Grammar is like K-Y Jelly — when used correctly, everyone benefits. But copywriters and art directors find equal pleasure wreaking grammatical havoc, the results of which Strunk and White deemed “the mutilation of language” back in 1918. They’d likely cringe at Honda Civic’s tagline “To Each Their Own.” (Do you know why?) And sometimes there are good reasons to disregard the evolving commandments of English language construction, like how pronouns must agree with their antecedents, especially when following the “rules” will turn off your reader. But even in 2012, some things should be right every time. Who the hell are Strunk and White? And what are these things we should get right? Come find out. We’ll talk about where these “rules” came from, the assumptions made about those who appear not to follow them and a few grammar basics. Punctuation isn’t so boring if you think about quotation marks as little hugs, ravishing commas and periods. It’s almost hot, in a syntactic kind of way.

1. Language of Mutilation
Grammar for Ads and Life
#sxgrammar

4. William Strunk Jr. and E.B. White
“Today, the language of
advertising enjoys an
enormous circulation.
With its deliberate
infractions of grammatical
rules and its crossbreeding of the parts of speech, it
profoundly influences the tongues and pens of
children and adults…. You will want to try writing
that way, using that language. You should do so at
your peril, for it is the language of mutilation.”

5. Brief history of English grammar
CHANGE = DECLINATION?

6. 1,000 years ago
Hwæt! We Gardena in geardagum,
þeodcyninga, þrym gefrunon,
hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.
Oft Scyld Scefing sceaþena þreatum,
- Beowulf

7. 700 years ago
Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
- Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”

8. 400 years ago
I remember Adam, it was vpon this fashion
bequeathed me by will, but poore a thousand
Crownes, and as thou saist, charged my bro-
ther on his blessing to breed mee well: and
there begins my sadnesse…
- Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”

9. 100 years ago and so on
“P” banned the split infinitive in 1834.
Ben Franklin wanted all nouns capitalized.
Thomas Jefferson went ape shit with
apostrophes (see Declaration of Independence).
Noah Webster determined standard spellings.
Henry Watson Fowler publishes “A Dictionary of
Modern English Usage” in 1926.
Strunk & White warn of mutilation.

10. Today

11. Examples
CONTEMPORARY MUTILATION

19. Serial Comma
THE COMMA BEFORE THE
CONJUNCTION

20. Serial Comma
Judy’s favorite colors are red, green, and blue.
Judy’s favorite colors are red, green and blue.

22. Serial Comma:
Per the AP Stylebook
Use it when items in a series have internal
conjunctions
– Judy ordered cheese fries with bacon, green eggs
and ham, and beer to go.
• Use it when the elements are complex
– The main points to consider are whether they
serve cheese fries with bacon and spicy sauce, if
we can take the beer to go, and what time we
need to be back to the office for yet another
meeting.

23. Serial Comma:
Per the AP Stylebook
Use it when items in a series have internal
conjunctions
– Judy ordered cheese fries with bacon, green eggs
and ham, and beer to go.
• Use it when the elements are complex
– The main points to consider are whether they
serve cheese fries with bacon and spicy sauce, if
we can take the beer to go, and what time we
need to be back to the office for yet another
meeting.

24. Serial Comma:
Per the AP Stylebook
Use it when items in a series have internal
conjunctions
– Judy ordered cheese fries with bacon, green eggs
and ham, and beer to go.
Use it when the elements are complex
– The main points to consider are whether they
serve cheese fries with bacon and spicy sauce, if
we can take the beer to go, and what time we
need to be back to the office for yet another
meeting.

25. Serial Comma:
Per the AP Stylebook
Use it when items in a series have internal
conjunctions
– Judy ordered cheese fries with bacon, green eggs
and ham, and beer to go.
Use it when the elements are complex
– The main points to consider are whether they
serve cheese fries with bacon and spicy sauce, if
we can take the beer to go, and what time we
need to be back to the office for yet another
meeting.

26. Enough with the serial comma.
Questions?

27. Apostrophe
THE MARK OF OMISSION AND
OWNERSHIP

29. Show omission and ownership
Indicate what’s missing
– Judy O'Malley
– Rock ‘n’ roll
– Don’t, can’t, it’s, you’re, they’re
– Summer of ‘69
Indicate possession
– Judy’s clients
– Judy’s clients’ demands
– Judy and Jonah’s house
– Judy’s and Jonah’s houses
Avoid confusion when making single letters plural
– Cross your T’s, dot your I’s and earn all A’s
Per the AP
Stylebook

30. NOT needed to make nouns plural
The Joneses, who have lived in both Kansas
Citys, wore leg warmers in the 1980s.
This:

31. Enough with the apostrophe.
Questions?

32. Colon
THE MARK OF
INTRODUCTION, EXPLANATION
AND EMPHASIS

33. Introduce a list
Judy’s backpack held our beach necessities:
towels, sunscreen, small farm animals and
Corona Light.

34. Introduce a list
Judy’s backpack held our beach necessities.
towels, sunscreen, small farm animals and
AVOID:
Corona Light.
Judy’s backpack held our beach necessities, including: towels,
sunscreen, small farm animals and Corona Light.
BECAUSE:
Judy’s backpack held our beach necessities, including.

