Geraldine Woods English teacher • Exactly what you need to know to grasp grammar • The must-know parts of speech • What material often appears on college admissions tests Learn: Grammar Essentials Making Everything Easier!™ Open the book and find: • Clear explanations of vital grammar rules • Examples of correct and incorrect usage • Strategies for solving grammati- cal dilemmas • Punctuation principles • The basics of capital letters • How to choose the right words (such as whose vs. who’s) • Tips for tackling troublemakers such as double negatives and indirect objects • Ten ways to learn better grammar Geraldine Woods has more than 35 years of teaching experience and is the author of more than 50 books, including English Grammar Workbook For Dummies and Research Papers For Dummies. Reference/Language Arts/English $9.99 US / $11.99 CN / £8.99 UK ISBN 978-0-470-61837-0 Go to Dummies.com® for videos, step-by-step photos, how-to articles, or to shop! Need to brush up on your grammar pronto? This easy- to-use guide teaches you all the tricks of the grammar trade to help you communicate accurately and effectively. From making peace between subjects and verbs to using commas and apostrophes correctly, you’ll improve your writing and English skills in no time! • Grasp grammar nitty-gritty — understand what grammar is and how to put it to work in the real world • Start with your subjects — identify subjects, make subjects and verbs agree, and work with difficult subjects • Prepare for pronouns — pair them with nouns, choose between singular and plural pronouns, and master the use of possessive pronouns • Construct a complete sentence — steer clear of fragments and run-ons, join ideas, and watch out for danglers • Understand adjectives and adverbs — find them, place them, choose between them, and avoid common mistakes • Improve your writing — identify your audience, add meaning with strong verbs, and spice up boring sentences Your concise and fun guide to mastering good grammar Grammar Essentials Woods .3840” 02_618370-ftoc.indd vi 02_618370-ftoc.indd vi 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Grammar Essentials FOR DUMmIES ‰ by Geraldine Woods with Joan Friedman 01_618370-ffirs.indd i 01_618370-ffirs.indd i 4/6/10 7:56 PM 4/6/10 7:56 PM Grammar Essentials For Dummies® Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc. 111 River St. Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774 www.wiley.com Copyright © 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana Published simultaneously in Canada No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appro- priate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, (978) 750-8400, fax (978) 646-8600. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748- 6011, fax (201) 748-6008, or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions. Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley Publishing logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/or its affiliates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Wiley Publishing, Inc., is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. 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Library of Congress Control Number: 2010923557 ISBN: 978-0-470-61837-0 Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 01_618370-ffirs.indd ii 01_618370-ffirs.indd ii 4/6/10 7:56 PM 4/6/10 7:56 PM About the Author Geraldine Woods began her education when teachers still supplied inkwells to their students. She credits her 35-year career as an English teacher to a set of ultrastrict nuns armed with thick grammar books. She lives in New York City, where with great difficulty she refrains from correcting signs contain- ing messages such as “Bagel’s for sale.” She is the author of more than 40 books, including English Grammar For Dummies, English Grammar Workbook For Dummies, Research Papers For Dummies, College Admission Essays For Dummies, and The SAT For Dummies. 01_618370-ffirs.indd iii 01_618370-ffirs.indd iii 4/6/10 7:56 PM 4/6/10 7:56 PM Publisher’s Acknowledgments We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments at http://dummies. custhelp.com. For other comments, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002. Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following: Acquisitions, Editorial, and Media Development Project Editor: Victoria M. Adang Senior Acquisitions Editor: Lindsay Sandman Lefevere Copy Editor: Todd Lothery Assistant Editor: Erin Calligan Mooney Senior Editorial Assistant: David Lutton Technical Editor: Faith Van Gilder Editorial Manager: Michelle Hacker Editorial Assistants: Rachelle Amick, Jennette ElNaggar Cover Photo: © BananaStock Cartoons: Rich Tennant (www.the5thwave.com) Composition Services Project Coordinator: Katie Crocker Layout and Graphics: Erin Zeltner Proofreaders: John Greenough, Sossity R. Smith Indexer: Potomac Indexing, LLC Publishing and Editorial for Consumer Dummies Diane Graves Steele, Vice President and Publisher, Consumer Dummies Kristin Ferguson-Wagstaffe, Product Development Director, Consumer Dummies Ensley Eikenburg, Associate Publisher, Travel Kelly Regan, Editorial Director, Travel Publishing for Technology Dummies Andy Cummings, Vice President and Publisher, Dummies Technology/General User Composition Services Debbie Stailey, Director of Composition Services 01_618370-ffirs.indd iv 01_618370-ffirs.indd iv 4/6/10 7:56 PM 4/6/10 7:56 PM Contents at a Glance Introduction ............................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: Grasping Grammer Nitty-Gritty ............................................ 5 Chapter 2: Making Peace between Subjects and Verbs ...................... 13 Chapter 3: Perfecting Your Pronoun Usage ......................................... 33 Chapter 4: Constructing a Complete Sentence .................................... 45 Chapter 5: Drawing Parallels (Without the Lines) .............................. 65 Chapter 6: Adjectives, Adverbs, and Comparisons ............................ 75 Chapter 7: Polishing Your Punctuation ................................................ 93 Chapter 8: Capitalizing Correctly ........................................................ 117 Chapter 9: Choosing the Right Words ................................................ 127 Chapter 10: Tackling Other Troublemakers ...................................... 