Quick Tips: Using Contractions Correctly

Contractions are useful in both spoken and written language. They save time, use fewer letters than full words, and help us to sound less formal when the situation calls for it. Contractions are combinations of two words and, in most cases, the apostrophe indicates where letters are omitted. Here’s a handy list of contractions.

Common contractions Do + not = Don’t (The apostrophe tells us that a letter, O, has been removed.) Are/is + not = Aren’t/isn’t They + are = They’re It + is/has = It’s Could/Would/Should + have = Could’ve/Would’ve/Should’ve Could/Would/Should + not = Couldn’t/Wouldn’t/Shouldn’t We + are = We’re Will + not = Won’t (This is the slight exception to the rule that the apostrophe replaces the dropped letters. With this contraction, the spelling changes completely.)

Less common contractions Shall + not = Shan’t Might + not = Mightn’t You + all = Y’all (slang) Am/is + not = Ain’t (slang)

When to Use Contractions We use contracted words all the time in speech. This is natural because these habits help us to communicate quickly. Unfortunately, habits and tendencies that are common in speech are not always optimal in writing, especially when writing for formal situations. For this reason, we encourage our users to avoid using contractions when writing for work, school, and/or any formal environment.

Q Without U: 9 Must-Know Words to Celebrate Scrabble Day!

This Monday, April 13, is Scrabble Day, and Grammarly is celebrating with our fellow word-lovers, Dictionary.com!

Guest post by Michele Turner, CEO at Dictionary.com

Can you play a Q without a U in Scrabble? Whether you’re playing Scrabble, Words With Friends, or any other fun word game, here is a list of nine high-scoring solutions for the “Q conundrum,” so that you can make winning words with the letter Q — without its traditional letter companion, the U.

• Qi – a variant spelling on the word chi, qi is the vital life force believed to circulate around the body and through the universe in Chinese medicine.
• Qat – an evergreen shrub of Arabia and Africa, the leaves of which are used as a narcotic when chewed or made into a beverage.
• Faqir – a Muslim or Hindu religious ascetic or mendicant monk commonly considered a wonder-worker or a dervish.  Played on a triple word, this term could work wonders for your game. Can also be spelled fakir or faquir.
• QWERTY – yes, this acronym coined in the 1920s to describe the standard keyboard, can be used in the game.
• Qaid – refers to a tribal chief, judge, or senior official, and it stems from the Arabic word meaning “leader.” It entered the English language in the mid-1800s and is sometimes spelled caid.
• Qadi – related to qaid, this word refers to a judge in a Muslim community. It’s a useful variant when trying to stack words to play do or it.
• Sheqel – an ancient unit of weight equivalent to about a quarter or half an ounce. Today it is commonly used to refer to the Israeli currency, though it is also a slang term meaning money. Also spelled shekel.
• Qindar – a monetary denomination in Albania that is equivalent to 100th of a lek, the standard monetary unit. Also spelled qintar.
• Qoph – the 19th letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

Want more for your word game arsenal? Get Scrabble and Words With Friends word values by searching words at Dictionary.com. Search results will show a word’s corresponding score on the right hand side of the page, truly bringing words – and your game – to life! Keep these ten valuable words in mind as well; which will all rack up points in both games.

• Chapeau – a hat.
• Convex – having a surface that is curved or rounded outward.
• Exequy – a funeral procession.
• Frequent – happening or occurring at short intervals.
• Jacquard– a fabric with an elaborately woven pattern produced on a Jacquard loom.
• Jaywalk – to cross a street at a place other than a regular crossing or in a heedless manner, as diagonally or against a traffic light.
• Kumquat – small, round or oblong citrus fruit having a sweet rind and acid pulp, used chiefly for preserves.
• Mystique – an aura of mystery of mystical power surrounding a particular occupation or pursuit.
• Quixotic – extravagantly chivalrous or romantic; visionary, impractical, or impracticable.
• Quiz – an informal test or examination of a student or class.

Broadening your command of language by building your vocabulary not only gives you an edge in gameplay, it also translates to better communication skills in all parts of your life.

