Reference | English Usage Recommendations

Reference
English Usage Recommendations
This page contains a list of suggestions about some common English words or word patterns for which variant forms or practices exist. Examples of punctuation and word usage are also included. Nobody is in charge of the English language, and all we have as guidelines in some difficult cases is an educated preference. We here share some of our personal preferences, for consideration by contributors to the Journal, and by authors in general.
English orthography resists general statements. On the whole we prefer single-l to double-l forms when no ambiguity or mispronunciation is likely; similarly for other consonants (benefited vs benefitted). We prefer to hyphenate rather than close up compounds whose elements are indistinct or misleading if run together (eg, reeducate); a form is especially likely to be misleading if the second element begins with a vowel. We prefer apostrophe-plus-s forms where the base word ends in a sibilant or is the name of a letter (see also the Journal Style Sheet). We recommend avoiding periods after abbreviations, so as to reserve them for the ends of sentences. We deplore the current rage for decapitalization. Proper nouns have their uses. Proper adjectives too.
We recommend not dividing English words at the end of a line as printed on the page, and so give no suggestions in that category. References to "CM14" have in view the Chicago Manual of Style, 14ed. See our separate page of recommendations for word division in romanized Chinese. Entries in red are forms whose use we wish to discourage. To skip to a particular part of this list, use these shortcut links:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
Numerals

1980's [cf "P's and Q's"]
2ed [but cf next two entries]
3x5 in card [three-by-five-inch card; to avoid the sense "three 5-inch cards;" cf "x"]
40 km [spaced, because of the possibility of 40 km/hr]
5 May 2001 [we are pleased to concur in this recommendation with CM14 302]
6's and 9's [as obtained in divination; cf "sixes and sevens," below]
7/24 operation [properly a coordinate noun, thus slashed rather than hyphenated]
8's place [in binary notation, the 4th position left from the decimal point]
9° 14 N [the "minutes" sign on the 14 is unnecessary and is thus omitted]
Letters and Words

a historian [not "an 'istorian," following CM14 208]
a number of contractions [plural in sense, and thus takes plural verb; thus CM14 202]

a number of things ~ lots of things ~ many things
Abelian [mathematics; see Lie groups]
advisor [not "adviser" because of advisory]
ae- [we slightly prefer these variants to the modernized e-forms; cf next two]
aesthetic
aetiology
all together [in sum: "all together, there are 14 of them;" cf "altogether"]
also [do not set off with commas; cf "I too" below, and note Gm "ich auch nicht," Fr "moi aussi"]
altogether [entirely, very much: "there were altogether too many of them;" cf "all together"]
AM [capitals help to distinguish abbreviations; the further distinction of periods is unnecessary]
ambience, because of ambient
anti-intellectual [normally hyphenate between vowels at morpheme junctures]
appendices [supplements to an article; cf next and "indices"]
appendixes [organs of the body, cf previous]
Arabic numerals
archaeology
artifact [because of "artifice, artificial"]
at large [do not hyphenate; the case of "sergeant-at-arms" is not parallel]
bamboo strips (the minority usage "bamboo slips" is also acceptable)
benefited [do not double consonants on weak syllables; cf "fitted," but contrast "paralleled"]
beside > in addition to
besides > additionally
Biblical [as derived from the properly capitalized word Bible, on which see CM14 269]
bioluminescent
C minor [retain capital "c" in names of minor as well as major keys]; note:

