Commonly confused words

Commonly Confused Words Commonly Confused Words (printable version here) Words that sound alike or nearly alike but have different meanings often cause writers trouble. Here are a few of the most common pairs with correct definitions and examples: ACCEPT-to receive ex: He accepts defeat well. AFFECT-to influence ex: Lack of sleep affects the quality of your work. A LOT (two words)-many. ALLUSION-an indirect reference ex:The professor made an allusion to Virginia Woolf's work. ALL READY-prepared ex: Dinner was all ready when the guests arrived. ALTOGETHER-entirely ex: Altogether, I thought that the student's presentation was well planned. APART-to be separated ex: The chain-link fence kept the angry dogs apart. ASCENT- climb ex: The plane's ascent made my ears pop. BREATH-noun, air inhaled or exhaled ex: You could see his breath in the cold air. CAPITAL-seat of government. CITE-to quote or document ex: I cited ten quotes from the same author in my paper. LEAD-noun, a type of metal ex: Is that pipe made of lead?

The Best Books of 2014 We asked some of our contributors for their favorite books they read this year. (Most listed new books, but a few picked older favorites or ones that will come out in the new year.) I was riveted by Martin Amis’s “The Zone of Interest,” with its daring projection into the mind and “heart” of a character (Paul Doll, the commandant of a Nazi concentration camp) who, like Nabokov’s Kinbote, is a tour de force of crazed self-delusion. I just wish the whole book was in Doll’s voice, with his eruptions of unintentional humor, swathes of bathetic self-pity, and moments of blasé horror: he may have, at one point, killed a small girl prisoner who reaches for his hand, but it’s typical of Amis’s artfully elliptical method that I can’t be sure; I kept wincingly rereading the passage, as if through my fingers, trying to figure out what happened but not wanting to.

usage ALUMNI Hello Everyone! Have you ever been confused about which word is correct when you are referring to "graduates"? When should you use ALUMNA, ALUMNAE, ALUMNUS, and ALUMNI? The misuse of these words is fairly common, but if you'll pay attention, I'll try to show you how to use them correctly so you'll never be confused again. Here are some examples of common mistakes with this problem: I am an ALUMNI of Whiteville High School...or...All of the ladies in our Sunday School class are ALUMNI of The University of North Carolina at Wilmington...or Butch is an ALUMNI of NC State University in Raleigh. Notice how the word ALUMNI is getting a good workout in the above sentences. So what's going on here and what should we remember? Okay...Here are some simple definitions to help you keep them straight: ALUMNA is singular and simply means one female graduate. ALUMNAE is plural and means two or more female graduates. ALUMNUS is singular and means one male graduate. ...and finally... How about that? 1. 2. 3.

Theory & Methods - Literary Criticism Esthetics Objectives: The esthetics realm emphasizes the human relationship to beauty. Students study literature, music, art, drama and dance to understand and appreciate this relationship. By means of the core courses in this realm, the student is to ... develop an esthetic awareness of the human person and her environment use her creative expression for her own pleasure or for sharing confront the expression of the human person's creative nature and to develop a respect for it improve critical judgment and artistic taste Objectives for the English Department: The English Department offers three majors—English, English Middle/Secondary Education, and English Professional Writing—and a number of minors relating to these fields. Course Description: The course focuses on critical theory as it applies to literature and culture. Course Objectives*: *See “Assignments and Grading” below for correlation between objectives and assignments. Assignments and Grading: Required Texts: Tyson, Lois.

confused words INSTRUCTIONS Commas | Punctuation Rules Commas and periods are the most frequently used punctuation marks. Commas customarily indicate a brief pause; they're not as final as periods. Rule 1. Use commas to separate words and word groups in a simple series of three or more items. Example: My estate goes to my husband, son, daughter-in-law, and nephew. Note: When the last comma in a series comes before and or or (after daughter-in-law in the above example), it is known as the Oxford comma. Example: We had coffee, cheese and crackers and grapes. Adding a comma after crackers makes it clear that cheese and crackers represents one dish. We had coffee, cheese and crackers, and grapes. Fiction and nonfiction books generally prefer the Oxford comma. Rule 2. Example: He is a strong, healthy man. Example: We stayed at an expensive summer resort. Another way to determine if a comma is needed is to mentally put and between the two adjectives. Rule 3a. Incorrect: He walked all the way home, he shut the door. There are several simple remedies:

20 Common Grammar Mistakes That (Almost) Everyone Makes I’ve edited a monthly magazine for more than six years, and it’s a job that’s come with more frustration than reward. If there’s one thing I am grateful for — and it sure isn’t the pay — it’s that my work has allowed endless time to hone my craft to Louis Skolnick levels of grammar geekery. As someone who slings red ink for a living, let me tell you: grammar is an ultra-micro component in the larger picture; it lies somewhere in the final steps of the editing trail; and as such it’s an overrated quasi-irrelevancy in the creative process, perpetuated into importance primarily by bitter nerds who accumulate tweed jackets and crippling inferiority complexes. But experience has also taught me that readers, for better or worse, will approach your work with a jaundiced eye and an itch to judge. While your grammar shouldn’t be a reflection of your creative powers or writing abilities, let’s face it — it usually is. Who and Whom This one opens a big can of worms. Which and That Lay and Lie Moot Nor