Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Username

Astartes

Member Since

October 7, 2011

Total number of comments

23

Total number of votes received

109

Bio

Latest Comments

Capitalizing After the Colon

  • September 27, 2005, 5:00am

I believe that the capitalization rule comes into effect when a new 'sentence' is started after the colon. In the case of a list, it's not necessary.

So, you could say "He saw several things on the shelves: cookies, jam, bread, and soda." and since the continuation after the colon isn't a new idea per-se, it isn't capitalized.

However, in the example you cited, there is almost a new sentence. Lets replace the colon with a period for sake of argument. "The blue sky was beautiful. The sky resembled..." As you can see, it can be two seperate sentences, the colon is just more gramatically correct in this situation, and that's (I believe) why it is capitalized.

My dad is work at home.

  • October 26, 2004, 10:45pm

It sounds pretty bad to me.

I think the way you wrote it is just fine.

washeteria

  • October 26, 2004, 10:33pm

In linguistics, we refer to words such as this as "blends". One of the good examples is "hoick", as in "to hoick up one's pants. It's supposedly a blend of "hoist" and "hike".

“I says”

  • October 26, 2004, 10:31pm

It's used as the past tense of "said" in some dialects of English during the course of a narrative.

Irregardless?

  • October 26, 2004, 10:30pm

Yes, "irregardless" is based on analogy with words like "respective ~ irrespective". "Analogy" is actually the technical term in linguistics for this phenomenon. Another example is "dove" as the past tense for "dive" (it's actually "dived", but not too many people say that anymore), coming from an analogy with "drive ~ drove".

Footnote references and punctuations

  • October 26, 2004, 10:25pm

Yeah, definitely after.

begin from page 10

  • October 26, 2004, 10:18pm

"on page 10" sounds best to me.

Lux’ or Lux’s

  • October 26, 2004, 10:17pm

I would say "Lux's" as well.

A Jew and Jews

  • October 10, 2003, 8:43pm

This one has always been interesting to me. Before the TV show South Park openly critisized Kyle (one of the 4 main characters) for being Jewish, I was completely unaware that the word could be used as a derogatory noun. Even before it became used in this way people often used the word "jew" as an offensive transitive verb, as in "to jew down the price" which, I believe, originated with the idea that Jewish people are often frugal.

The word is not inherently defematory, but when used with a certain tone of voice or in the right context it can considered offensive. I find this usage of the word inane and ignorant.

I do agree with Joachim though; a likely possibility is that being Jewish has been considered shameful for hundreds of years (although recently it has become more acceptable.)

Questions

Prepositions at the end of a clause October 7, 2011