Dzetsu's Daily Grammars and Story-writing Tips

[dzetsu]

Day 1: Commonly Confused Words - Part One

Whom vs. Who

'Whom' refers to an object while 'Who' refers to a subject. If that doesn't already clear up the whole issue, then allow me to further elaborate.

You've probably at least heard of a sentence requiring at least a subject and predicate? A subject is the 'main character' of the sentence that does an action. In such a case, you would use who.

Ex: "Who ate Steven?"

In this case, someone has done the action of eating upon the object. You do not know exactly who the subject is, and therefore 'who' is the replacement of it in the question.

As for 'whom,' it has an inverse relationship with 'who.' If 'who' refers to the subject, then 'whom' refers to the object. Quite opposite of the subject, an object is the 'character' of the sentence in which the action is being imposed upon.

Ex: "Whom will Josh eat?"

'Whom' is the replacement for the subject which was eaten. We do not know what the subject exactly is and that's why we are asking for clarification. 'Whom' is being eaten by the ravenous cannibal known as Josh.

In condensed terms, 'who' is the one doing the thing and 'whom' is the one that is having something done to it.

Here are some last few examples:

"President Abraham Lincoln was the one who signed the Emancipation Proclamation."

"It was he who destroyed the castle."

"Whom shall we turn to in our moment of need?"

"It was he whom we destroyed."

Who's vs. Whose

This one is definitely a common mistake, but is no where near as hard to understand.

'Who's' is the contraption for 'who' and 'is.' That in itself is already a good enough explanation, I should hope.

Ex: "Who's he?"

A simple explanation, which I believe should prove worthy, is: Who is he?

Moving on, 'whose' is used to relate an object to a person as in possession. It is used to connect something's ownership to an unknown being.

Ex: "Whose book does this belong to?"

The sentence part 'whose book' is showing that we know the object, a book, but we do not know the subject which is doing the action of ownership upon the book.

In fact, you could also ask, "To whom does this book belong to?" if you wanted to make the book doing the action of being owned, but that's another story.

"Whose book does this belong to?" is basically another way to say "Who owns this book?" If you still don't get how 'whose' is used, the latter example may be the one for you.

However, one last point of clarification I must make is 'whose' is very much related to 'their.'

That should already be a huge hint.

Another few examples to finish:

"Who's making that smell? I'm starting to feel sick."

"I can't tell who's who if they're covering their faces like that."

"Whose pants keep blocking the air vent? It's a huge problem, you know."

"Wait, the underwear is whose?"

[dzetsu]

Day 2: Fragment sentences

Sometimes, fragments are used for emphasis. But most of the time, no, you shall not be using one, or it just leads to ruining the flow of your writing piece.

A sentence requires a subject and predicate, or a noun and a verb. Even so, another thing must be noted is that even if it contains both of these elements, it can not be a dependent clause.

There are three things you should ask yourself when you see a sentence, or at least keep in mind.

What is the sentence about? What is the thing doing? Is this a complete thought?

Remember, though, that 'is' is a linking verb, and therefore does count as a predicate. An object cannot do the action of issing, quite obviously.

If you'd like a lesson on Linking Verbs, go ahead and ask.

A proper sentence also has a complete thought. Therefore, by reading the sentence alone, you should already have a clear idea what is being said.

"But he didn't."

This is not a clear idea, and it is not a complete sentence. I did mention before, however, that they could be used for emphasis, so in this case, a sentence before is vital.

"Jerry needed to do something very important for the science team, for the competition was the next day and everyone was relying on him. But he didn't."

As you can see, the second part is definitely not a sentence. But it relates so strongly to the previous statement and emphasizes how he totally didn't fulfill his duties, that ass. Not that it actually happened in Science Team. That was a random example.

[dzetsu]

Day 3: Pronoun Misuse

This is less of a grammar lesson and more of one of the story-writing tips. Pronouns may make a story unclear if used improperly.

Pronouns are lovely for replacing the tediousness of proper nouns. How awkward would it be if sentences went along the lines of, "Chandler sat down on Chandler's chair and turned on Chandler's computer that Chandler's parents bought for Chandler."

Already you can see how superfluous the use of "Chandler" is becoming. You already get that it's her computer, her chair, and her parents.

But now, listen to this paragraph: "She entered the house and glanced around. Her friend was there, listening to her radio. She smiled as she entered. (Note how you can't tell who's smiling?) She shut off the radio and pulled out her backpack."

How confusing, no?

Perhaps you want me to create an example with proper moderation? To be honest, I'm quite exhausted and really would prefer not to. But then I would feel as though I am also leaving out a vital part, so here we go.

"Ash Ketchum rushed into the large Pokemon Center, the automatic doors sliding shut behind him. Cradling his beloved yellow friend, Pikachu, in his arms, he strode to the counter.

"Nurse Joy," he cried, caressing the mouse Pokemon. "Please help my Pikachu!"

The red-haired woman nodded, her expression quite serious. Reaching out, she relieved Ash of his Pikachu and carried him to the healing room."

As you notice, even if Ash was a girl, the pronoun usage would not cause you sit there and wonder who own's the Pikachu and who is the Nurse.

Perhaps you believe that I'm using characters known by many, so of course you would have no problem understanding, so poor tired me will give another example.