What’s the best Scrabble word you’ve played? Share in the comments!

About the Author

Michele Turner is CEO of Dictionary.com, providing online and mobile properties that are top destinations for learning and word discovery. Dictionary’s products serve 70 million unique users monthly across mobile and web. Visit www.dictionary.com for all the contextual tools you need to boost your Scrabble or Words With Friends game and truly expand your vocabulary.

Funny Phrases: Whet Your Appetite

It’s no wonder that many people misspell the phrase “whet your appetite.” After all, your mouth waters when your appetite is stirred, so why wouldn’t the phrase be spelled as “wet your appetite”?

In its most literal sense, “whet” means to sharpen like you would a knife or blade. When used in the phrase “whet your appetite,” it means to arouse interest or eagerness, to metaphorically sharpen your appetite. When your appetite is whetted, you’re hungry and ready to eat!

If you want to learn more about idioms and odd phrases, read this post about “nip it in the bud.”

What’s the Worst Poem of all Time?

It was a Sunday evening, the 28th of December in the year 1879. A dire storm was hitting Scotland hard—in Glasgow, the wind speed was measured at 71 mph. In Dundee, the wind was pummeling the bridge over the Firth of Tay, the Tay Rail Bridge, blowing at a speed of 80 mph and at a right angle. The wind, along with questionable design and craftsmanship of the bridge, was blamed when the the bridge collapsed that night, taking with it a train that was passing over it and the lives of everyone aboard. The event was later dubbed the “Tay Bridge disaster,” and there were at least two poems written about it.

One of them was “Die Brück’ am Tay” by the German poet Theodor Fontane. The other was “The Tay Bridge Disaster” by the Scottish poet William McGonagall, who was considered to be a particularly bad poet during his lifetime. Over a century later “The Tay Bridge Disaster” is still one of the top contenders for the title of Worst Poem Ever.

What Makes a Poem Bad?

There are those who believe that there’s no such thing as a good poem. Plato was one of them—he believed that all poetry was bad. The ancient Greek philosopher had three objections to poetry. He considered it to be unethical because it promoted passions he deemed undesirable. He did not find poetry to be philosophical, because it didn’t provide any true knowledge. He also found it less worthy than more practical arts, which diminished poetry’s educational value. These views, of course, had their opponents—most notably Aristotle, who defended poetry, saying that it provided the valuable experience of catharsis, among other things.

Plato’s objections and Aristotle’s valiant defense dealt with the very essence of poetry. Both men were philosophers, after all. But Quintus Horatius Flaccus, a.k.a. Horace, was a Roman poet who, in his work Ars Poetica gave the world a set of guidelines for what makes poetry—or any other kind of writing, for that matter—good. Horace was an adversary of purple prose, which was the term he coined for flowery language. He advocated for unity and proper use of meter and style. He set standards for the traits a poet should possess, including a superior intellect, common sense, and adherence to higher ideals. By setting standards for good poetry, Horace also set standards for poetry that’s not good.

What Would Quintus Horatius Flaccus Say Today?

Horace’s ideas proved to be very influential—he was an inspiration behind the thirteenth century Poetria nova by Geoffrey of Vinsauf, which aimed to replace Horace’s work. Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism, written in the early eighteenth century, gives what we call today best practices for poets, but also draws on Horace, among other classical sources, for inspiration.

Over time, of course, the perception of what is good and what is bad in poetry has changed a lot. It would be interesting to see what Horace would say about Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl” or Gil-Scott Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not be Televised.” But what was set up so long ago remains true to this day—there are those who think that all poetry is bad. There are also those who think that only certain types of poetry are good and that everything else is bad.

The unfortunate William McGonagall had rotten fish thrown at him when he read his poems in front of audiences. Today, he is still considered one of the worst poets in the world, but if you read any of his works, you might think it’s so bad it’s actually good—there is such a thing today. The same might be said for Theophilus Marzials, whose poem “A Tragedy” might just match the badness of anything McGonagall ever did. Or you can look up Margaret Cavendish or Edgar A. Guest, who are also often cited as very bad poets. Or maybe hunt down the poetry of Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings. But maybe, just maybe, you might take Bad Poetry Day as an opportunity to write your own bad poetry. And remember—the worse it gets, the more fun it will be to laugh at it.

