10 things to say to sound smarter

1. Use “fewer” not “less” When speaking about a subject you can count, use “fewer”. The living room had fewer chairs than the kitchen did. Use “less” to refer to subjects you can’t count (less air, less sand, less water). 2. Use “there are” instead of “there’s” There’s is short for “there is” and should… Continue reading 10 things to say to sound smarter

Canadian Style Tip #16: Numbers

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 1.17 Numbers When abbreviating the words number or numbers within the body of a text, use No. or Nos. but not the symbol #, which is reserved for tabular and statistical material.

Canadian Style Tip #15: Titles

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 8.13 Titles Quotation marks should enclose the titles of the following within footnotes, bibliographies, and bodies of text: newspaper, magazine, and periodical articles book chapters short stories from collections lectures papers songs poems from collections dissertations theses unpublished manuscripts radio and TV programmes

Canadian Style Tip #13: Comparative and inclusive numbers

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 5.24 Comparative and inclusive numbers (c) Opinions differ on the proper forms for inclusive numbers written as numerals. To ensure clarity, abbreviate second numbers according to the following principles. Repeat all digits in numbers below 100 (e.g. 62–98). Repeat all digits where the first number is… Continue reading Canadian Style Tip #13: Comparative and inclusive numbers

Canadian Style Tip #11: Hyphenation for points of the compass

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 2.13 Hyphenation: Points of the compass Write as one word compass directions consisting of two points, but use a hyphen after the first point in those compounds consisting of three points:: northwest southeast east-northeast south-southwest

Canadian Style Tip #10: Roman numerals

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 5.25 Roman numerals Roman numerals are becoming increasingly rare, but they still have the following uses: names of rulers, aristocrats, and the names of ships, racing cars and space vehicles numbers of volumes, chapters, tables, plates, acts and other divisions of a book or play Government… Continue reading Canadian Style Tip #10: Roman numerals

Canadian Style Tip #9: Periods properly omitted

This post is part of the Canadian Style series. 7.08 Periods properly omitted Do not use periods with acronyms and initialisms and with abbreviations of compass directions, degrees, memberships, and distinctions, SI/metric unit symbols, chemical symbols or mathematical abbreviations.