139 Chapter 11: Improving Your Writing ................................................... 149 Chapter 12: Ten Ways to Improve Your Grammar Every Day ......... 165 Index........................................................................................................ 169 02_618370-ftoc.indd v 02_618370-ftoc.indd v 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM 02_618370-ftoc.indd vi 02_618370-ftoc.indd vi 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Table of Contents Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 About This Book ........................................................................ 2 Conventions Used in This Book ............................................... 2 Foolish Assumptions ................................................................. 2 Icons Used in This Book ............................................................ 3 Where to Go from Here ............................................................. 3 Chapter 1: Grasping Grammar Nitty-Gritty . . . . . . . . . . . .5 Grammar: What It Is! .................................................................. 6 The Big Ideas of Grammar ........................................................ 7 Making the right word choices ...................................... 7 Arranging words for optimal understanding ............... 9 Pinpointing punctuation ............................................... 10 Putting Grammar to Work in the Real World ....................... 11 Chapter 2: Making Peace between Subjects and Verbs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13 Getting Reacquainted with Verbs .......................................... 14 Linking verbs: The giant equal sign ............................. 14 Action verbs: The go-getters ........................................ 16 Helping verbs: The do-gooders .................................... 16 Doubling your money: Compound verbs .................... 17 Infinitives: Verb imposters ........................................... 18 Identifying Subjects ................................................................. 18 Getting two for the price of one: Compound subjects ................................................... 19 Figuring out you-understood........................................ 19 Finding subjects when words are missing.................. 20 Grappling with unusual word order ............................ 21 Searching for the subject in questions ....................... 22 Tossing fake subjects aside .......................................... 22 Give Peace a Chance: Making Subjects and Verbs Agree ................................................................... 23 No mixing allowed: Singles and plurals ...................... 23 Verbs that change and verbs that don’t ..................... 24 Dealing with negative statements ................................ 26 Cutting through distractions ........................................ 27 02_618370-ftoc.indd vii 02_618370-ftoc.indd vii 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Grammar Essentials For Dummies viii Coming to an Agreement with Difficult Subjects ................. 28 Spotting five little pronouns that break the rules ..... 28 Finding problems here and there ................................ 29 Meeting the ones, the things, and the bodies ............ 30 Figuring out either and neither .................................... 31 Chapter 3: Perfecting Your Pronoun Usage . . . . . . . . . .33 Playing Matchmaker with Pronouns and Nouns .................. 33 Selecting Singular or Plural Pronouns ................................... 35 Letting your ear be your guide .................................... 36 Treating companies as singular nouns ....................... 36 Steering clear of “person” problems ........................... 37 Getting Possessive with Your Pronouns ............................... 37 Keeping Your Pronouns and Antecedents Close ................. 38 Pairing Pronouns with Pronoun Antecedents ...................... 41 Wrestling with everybody, somebody, and no one ... 41 Following each and every rule ..................................... 42 Examining either and neither ....................................... 43 Avoiding Sexist Pronouns ....................................................... 43 Chapter 4: Constructing a Complete Sentence . . . . . . .45 Creating Complete Sentences from Complete Thoughts .... 45 Locating subject-verb pairs .......................................... 46 Not relying on context .................................................. 47 Fishing for complements .............................................. 48 Banning Fragments from Formal Writing .............................. 51 Enough Is Enough: Avoiding Run-ons .................................... 52 Getting your endmarks in place ................................... 53 Fixing comma splices .................................................... 54 Attaching Sentences Legally ................................................... 54 Employing coordinate conjunctions ........................... 55 Relying on semicolons .................................................. 56 Connecting Unequal Ideas ...................................................... 56 Giving subordinate clauses a job ................................. 57 Finding homes for your subordinate clauses............. 58 Making connections with subordinate conjunctions ......................................... 59 Combining Sentences with Pronouns.................................... 61 Don’t Keep Your Audience Hanging: Removing Danglers .............................................................. 62 Dangling participles ....................................................... 62 Dangling infinitives ........................................................ 64 02_618370-ftoc.indd viii 02_618370-ftoc.indd viii 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Table of Contents ix Chapter 5: Drawing Parallels (Without the Lines) . . . .65 Seeking Balance ........................................................................ 65 Striving for Consistency .......................................................... 68 Matching verb tenses .................................................... 68 Staying active (or passive) ........................................... 