The Grammar Factor (Factorial’s twin)
August 2010

From Mary Morel
Consultant, trainer and author
www.themfactor.com.au and www.onlinegrammar.com.au

Colons

A reader sent me a link (below) about our changing use of colons. The author, Conor J. Dillon, asserts: ‘Colons, once on life support, are proliferating.’

http://tinyurl.com/25xdzxs

Grammar and style questions

Use of bold for abbreviations

Reader’s question: Is it appropriate to put the first mention of abbreviations and appendices in bold. For example:

Widgets Pty Ltd (Widgets) is a leader in this field as shown in Appendix A.

My answer: This is a style issue so it’s your choice, but I don’t think bold is necessary.

Abbreviations in executive summaries

Reader’s question: Should you use abbreviations in an executive summary?

My answer: As a general rule, do not use abbreviations in an executive summary, but use your common sense. I would use an abbreviation if it were more common than the full term or used several times.

As always, when you use an abbreviation, spell out the term in the first instance and put the abbreviation in brackets.

If you use an abbreviation in the executive summary, you need to spell it out again the first time you use it in the body of the report.

Listing qualifications

Reader’s question: How should you write qualifications after your name, i.e. with double spaces, commas or semicolons?

My answer: I would use commas (e.g. BA, DipEd, DipTchg) or if space permitted, you could list them.

BA
DipEd
DipTchg

Apostrophes yet again!

Reader’s question: Do you add an extra possessive ‘s’ with names that end in ‘s’ , for example, Marcus’s pen or Marcus’ pen.

My answer: The Australian Government style manual (Style Manual) recommends the extra ‘s’, i.e. Marcus’s pen.

I still use the extra ‘s’, but most young people I ask don’t use an extra ‘s’. I am not sure it matters. What do you think? Email mary@themfactor.com.au

Empathetic and empathic

Reader’s question: So many people say empathetic but I like empathic. What’s your view?

My answer: I think they can be used interchangeably, but the following site is interesting on these words:
http://www.dailywritingtips.com/empathic-or-empathetic/

In summary, it said:

‘Because of the Star Trek influence, I do see a difference between empathic and empathetic. I would use empathetic to describe the empathy an ordinary person feels. I’d use empathic to describe the feeling experienced by an empath.’

Guess you have to be a Star Trek fan to appreciate this distinction!

Reader’s feedback on preventive and preventative

Did you know that in Australia we have a National Preventative Health Strategy, yet a National Preventive Health Agency?

Not sure what logic applies here!

A question for you

Reading some board papers recently, I came across the phrase ‘two 1 year contracts’. I thought this looked odd and wanted to change it to ‘two one-year contracts’. A few people I spoke to disagreed, saying this numeral usage was standard practice in university writing.

What do you think? Email mary@themfactor.com.au

Word of the day for the month

You can subscribe to a word of the day at http://dictionary.reference.com/wordoftheday


Regards


Mary Morel
Author of Promote Your Business, Talk Up Your Business and Write to Govern.
The M Factor
PO Box 7094, Bondi Beach, NSW 2026, Australia
www.themfactor.com.au
Ph: 61 2 9365 7711 or 0400 686 600
Email: mary@themfactor.com.au