Holiday Gift Guide 2015: Get the Perfect Book for Everyone on Your List

You know what feels great? Getting your holiday shopping done and out of the way early. One way to accomplish that is by keeping your game plan simple. Need a present for Aunt Trish? Book. For your brother-in-law? Book. For a special someone who just might be the one? Two books! Read on to find Grammarly’s hand-picked recommendations for everyone on your list:

The History Buff

Lafayette in the Somewhat United States, Sarah Vowell Sarah Vowell, widely adored for her ability to make nearly any moment in history at once fascinating, hilarious, and startlingly relevant to the world of today, offers yet another gem: an insightful and unconventional account of George Washington’s trusted officer and friend, that swashbuckling teenage French aristocrat, the Marquis de Lafayette.

 

 

Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania, Erik Larson Delight the WWI expert on your list with this riveting chronicle of the Lusitania disaster. Knowing that the ship sinks at the end spoils absolutely nothing about this masterfully told true story.

 

 

The Sports Nut

Superbowl Gold: 50 Years of the Big Game, The Editors of Sports Illustrated Between the covers of Superbowl Gold, the football fanatic in your life will find overviews of each championship, accounts of the most stirring performances, commentary from players and coaches, reviews of every halftime show, and lots of fascinating photos. It even covers the commercials!

 

 

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics, Daniel James Brown The Boys in the Boat is the improbable true story of how nine working-class boys from the American West showed the world at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin what true grit really meant. Also a great pick for The History Buff.

 

 

The Romantic

The Rosie Project, Graeme Simsion For a sweet, unconventional romance, look no further than The Rosie Project, the story of an oddly charming, socially challenged genetics professor named Don and a spontaneous whirlwind of a woman named Rosie.

 

 

Uprooted, Naomi Novik Naomi Novik’s spellbinding tale has everything: monsters, magic, love, and at its heart, a powerful and courageous heroine. Also a great pick for The Adventurer.

 

 

 

The Adventurer

A Walk in the Woods, Bill Bryson Bill Bryson’s classic book about walking the Appalachian Trail is a sure bet for hikers, nature lovers, and anyone who enjoys a simultaneously fascinating and hilarious tale about the great outdoors.

 

 

Nimona, Noelle Stevenson Is your Adventurer adventurous enough to try a graphic novel? The brilliantly subversive National Book Award finalist Nimona turns the classic adventure story on its head, following a supervillain and his mysterious sidekick as they set out to prove that their kingdom’s good guys aren’t quite the heroes everybody thinks they are.

 

 

The Scientist

Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff in Simple Words, Randall Munroe In Thing Explainer, Randall Munroe, creator of the webcomic xkcd, delivers exactly what he promises: explanations about cool things. Funny, interesting, and always understandable, this book is for anyone—age 5 to 105—who has ever wondered how things work, and why. Also a great pick for The Nerd.

 

 

Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs: The Astounding Interconnectedness of the Universe, Lisa Randall Did dark matter kill the dinosaurs? The armchair scientist on your holiday list will clearly want to know the answer, which, fortunately, can be found in this new book by the renowned particle physicist Lisa Randall.

 

 

The Nerd

You’re Never Weird on the Internet (Almost), Felicia Day Nerd icon Felicia Day’s rags-to-riches story of rising to Internet fame and embracing her weirdness along the way is sure to resonate with the nerds on your list.

 

 

 

William Shakespeare’s Star Wars Trilogy: Verily, A New Hope; The Empire Striketh Back; The Jedi Doth Return, Ian Doescher Make a list of everyone you know who is a Star Wars geek or a Shakespeare lover. Then give this brilliant boxed set to all of them. Also a great pick for The Classics Lover.

 

 

 

The Classics Lover

Penguin Drop Caps The beautiful, colorful, Penguin Drop Cap series makes a lovely gift for a literature lover. Choose a book by her favorite author, or give her a set that matches her initials. Just be prepared to take the blame when she decides she has to collect them all.