69 Being true to your person............................................. 70 Using Conjunction Pairs Correctly ........................................ 72 Constructing Proper Comparisons ........................................ 73 Chapter 6: Adjectives, Adverbs, and Comparisons . . . .75 Spotting Adjectives .................................................................. 75 Describing nouns and pronouns.................................. 76 Working hand in hand with linking verbs ................... 76 Recognizing articles as adjectives ............................... 77 Locating adjectives ........................................................ 78 Hunting for Adverbs ................................................................ 79 Sprucing up verbs .......................................................... 79 Modifying adjectives and other adverbs .................... 80 Locating adverbs ........................................................... 80 Sorting through Some Sticky Choices ................................... 81 Choosing between “good” and “well” ......................... 81 Do you feel “bad” or “badly”?....................................... 82 Coping with adjectives and adverbs that look the same ..................................................... 83 Getting Picky about Word Placement ................................... 83 Placing “even” ................................................................ 83 Placing “almost” and “nearly” ...................................... 85 Placing “only” and “just” ............................................... 85 Creating Comparisons ............................................................. 86 Getting the hang of regular comparisons ................... 86 Good, better, best: Working with irregular comparisons ............................................................... 88 Error alert: Using words that you can’t compare ...... 90 Confusing your reader with incomplete comparisons .......................................... 91 Chapter 7: Polishing Your Punctuation . . . . . . . . . . . . . .93 More Rules Than the IRS: Using Apostrophes ..................... 93 Showing possession ...................................................... 94 Cutting it short: Contractions ...................................... 97 Quoting Correctly .................................................................... 98 Punctuating your quotations ....................................... 99 Identifying speaker changes ....................................... 102 Using quotation marks in titles .................................. 102 02_618370-ftoc.indd ix 02_618370-ftoc.indd ix 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Grammar Essentials For Dummies x Making Comma Sense ............................................................ 103 Placing commas in a series ........................................ 103 Adding information to your sentence ....................... 104 Directly addressing someone ..................................... 108 Presenting addresses and dates ................................ 109 Setting off introductory words ................................... 110 Punctuating with conjunctions .................................. 111 Mastering Dashes ................................................................... 111 Long dashes .................................................................. 112 Short dashes ................................................................. 113 Wielding Hyphens with Ease ................................................ 113 Creating compound words ......................................... 113 Hyphenating numbers ................................................. 114 Connecting two-word descriptions ........................... 114 Creating a Stopping Point: Colons ....................................... 115 Sprucing up a business letter ..................................... 115 Inserting long lists ....................................................... 115 Introducing long quotations ....................................... 115 Chapter 8: Capitalizing Correctly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .117 Covering the Basic Rules ...................................................... 117 Capitalizing (Or Not) References to People........................ 118 Treating a person’s titles with care ........................... 119 Handling family relationships .................................... 120 Tackling race and ethnicity ........................................ 121 Getting a Geography Lesson: Places, Directions, and More ............................................................................. 122 Locations and languages ............................................ 122 Directions and areas ................................................... 123 Looking at Seasons and Times of Day ................................. 123 Getting Schooled in Education Terms ................................. 124 Wrestling with Capitals in Titles .......................................... 124 Writing about Events and Eras ............................................. 125 Capitalizing Abbreviations.................................................... 126 Chapter 9: Choosing the Right Words . . . . . . . . . . . . . .127 One Word or Two? ................................................................. 127 Always opting for two ................................................. 128 Picking your meaning .................................................. 128 Separating Possessive Pronouns from Contractions ........ 129 Its/it’s............................................................................. 129 Your/you’re .................................................................. 130 There/their/they’re ...................................................... 130 Whose/who’s ................................................................ 130 02_618370-ftoc.indd x 02_618370-ftoc.indd x 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Table of Contents xi Using Words That Seem Interchangeable but Aren’t ........ 131 Affect versus effect ...................................................... 131 Between versus among ............................................... 132 Continual versus continuous ..................................... 132 Due to versus because of ............................................ 