Capitalization: The Days Of The Week and The Months

Capitalization: The Days of the Week, the Months of the Year, and Holidays (But Not the Seasons Used Generally)

Days, months, and holidays are always capitalized as these are proper nouns. Seasons aren’t generally capitalized unless they’re personified.

The maid comes on Tuesdays and Fridays.

My doctor’s appointment is on Monday afternoon.

Your birthday is in March, right?

Thanksgiving in November, Christmas in December, and New Year’s in January: North America has a lot of winter holidays.

The seasons aren’t capitalized unless they’re being used as a proper noun, such as when personified in creative writing or poetry. Consider the sentences below:

My favorite season is autumn.

Many animals hibernate in the winter.

It’s that time of year again, when Winter blankets all creatures with somniferous snow and whispers to them, “Rest, children, rest.”

Generally speaking, the days of the week and months of the year are capitalized, but there are exceptions to this rule.

“Are You the Jedi Master or the Sith Lord of Your Office?” Quiz

There is a light and dark side to the balance of office life. Which way do you lean? Find out whether you’re an Office Jedi or Sith with our fun quiz!

What do you think, did we get it right? Share your reactions in the comments.

This Week in Writing, 9/5-9/11

Do you ever worry that one day someone will invent a robot that puts you out of a job? If you happen to be a choose-your-own adventure novelist, that worry just might have become a little bit more real. Check out that story and a few other highlights from around the web this week. Have something you’d like to see us cover here? Let us know in the comment section!

Our Favorite Stories:

1. Georgia Tech’s AI Is a Choose-Your-Own Adventure Author (Engadget)
2. The Most Popular Books in U.S. Public Libraries, Mapped by City (Quartz)
3. How Corporate America Killed My Writing (The Washington Post)
4. Celebrate International Literacy Day (Grammarly)

 

Staff Book Picks of the Week:

Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights (Fiction) Salman Rushdie

“From Salman Rushdie, one of the great writers of our time, comes a spellbinding work of fiction that blends history, mythology, and a timeless love story. A lush, richly layered novel in which our world has been plunged into an age of unreason, Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights is a breathtaking achievement and an enduring testament to the power of storytelling.”

Dataclysm: Love, Sex, Race, and Identity–What Our Online Lives Tell Us about Our Offline Selves (Nonfiction) Christian Rudder

“Our personal data has been used to spy on us, hire and fire us, and sell us stuff we don’t need. In Dataclysm, Christian Rudder uses it to show us who we truly are.”

 

Author & Illustrator Birthdays

Robert Persig – September 6, 1928

Eric Hill – September 7, 1927

Alexandra Day – September 7, 1941

Alison Bechdel – September 10, 1960

O. Henry – September 11, 1862

 

15 Words English Borrowed From Chinese

When people are learning a language, often they learn the names of delicious foods. English has adopted the names of many Chinese dishes. However, you may be surprised to realize that many other everyday words and phrases are also borrowed from various dialects of Chinese.

Foods

Bok choy is an Asian green that can be cooked or eaten raw. In Chinese, the expression derives from words meaning “white vegetable” because of the white stalks. Ketchup, also spelled catsup, is thought to derive from Chinese words referring to the juice of an eggplant. Oolong, literally meaning black dragon, and pekoe, meaning white hair, are types of tea. In fact, the word tea itself comes from a Chinese word! Other Chinese food words include ginseng and lychee.

Animals

Many cultures love dogs, and the Chinese are no exception. From them, we get the names of many dog breeds. Shar peis, a breed distinctive for loose wrinkly skin, get their name from Chinese words meaning “sand” and “fur.” We also get the breed name for shih tzus from Chinese words meaning “lion dog.”

Expressions

The expression chop chop, an impatient way of telling someone to hurry up, comes from a Chinese expression with a similar meaning. Yin Yang describes the interaction of darkness and brightness. Gung ho, which in English means enthusiastically or wholeheartedly, has an interesting story. A U.S. Marine officer used the phrase as a training slogan after learning the name of the Chinese Industrial Cooperative Society derived from a literal translation of the Chinese expression for “work together.”

Other Cool Things

Many martial art forms, such as tai chi and kung fu, owe their names to their Chinese origin. Mahjong is a fun matching game that many enjoy. Rickshaw is an alternative name of jinrikisha, a small cart pulled by a human driver that was once very popular in China and Japan.

This article contains only a few words adopted from Chinese. With a little investigation of your own, you will discover many more Chinese words embedded in the English language. Why not brainstorm with your family and friends to see how many more you know?