 

 

100 Years of the Best American Short Stories, Edited by Lorrie Moore The centennial celebration of the Best American Short Stories series features forty of the more than two thousand stories published in previous editions, hand-selected by Lorrie Moore, and accompanied by commentary from series editor Heidi Pitlor. Together, the stories and commentary offer an extraordinary guided tour through a century of literature.

 

 

The Mogul

Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future, Peter Thiel Peter Thiel’s smart treatise on innovation and success makes a great gift for the entrepreneurially inclined. Zero to One presents an optimistic view of the future of progress in America and a new way of thinking about innovation: it starts by learning to ask the questions that lead you to find value in unexpected places.

 

 

Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, Ashlee Vance Who better to inspire the energetic innovator on your list than the legendary Elon Musk? Ashlee Vance’s insightful book, written with exclusive access to Musk himself, traces the entrepreneur’s journey from a rough upbringing to the helm of multiple world-changing companies.

 

 

The Health Enthusiast

Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Underrated Organ, Giulia Enders With quirky charm, Gut reveals the story of the body’s most ignored and least appreciated organ. The health enthusiast on your list will thank you for this smart and useful book.

 

 

 

Natural Born Heroes, Christopher McDougall Christopher McDougall’s instant classic Born to Run changed the game for dedicated runners. In his new book, he discovers that the secrets of ancient Greek heroes are still alive and well on the island of Crete, and ready to be unleashed in the muscles and minds of casual athletes and aspiring heroes everywhere.

 

 

The Foodie

Thug Kitchen: The Official Cookbook This one is perfect for any pre-foodies you know. With the help of some truly, er, colorful language, Thug Kitchen proves that kale doesn’t have to be pretentious.

 

 

 

The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, J. Kenji López-Alt And this one is perfect for the full-blown foodie. The Food Lab offers a grand tour of the science of cooking explored through popular American dishes, illustrated in full color. Also a great pick for The Scientist.

 

 

Have a recommendation of your own? Don’t keep it to yourself! Share it in the comment section or via our Facebook or Twitter feeds.

5 Authors Who You May Not Know Were Women

Let’s say you’ve written your very first novel, and you’re shopping it around to various publishers. And they generally like it, or at least one of them does, but they have a weird request—you need to change your name before they’ll publish the book. Not legally, of course. That would be silly. Just, you know, assume a pen name or use your initials instead of your full name because it might help you reach certain segments of the market. So if your name is Joanne, for example, you might go with something like J. K. in order to attract boy readers. Never mind the fact that you’ll become a celebrated author, even after the news that you’re a woman gets out. Sound familiar? That’s exactly what happened with J. K. Rowling. And it illustrates that even today, gender matters in the world of writing and female writers still have to fight for equal treatment.

In the literary world, the tradition of women posing as men in order to publish their work reaches back to at least the nineteenth century. Jane Austen hid her identity, although not her gender, behind the pen name “A Lady.” The Brontë sisters all wrote under male pen names at one time or another. Louisa May Alcott championed the use of ambiguous initials. And all of them are recognized under their own names today. But are there other female authors who worked (or still work) under male pen names who haven’t gained that recognition? Let’s have a look.

1George Sand (1804–1876)

If there’s one thing to say about Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin, better known as George Sand, it’s that she was a lady ahead of her time and who never left anyone indifferent to her. Flaubert and Balzac sang her praises; Baudelaire was her critic. She wrote novels, memoirs, and plays, and she was notorious for her companionship with prominent men, including the writer Charles Didier, the composer Frederic Chopin, and the writer Prosper Mérimée. Among her more famous works are the novels La Mare au Diable, La Petite Fadette, and the autobiographical novel A Winter in Majorca.

2 George Eliot (1819–1880)

Mary Ann Evans wanted her literary work to be taken seriously, so she did something that made perfect sense in the age she lived in—she took George Eliot as her pen name. Eliot became one of the most prominent authors of the Victorian era, writing seven novels and a number of books of poetry and short stories. Her best-known work includes the novels Adam Bede, Middlemarch, and Daniel Deronda.