35. Introduce text
Judy promised me this: Our love will not die
unless we are both dead, and then maybe the
memory of our love will spur others to love
nondead people, but the original love, which
was ours, will have died.

36. Introduce text
Judy promised me this. Our love will not die
unless
AVOID: we are both dead, and then maybe the
memory of our love will spur others to love
Judy promised me that: Our love will not die unless we are both dead,
nondead people, but the love will spur otherswhich
and then maybe the memory of our original love, to love
nondead people, but the original love, which was ours, will have died.
was ours, will have died.
BECAUSE:
Judy promised me that.

37. Introduce text
Judy promised me this. Our love will not die
unless
AVOID: we are both dead, and then maybe the
memory of our love will spur others to love
Judy promised me that: Our love will not die unless we are both dead,
nondead people, but the love will spur otherswhich
and then maybe the memory of our original love, to love
nondead people, but the original love, which was ours, will have died.
was ours, will have died.
BECAUSE:
Judy promised me that our love will not die unless we are both dead,
and then maybe the memory of our love will spur others to love
nondead people, but the original love, which was ours, will have died.

38. Introduce a long quote
Just as she was leaving, Judy turned and recited
a limerick:
A flea and a fly in a flue
Were caught, so what could they do?
Said the fly, "Let us flee.”
"Let us fly," said the flea.
So they flew through a flaw in the flue.

39. Explain and emphasize
Judy refuses to eat ice cream: She is allergic to
dairy and ice.
Judy refuses to eat one thing: ice cream.

40. Enough with the colon.
Questions?

41. Semicolon
THE BASTARD LOVE CHILD OF THE
PERIOD AND THE COMMA

42. Yeah
• It’s not quite a full • It’s more than a
stop. pause.

43. Join related sentences
Replace a junction . . .
– And
– But
– Or
. . . with a semicolon
(Keep the conjunction if one or both clauses use
an excessive amount of punctuation.)

44. Without a conjunction
Before:
The baby was due on Saturday, but she was
born on Sunday instead.

45. Without a conjunction
Before:
The baby was due on Saturday, but she was
born on Sunday instead.
After:
The baby was due on Saturday; she was born on
Sunday instead.

46. With a conjunction
The baby girl, Jennifer, was due on Saturday,
July 2, 2011, which is exactly one year after her
brother, John, was born; but she arrived (thanks
to a C-section) on Sunday, July 3, instead, which
upset her sibling, as he was reluctant to share
the affections of his mother with such a squirmy
little being.

47. With a conjunction
The baby girl, Jennifer, was due on Saturday,
July 2, 2011, which is exactly one year after her
brother, John, was born; but she arrived (thanks
to a C-section) on Sunday, July 3, instead, which
upset her sibling, as he was reluctant to share
the affections of his mother with such a squirmy
little being.

48. Separate serial items with
internal punctuation
The specials tonight are beer cheese soup, which is
made with aged cheddar, ale, cheese, beer and
cream; spinach, feta and spicy walnut salad; and an
obscenely large cut of red meat with your choice of
mashed, fried or baked potatoes.
– The entire family celebrates July birthdays: The
youngest, Jennifer, was born in July 3, 2011, via C-
section; her brother, John, was born the year before
on July 2; and her parents, Judy and Jonah, were both
born on July 28, 1980.

49. Separate serial items with
internal punctuation
The specials tonight are beer cheese soup, which is
made with aged cheddar, ale, cheese, beer and
cream; spinach, feta and spicy walnut salad; and an
obscenely large cut of red meat with your choice of
mashed, fried or baked potatoes.
– The entire family celebrates July birthdays: The
youngest, Jennifer, was born in July 3, 2011, via C-
section; her brother, John, was born the year before
on July 2; and her parents, Judy and Jonah, were both
born on July 28, 1980.

50. Enough with the punctuation review.
Questions?

51. Help
ONLINE SOURCES

52. Merriam-Webster and AP Stylebook

53. More online sources
• Bartleby.com • Guide to Grammar and
– Strunk & White, Fowlers Writing
• Purdue Online Writing – Index, quizzes
Lab (OWL) • Chicago Manual of Style
• U of IL Center for – Subscription required
Writing Studies • Grammarphobia
• Oxford Dictionary – The living dead
• Paul Brian’s Non-errors
My tweets: @gmariethatsme
My blog: towriteawrong.tumblr.com

54. My tweets: @gmariethatsme
My blog: towriteawrong.tumblr.com