Pain in the English » Punctuation and Mechanics

Adding a question mark to ensure a response

Fred — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 06:58:46 +0000

I am in media relations and sent a story pitch to an editor telling him I could send him more information if he was interested and added a question mark to ensure some kind of response, e.g.,

I can send you more information if you are interested?

Is this grammatically incorrect? I just like doing this because it’s not as forceful as Are you interested?

p. v. pp.

juttin — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 04:15:31 +0000

Why is “page” abbreviated “p” while “pages” is “pp”? Of somewhat less interest to me, I also wonder whether “p” or “p.” is the correct notation?

Heaven or heaven?

Andy — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 02:52:25 +0000

Talking about the concept of the afterlife in Catholicism, would you capitalize Heaven? Moreover, what about Hell?

Is Punctuation Part of “Mechanics”?

dyske — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 01:23:46 +0000

According to my research, punctuation is part of “mechanics”. If so, is it redundant to say, “punctuation and mechanics”?

I do see many instances of people using “punctuation and mechanics”. For instance, I came across an article written by an English professor entitled “Common Mistakes of English Grammar, Mechanics, and Punctuation”. If punctuation is indeed part of mechanics, then this title itself would be a mistake ironically.

Capitalization of dog breeds

Jenn — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 19:03:27 +0000

When referring to “French” and “English” bulldogs, the geographic part of the breed will always be capitalized. What are the rules about capitalizing the stand alone word “bulldog?”

From what I understand, AKC dropped the requirement to use “English” in front of the word “bulldog” (or so I’ve been told….) so I am left with the word “bulldog.”

Should I capitalize or not? I referred to the AKC site to see how they were handling the capitalization and they begin by capitalizing the word then use a non-capitalized version throughout their article.

Thoughts?

Someone else’s

dyske — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 13:40:14 +0000

Is “someone else’s” grammatically correct? Every time I type, the spell-checker reminds me that it’s wrong.

There are a lot of discussions online about “passers-by” vs. “passer-bys”. The general consensus, from what I saw, is that the former is more correct. If this is true, shouldn’t it be “someone’s else”?

I personally feel that “passer-bys” is more correct, especially when you remove the hyphen (“passerbys”). It’s more consistent with other words like “blastoffs” and “playoffs”.

Dashes when saying year-olds

Brie — Sat, 02 May 2009 13:17:51 +0000

I have a question about when to use hyphens. For example, do I have a five-year-old dog or a five year-old dog?

Find the error

Kangnamgu — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 05:08:10 +0000

Working from a textbook, one exercise requires students to find the error in different sentences. Can anybody find the error in the following sentence?

*The painting of the Buddha, that has nine figures, made the religion more concrete to believers in 13th-century Tibet.*

The sentence refers to a picture in the book of a painting of a Buddha with several other figures (bodhisattvas) around it.

Sections of the sentence is underlined. I will use square-brackets to indicate the underlined sections. The error should be with one of these underlined sections. Here is the sentence again:

The painting of the Buddha[, that has]{A} nine [figures,]{B} made the religion more [concrete]{C} to believers in [13th-century Tibet.]{D}

The Teacher's Edition of the textbook says that the error is with {A}. If this is correct, what is wrong with it?

Thanks!

Numbered List of People

Karen Metrin — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 12:43:02 +0000

I need to list the people in a photo, below the photo. The picture will be framed, not in a magazine, etc. What is the proper punctuation? The way I originally typed the names follows but I am ready to finalize the layout and want to know the proper format. The way I have it now:

1. Catherine, March 11, 1874; 2. Alice Bell, July 8, 1875; 3. Birdie Alberdine, February 14, 1877; 4. Mary Adella, November 15, 1879… and so on for eight people.

If I number each person, is additional punctuation required between the names as I have typed it or do the numbers stand alone? Should the individual names even be numbered? I am really not certain what the proper format is.

I am on a deadline to complete this restored photo and layout for a client so a prompt reply would be greatly appreciated.

Pluralization of "Stachewicz"

Julie — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 09:41:32 +0000

So, for a last name like “Stachewicz”…would it be The Stachewiczs or the The Stachewiczes?