133 Farther versus further ................................................. 133 Lie versus lay................................................................ 134 Rise versus raise .......................................................... 134 Since versus because .................................................. 135 Sit versus set ................................................................ 135 Suppose versus supposed .......................................... 135 Whether versus if......................................................... 136 Who versus whom ....................................................... 136 A Word and a Phrase to Avoid ............................................. 137 Irregardless................................................................... 137 Different than ............................................................... 138 Chapter 10: Tackling Other Troublemakers . . . . . . . . .139 Creating Noun Plurals ........................................................... 139 The -ies and -ys have it................................................ 140 Gooses? Childs? Forming irregular plurals .............. 141 Making plurals with hyphenated nouns ................... 142 Perfecting Prepositions ......................................................... 142 Expressing relationships ............................................ 142 Eyeing the objects of prepositional phrases ............ 144 Identifying the objects of prepositions ..................... 144 Paying attention to prepositions ............................... 145 Are you talking to I? Matching prepositions and pronouns ........................................................... 145 A good part of speech to end a sentence with? ....... 147 Deleting Double Negatives .................................................... 147 Chapter 11: Improving Your Writing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .149 Identifying Your Audience .................................................... 149 Keeping it formal.......................................................... 150 Knowing when conversational English will work .... 150 Cutting Ties with Your Computer Grammar Checker ....... 151 Giving Your Writing Punch with Great Verbs .................... 152 Staying active ............................................................... 152 Knowing when “there is” a problem.......................... 154 Recognizing that your writing “has” issues .............. 154 Letting your subjects do more than “say” and “walk” ....................................................... 155 Deleting All That’s Extra ....................................................... 156 02_618370-ftoc.indd xi 02_618370-ftoc.indd xi 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Grammar Essentials For Dummies xii Spicing Up Boring Sentences ................................................ 157 The clause that refreshes ........................................... 158 Verbally speaking ........................................................ 159 Writing for Electronic Media ................................................ 160 Scoping your audience ................................................ 160 Being clear and concise .............................................. 161 Structuring an e-mail message ................................... 163 Proofreading before you send.................................... 164 Chapter 12: Ten Ways to Improve Your Grammar Every Day . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165 Pick Up a Good Book ............................................................. 165 Read the Newspaper .............................................................. 166 Sample Some Magazines ....................................................... 166 Delve into Strunk and White ................................................. 166 Surf the Web ........................................................................... 167 Review Style Manuals ............................................................ 167 Watch High-Quality TV Shows ............................................. 167 Peruse the News ..................................................................... 168 Download Podcasts ............................................................... 168 Listen to Authorities .............................................................. 168 Index ............................................................. 169 02_618370-ftoc.indd xii 02_618370-ftoc.indd xii 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM Introduction W hen you’re a grammarian, people react to you in interesting — and sometimes downright strange — ways. An elderly man once asked me about something that had puzzled him for eight decades: Why did his church, St. Paul’s, include an apostrophe in its name? My nephew recently called to inquire whether his company’s sign in Times Square should include a semicolon. (I said no, though the notion of a two-story-tall neon semicolon was tempting.) Lots of people become tongue-tied, sure that I’ll judge their choice of who or whom. (They worry needlessly, because I consider myself off-duty when I’m not teaching or writing.) Though you may aspire to be something other than a gram- marian, knowing how to use proper grammar is always an advantage — especially in the workplace. Most jobs that pro- vide you with a desk (and many jobs that don’t!) demand that you know how to communicate in both speech and writing. If you haven’t yet reached the workplace, now’s the best time to master good grammar. No matter what subject you’re study- ing, teachers favor proper English. Also, the SAT includes a writing section that’s heavy on grammar and, ironically, light on writing. In this book, I show you the tricks of the grammar trade, the strategies that help you make the right decision when you’re facing such grammatical dilemmas as the choice between I and me or was and were. I explain what you need to do in such situations, and I also tell you why a particular word is correct or incorrect. You don’t have to memorize a list of meaningless rules (with the exception of some points from the punctuation chapter) because when you understand the reason for a particular choice, you’ll pick the correct word automatically. 03_618370-intro.indd 1 03_618370-intro.indd 1 4/6/10 7:57 PM 4/6/10 7:57 PM