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Some Points of Styleby Jennifer Stewart When you're writing for general consumption, you need to follow certain conventions of style. These have evolved over the years as the most effective/efficient ways to convey ideas to a mass readership, so who are we to buck the system?
You'll often find that there are 'in-house' variations on these, so follow the lead of your own organisation / community. NB Organisation is a perfect example - US-based spelling prefers organization, but in Australia, Britain and other places, it's organisation. The important point with style is to be consistent. If you use organisation on your first page, then that's how it must be spelt (or spelled ...) on every page. If you use the -ed form of the past tense for verbs like spelled (rather than the -t), then use it for all similar verbs throughout your document (learned / learnt; burned / burnt etc). The whole point of writing something is to communicate your ideas to others. If readers are constantly distracted by your devil-may-care approach to the rules of consistency, they'll be so busy watching for the next example, they won't pay any attention to your message or content. Numbers The general rule is to write the word for numbers under (and including) one hundred, and to use numeral for numbers over:
When the number is greater than 999, you can use a comma or a space (be consistent and follow 'house rules'). If the number opens the sentence, write the words:
When using approximations and round figures, write the word:
When referring to millions (and these days) billions, use the numerals to indicate the number of millions / billions:
When referring to spans of numbers, use as few numerals as possible:
except for numbers between 10 and 19:
and dates:
When decimal numbers are less than unity, place a zero before the decimal point (except in cases such as calibre):
Use numerals for sums of money, times, weights, measures, degrees of inclination and temperature, percentages and a person's age (sometimes):
If writing about military forces use abbreviated ordinal numbers for units and formations up to divisions:
Use roman numerals to designate corps:
Use full ordinal numbers (and capital letters) for armies:
Roman numerals are upper case if they're used in titles:
but are lower case when used for preliminary pages in books:
Dates The preference is for a format that leaves no possibility for ambiguity:
Years and spans of years are as follows:
Capitals All proper nouns take a capital letter:
Points of the compass take capitals when they're part of the name of an area or when they refer to a part of a country:
Abbreviations use capitals:
Titles of books, films, plays, television shows etc use capitals for all words except articles and conjunctions (unless the first word of the title) and are also italicised or put in quotation marks: The Day of the Triffids: Star Wars; One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest; This Day Tonight Hyphens Numbers are hyphenated when used to denote age:
Compound terms in titles take a capital for the first word but lower case for the second word IF it's a modifier:
Both words have capitals if they are of equal weight:
Final Word There are always House Rules, so make sure you check with your employer or educational institution before writing. Jennifer Stewart is a professional writer who offers copy writing, proof reading and editing services for businesses and individuals from her site. She has undertaken a variety of assignments - writing articles for ezines and the print media; preparing award submissions for business clients; copy writing and proof reading works of non-fiction; editing web pages and ebooks; writing press releases and much more. If the spelling of words like "harbour" in this article worried you, please read this.Did you forget to subscribe to your FREE, weekly Writing Tips? If so, CLICK NOW! Return to read more Hints for Writers
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