Prelude in C Minor ["Minor" is capitalized as part of title]
cents' worth
cf [but do not begin a sentence or a note with it; use instead "See" or "Compare"]
color
commentarial
commentary on [the Analects]
commentary to [LY 4:15]
Confuciuses [plural of the Anglicized term]
Confucius's [and similarly when the main word ends in a sibilant; cf "Horace's"]
crossing the T [naval maneuver; notice the capital form when citing letter names]
cruxes (plural of the Anglicized word; "cruces" is good Latin but pedantic English)
Dadaism [we retain many proper nouns longer than does CM14. On -ism, cf "geisha-ism"]
Darwinism
decapitalization [do not follow the French practice of decapitalizing all adjectives]
de-institutionalize [hyphenate de- before a stem beginning with a vowel]
despite [OK usage, but cf "or perhaps because"]
Dr [no period. But titles of respect are normally avoided in our usage anyway]
du Halde [cf van Beethoven]
e- [see under ae-]
E E Cummings [be aware that Cummings never decapitalized his own name]
eg [exempli gratia, but without all the periods]
E-mail [in titles or headings, capitalize as E-Mail]
enfief [not enfoeff, but rather as formed anew from "fief"]
etiology, see rather aetiology
fast-sailing ship [hyphenated to avoid confusion with "fast sailing-ship"]
Franz Liszt [but cf Liszt Ferenc]
filled [but cf "fulfil"]
fitted [normally double final consonants on stressed syllables, as in "fitted," but cf "benefited"]
focused [cf "totaled"]
four and a half [but cf "one-half"]
fulfil, fulfilment (but "fulfilled")
geisha-ism [the coyness of citing scholars without saying what they say; cf "Dadaism"]
great [forbidden if the following word is "historian," see Rule 7]
great-grandfather
great-great-grandfather
half-baked
halfway
Homeric
Horace's [this clear case is phonetically quite parallel to "Confucius's," qv]
hotshot [now a standard locution; so also "wiseguy"]
however [often gives a too fussy appearance if surrounded by commas]
However, [initial "however" implies a contrastive pause which the comma nicely represents]
hyphenation [compounds are written together as they become familiar; there is no fixed rule].
I too dislike it [revising Marianne Moore; do not set off "too" or "also" (qv) by commas]
I-beam
Imperial [as referring to the specific British or Chinese Empire]
imperialism [a general phenomenon, occurring in the history of several countries]
indexes [more than one text index; as a concordance series; cf next and "appendices"]
indices [more than one indicator, as population indices; cf preceding]
Indology, Indological [no reason to have a different rule for adjectives; cf "Sinology"]
interpretive (from "interpret") or interpretative (from "interpretation")

if there is no clear choice or preference, we recommend the shorter form
instalment
instil [cf "instilled"]
-ism [hyphenate if a neologism, or if the stem ends in a vowel; cf "geisha-ism"]
it's me [standard grammar for exposed or assertion pronouns; cf Fr "c'est moi," not "c'est je"]
-jou [normally close up this placename element, eg Hangjou; cf -syen]
judgement [see Fowler p310; the "e" tends to signal the "soft g" sound in English spelling]
King of Chi [our paradigmatic proper noun; cf the general term "Chi kingship"]
last but not least [this toastmaster's joke is overworked; reduce to "last" or "finally"]
Lie groups [mathematical; cf Hilbert spaces, Abelian functions]
Liszt Ferenc [retain Hungarian order if name is in Hungarian form; cf Franz Liszt]

respect familiar exceptions, eg Ferenc Molnar
Lombardy poplar [the proper-noun origin remains visible in the common noun]
-ly [however grammatical, don't use two successive words ending in -ly. Rewrite]

