Tag Archives: Writing English
The Highly Versatile Em Dash Posted by Gary Locke on Oct 7, 2021
I’ve often remarked on this page that punctuation is a very important and often neglected part of learning English. Of all the little squiggles and lines that make up the world of punctuation, perhaps the most versatile and popular is what we call the em dash. Let’s take a look at what it is, how…
English Words and Phrases of Transition Posted by Gary Locke on Feb 11, 2021
In English, a transition is a word or phrase that links the idea from one paragraph to the next. It’s necessary to connect sentences and paragraphs so that thoughts and ideas merge. We need a bridge from one to the other, otherwise it just seems as though we are jumping from one thing to the…
Writing the Date in American English Posted by Gary Locke on Sep 17, 2020
One of the things that distinguish the United States from almost every other country is also one of the most basic. We write the date differently. In the U.S., the date is written mm/dd/yyyy, or sometimes mm/dd/yy. For most of the world, this is backward (or, more accurately, sideways.) Why we do this has been…