Write for Business - Blog

1. A noun is a word that names something: a person, a place, a thing, or an idea.

   Tony Blair/prime minister      South Africa/country
   Working Woman/magazine     World Federalism/ideology

2. A pronoun is a word used in place of a noun.

   I    you    she    it    which    themselves
   me    that    he    they    whoever    whatever
   my    mine    ours

3. A verb is a word that expresses action or state of being.

   fight    walk    drive    rip    dive    jump
   play    write    lift    type    call    work
   is    are    was    were

4. An adjective describes or modifies a noun or pronoun. (The articles a, an, and the are adjectives.)

   good    bad    tall    wide    clear    fast

5. An adverb modifies a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. An adverb tells how, when, where, why, how often, or how much. (Not and never are adverbs.)

   tomorrow    near    far    perfectly    well    completely
   surely    regularly    greatly    partly    slowly    quickly

6. A preposition is a word (or group of words) used in front of a noun or a pronoun to form a phrase that modifies some other word in the sentence.

   above    across    after    with    by    for
   from    in    of    off    on    out
   over    through    to    until    up    away from

7. A conjunction connects individual words or groups of words.

   and    but    or    nor    for    yet
   so    because    when    though    whereas    while

8. An interjection expresses strong emotion or surprise.

   Help!    Yikes!    Wow!

(From Write for Business, page 252, and Proofreader's Guide PDF, page 66)

An interjection is a word or phrase that expresses strong emotion or surprise. Punctuation (usually a comma or an exclamation point) sets off an interjection from the rest of the sentence.

Help! The elevator is stuck!

Oh my, that happens often.

Caution: Use strong interjections sparingly. Like shouting, they can diminish the dignity of your writing.

Coordinating conjunctions connect grammatically equivalent elements, that is, a word to a word, a phrase to a phrase, or a clause to a clause.

"It's not the most intellectual job in the world, but I do have to know the letters."
- Vanna White

(From Write for Business, page 251, and Proofreader's Guide PDF, page 65)

Correlative conjunctions are always used in pairs, linking items of equal weight.

She decided to neither buy nor lease a new car.

(From Write for Business, page 251, and Proofreader's Guide PDF, page 65)

Subordinating conjunctions connect a dependent clause to an independent clause, completing the meaning of the dependent clause.

If the trailer is still here tomorrow, it will be impounded. (The dependent clause If the trailer is still here tomorrow depends on the rest of the sentence to complete its meaning.)

(From Write for Business, page 251, and Proofreader's Guide PDF, page 65)