Having quite an interest in breaking and traumatic news reporting, I’m rather fascinated by a term that’s coming into common usage when describing people fleeing an area under threat from […]
Despite what you might read in certain online forums, you should almost always speak to (or talk to) someone and not speak with (or talk with) them. Broadcasters seem to […]
Writing fluent English can be a real a challenge for non-native and native speakers alike. Students at high school and university often find their work will be marked down because […]
It is surprising how many writers struggle to master the rules for expressing dates, date ranges, numbers, times, ages, etc. So let’s review the basics, starting with dates. The style […]
Yesterday I was reading about the awful fires in Arizona that claimed the lives of 19 brave firefighters when this sentence caught my eye: Officials said they expected about half […]
There is a subtle difference between the verb form of career and its lesser-known – and I would argue increasingly under-used – cousin careen. The word “career” (used in its […]
I suppose I shouldn’t be but I’m always surprised when editing the copy of trained journalists – or, for that matter, grading highly educated university students about to begin their […]
The verb “refute” is often misused by writers. It means to disprove with evidence. Often writers will use it when they really should have used “reject” (to refuse to accept, […]
Want to polish your writing style? Need to improve your grammar? Want to understand more about English writing rules? Then check out Towards a working grammar for journalists, a handy booklet co-written […]
Increasingly we are reading/hearing the phrase “in the wake of …” If one is referring to the disturbed water behind a boat, then that’s fine. For everything else, why not […]
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