or painful state or action; (d) to speak to or address in a witty and teasing manner.

5. gambol: (a) one who avidly seeks or collects something; (b) to play a game for money or property; (c) to skip about in play; (d) an excursion undertaken especially for pleasure.

6. burthen: archaic variant of (a) bearing; (b) birth; (c) burn; (d) burden.

7. coppice: (a) a thicket, grove, or growth of small trees; (b) a rounded vault resting on a usually circular base and forming a roof or a ceiling; (c) a stroke or blow delivered with a sweeping arm movement; (d) a culminating point.

8. misanthropy: (a) a particular fondness of humankind; (b) a hatred or distrust of humankind; (c) a state of suffering and want that is the result of poverty or affliction; (d) containing malodorous sulfur compounds.

9. manumit: (a) to conscript for military service; (b) to return to custody pending trial or for further detention; (c) to relinquish voluntarily (as a legal right); (d) to release from slavery.

10. foolscap: (a) a metal covering or cowl (as for a fireplace, valve chamber, or ventilator); (b) a piece of writing paper; (c) a woolen cap of Scottish origin — called also glengarry bonnet; (d) fake gold.

Click here for the answers!