3 Vernon Lee (1856–1935)

Violet Paget was a British author who used the pen name Vernon Lee to publish her work. Paget was a prolific writer, known today for essays about art, music, and travel as much as for her supernatural fiction. Paget was also politically active as a pacifist during World War I and held feminist views. She had romantic relationships with women, and like George Sand, she had a nonconformist attitude toward the prescribed gender roles of her time.

4 Isak Dinesen (1885–1962)

At the 1985 Academy Award ceremony, the movie Out of Africa won no fewer than seven Oscars, including the one for best picture. The movie was based on a memoir of the same title by a Danish author named Isak Dinesen. Dinesen’s real name was Karen Blixen, and Isak Dinesen is not the only male pen name she used—she also wrote under the name Pierre Andrézel. Out of Africa is not the only book of hers that was adapted into an Oscar-winning movie—she also wrote Babette’s Feast, which was made into a movie that won an Oscar for best foreign language film.

5 Rob Thurman

Rob Thurman is a contemporary New York Times bestselling author whose work includes the urban fiction–themed Cal Leandros series and the Trickster series. Thurman’s actual name is Robyn, but her use of a male moniker as a literary name doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with catering to audiences—Rob is actually Thurman’s nickname. She did, however, keep the “about the author” sections of her books gender-ambiguous until her fourth novel.

Spoken Language Rules Work In Signed Communication, Too

Language is language, regardless of the way you communicate. A new study by Psychology and Linguistics Professor Iris Berent at Northeastern University demonstrates that similar structures rule communication, and whether communication is via speech or sign is of secondary importance.

Basically, people adhere to certain patterns for what’s permissible in language and reject structures that “seem wrong.” By observing that research subjects with no knowledge of sign language mapped the rules of spoken language onto signs they were shown, researchers learned that ingrained rules play a bigger role than previously thought.

Sign language was already known to have its own grammar and rules for pronunciation, word order, and usage before this study. Beyond that, American Sign Language (ASL) has a very different vocabulary and set of rules from sign languages used in other countries, and there are different regional accents and dialects within one country, just like in spoken language.

Berent said that her research aimed “to reveal the complex structure of sign language, and in so doing, disabuse the public of this notion [that sign language is not really a language].”

How do you research language without taking the time to make people learn a whole new language?

Berent’s lab approached the problem by focusing on words and signs that had the same basic structure. Then, they extended that structure to meaningless sounds and signs. The researchers showed signs with similar patterns to participants with no knowledge of sign language and asked the participants to rate whether certain patterns seemed to make sense.

The main pattern was doubling: words and signs with a sound or sign that was repeated. Here are some examples:

• bagogo
• fatiti
• bizanzan
• slaflaf

If these words seem like they might be right at home in Dr. Seuss, you’re not far off the mark. These combinations are nonsensical, and participants in the study recognized that. The exciting thing for the researchers is that their participants recognized and reacted to this type of pattern in both speech and signs.

The subjects were asked to respond to signs the same way they would to words, judging whether they made sense in certain contexts. If a word was given as a name for a single object, people gave lower ratings to words with doubling than ones without doubling. For example, slaflaf got worse ratings than slafmak. Sure, they both sound like gibberish, but one sounds more likely to be a word. One exception: if subjects were given a word or sign with doubling and told that the doubling signaled plurality, they were more likely to give it a higher rating.

In short: people’s responses to specific forms change based on the linguistic context of those forms.

By finding that people with no knowledge of sign language reacted in the same way to both words and signs with similar patterns, Berent showed that the governing rules for spoken language and sign language aren’t as different as people may think.

Berent’s study shows that sign languages aren’t just based on things like the shapes of objects described in individual words: instead, they rely on abstract rules just like spoken languages do. The idea that the same mechanisms in the brain are at work for both spoken and sign languages is big news for neurologists, psychologists, and linguists alike. In the task of uncovering the mysteries of language, we’re just scratching the surface.