"simply beautifully" > "just beautifully" (or just "beautifully")
MA (cf PhD)
Mawangdwei [an accustomed form, hence not hyphenated; cf hyphenation]
me too [without comma; cf "I too" and "also"]
mediaeval [in general, prefer "ae" over "e" options; cf "aesthetic," "archaeology"]
mid-04c [as an adjective, but "the mid 04c" as a noun]
mid-Atlantic [but "middle Atlantic States"]
minor; see C minor
Mr [but normally use the plain surname; the effect of titles is often sarcastic]
NE
neo-Baroque [but cf next]
neoclassical [but cf preceding]
nitpick [but objections to someone else's detail are really better if simply given in detail]
no one [phonetically a single word, but looks stupid if written together]
non-integral [hyphenate "non-" compounds if the following word begins with a vowel]
non-Sinitic [hyphenate "non-" compounds before a capital letter; cf "Sinitic"]
nor [best restricted to the pattern "neither A nor B," and that not too frequently]
of course [intrinsically offensive, and often used to smuggle in a unproved statement]
one-half [as the name of a fraction, but cf "four and a half" and "one lousy half"]
on-line
or perhaps because [this device is overworked; give only your preferred conclusion]
over-educated [the hyphen is useful if the next word begins with a vowel; cf next]
overstuffed [cf preceding]
paradoxically [use with care; most paradoxes vanish with clear thinking]
paralleled [for non-doubled consonants on weak syllables, cf "fitted," "benefited"]
PhD
pitsi-pitsi ["quiddling;" hyphenate this and other onomatopoeic or affective expressions]
place names [note the structurally parallel "personal names"]
PM
postmodernism [the term is printable; the stance is forbidden. See the Me Fallacy page]
P's and Q's [an example of the apostrophe in the plurals of letter names, but cf "X's and Y's"]
pseudo-intellectual [a perhaps needless term; are there non-pseudo intellectuals?]
QED [without periods as an abbreviation, the better to take a final period as a sentence]
quasi-authorial
real time [as a noun phrase, as "in real time;" cf next]
real-time [as an adjective, as "at our real-time Conferences;" cf preceding]
relegate [often misused, and very limited when correctly used; such words are best avoided]
SA [our standard compact form for the "Spring and Autumn" period]
self-plonking idioms: do not use [see nitpick]
self-styled [see "soi-disant"]
sensei-ism [the demand that students parrot their teacher; avoid and penalize]
Sinitic [use for "Chinese" in the pre-Chin period when "Chinese" is strictly speaking anachronistic]
Sinology, Sinological [this is what they invented capital letters for; cf "Indology"]
sister-in-law
sixes and sevens [but 6'sand 9's, as in Yi divination results; cf "X's and Y's"]
skeptical [the less unnatural spelling of this somehow always awkward word]
soi-disant [insufferably arch in English; substitute "so-called." And then delete]
-syen [normally hyphenate this placename element, eg Ding-syen; cf -jou]
T S Eliot [we avoid many rules, eg CM14 198, by eliminating periods after abbreviations]
Takigawa Kametarô (not Takikawa; so adjudicated on WSW 16 May 2003)
that [do not use to globally replace "which;" each its own uses, and shouldn't be squandered]
thirty-four (hyphenate; see next)
three hundred members (do not hyphenate; see next)
the three-hundredth time (hyphenation is helpful in compound adjectives generally)
too [as an adverb, do not set off by commas; cf "I too"]
totaled [generally, prefer single-l forms in unaccented syllables]
twenty-odd
twenty-some
two hundred [not hyphenated]
underhanded
updatable
user-friendly
van Beethoven [by preference, do not capitalize connectives de, du, ibn, ten, ter, von]
Vedic [always capitalize; cf Biblical]
vice-regent [hyphenate most "vice" compounds for clarity, but cf next]
viceroy [established term]
von [alphabetize German surnames by the following word, eg Falkenhausen]
which [the only unambiguously relative pronoun; cf "that"]
wiseguy [established slang term; cf "hotshot." But do you really need slang in formal writing?]
WS [our standard compact form for the "Warring States" period]
x [close up any preceding numerals, eg 3x "three times" as an occurrence frequency]
X-ray
x-ref [but: cross-reference]
X's and Y's [when pluralizing the name of the letter; may be decapitalized in algebraic context]
x's and y's [in algebraic context (cf previous); preferable to quotes around the letter name]
Yangshau [see also our separate page for word division in Chinese]
zazen [as a mere term; cf next]
Zen [the movement or cultural phenomenon; cf preceding]

We will add to this list any hard cases brought to our attention, and we are prepared to reconsider the above suggestions in light of those hard cases, bearing however in mind Oliver Wendell Holmes's dictum "hard cases make bad law." In the end, we here offer the perplexed author only a conscientious effort to pay attention to what English does, or does most of the time when in good company. And a balancing sympathy with what scholars need. We are not out to make the language too much more systematic than it is.

16 May 2004 / Contact The Project / Exit to Reference Page