"Janice swung her legs, sitting at the edge of a large black science lab desk. As she did so, she whistled and examined how the light from the window refracted against the sequins of her sparkling shoes and spread flashing colors across the ceiling.

"Hey, Janice," Chi Yan greeted, skipping cheerfully into Mrs. Roberts's science classroom. "You weren't waiting too long, right?"

Chi Yan had a very small stature and a round cute face, but behind her pretty looks, she held a very intelligent brain in her cranium. Those who knew her were impressed by her academic achievements in science and math.

"Of course not," Janice replied, noting the lack of pronoun for her name because it would be unclear if who was speaking otherwise."

[Dream Adept]

Superfluous: being excessive and repetitive when definitely not necessary or needed. Like how the word "Chandler" was clearly uses one too many times.

Just thought I'd elaborate (explain) that.

(Thank you dzetsu for noting my mistake!)

[dzetsu]

Thank you, Gabby, although you chose a very bad time to misspell definitely.

If there are words you do not understand, I'm sure Gabby will be kind enough to post the definitions underneath! Of course, you may also ask me in the chatbox or send me a private message.

Another reminder: The internet is at your fingertips. Google words you do not understand, or use dictionary.com.

[Dream Adept]

(ooops sorry about the typo! Did that post on my iphone xD I'll correct that...)

[dzetsu]

And now the lack of proper capitalization! Ooh, and the second sentence is a killer one. It sends my heart aflame in a passionate and painful cascade of tumultuous upset! But I'm just being facetious. Carry on; I understand.

[Dream Adept]

Oh, no, my friend, YOU may carry on. After all, this IS a grammar thread and I take full responsibility of my mistakes! Anyways, you may move on to the next grammar lesson now. I will pop in here once in a while when I feel there is a need for it~

(I'm on the computer now, so there shouldn't be as many errors.)

[dzetsu]

Day 4: The Comma Splice

One of the most painful errors is the comma splice. Perhaps the word appears quite similar to spice, but let me tell you--such a mistake is not going to add "spice" to your writing.

The comma itself is normally a useful tool, but just so, it easily is misused. Remember that commas are used for lists and connecting two related clauses, one independent and one dependent--not two independent clauses.

In such a case, a comma separating a sentence such as "The dog ran across the street, it was very quick." is a very obvious and painful misuse. It is an error known as the comma splice. It 'splices' two sentence parts with a 'comma'.

Anyways, to fix such a sentence, there are a variety of methods. The first, which is very obvious and definitely common among low level writers, is replacing the comma with a period.

"The dog ran across the street. It was quick."

Two short, choppy sentences, yes, but no comma splicing error.

Another technique which is relatively simple and avoids the choppiness is the use of a conjunction. As all of you should know by now, the important and easy to remember conjunctions are FANBOYS. For, and, nor, but, or, yet, and so.

"The dog ran across the street and it was quick." or "The dog ran across the street, and it sure was quick!"

You can probably notice that the use of conjunctions is still not the best way to go, for it lacks flow.

Next, you can use a hyphen. Hyphens--also known as dashes--you must note, are not always the answer and do not spam its use at every possible opportunity. They are used when the part that follows is surprising or emphatic, or has a twist. Hyphens can also demonstrate a change of tone or show parenthetical elements.

"The dog ran across the street--it was quick!"

Finally--my favorite punctuation mark--is the semicolon. The semicolon is very helpful; it can also be used in a variety of ways. It can replace the conjunctions and avoid comma splicing. Also, the use of a conjunctive adverb in the middle of a sentence requires a semicolon.

"The dog ran across the street; it was quick."

The semicolon is a nifty bit of punctuation, but it should be used sparingly; otherwise, it will lose it's punch. As you can see, the simple sentence about the canine sprinting across the street hardly requires such a sophisticated mark!

But you must remember that they semicolon can only connect two related independent clauses. "The dog ran across the street. It had brown fur with white paws." cannot be changed into "The dog ran across the street; it had brown fur with white paws."

In fact, that is a situation where any other method than changing the comma to a period is awkward and incorrect.

[dzetsu]

Day 5: Paragraphing

New subject, new line. If you do not indent, then double space between paragraphs. As for dialogue, new speaker, new line.

[dzetsu]

Day 6: Word Usage

Sometimes, one finds a word that is really, really freaking awesome and would just love to show how intelligent they are by using the word. It is impressive, but after a while of using it, it just becomes dull, overused, and even annoying.

Now, I don't mean to pick on anyone by using an example, but it's not a horrible offense that means you are stupid or anything. It just simply means you need to either rephrase your sentences or think about investing in a thesaurus. To be honest, one should avoid using an adjective or verb, or a form of them, more than once per post!

Ex: "It was another day, another boring yet particularly exciting day. A bunch of students would be headed on a trip to somewhere, somewhere that I forgot. This trip would be highly enjoyable, unless something tragic[/b] happened.

Tragedies[/b], they are so heart-wrenching don't you think? People dieing, people suffering from a horrid disease, lovers seperated because of something. Tragic[/b] isn't it.

But this tale will have a twist, it won't have normal tragedies[/b] in it, people suffer tragedies[/b] all on one island. It's quite unsual isn't it. I told you this story would have a twist, but let me get to the point. This tale will be about a group of people, surviving on an island.

The island always has many tragedies[/b], meaning that the people on that island will have some sort of tragedy.[/b] It would be quite hard to survive on that island alive, but it's quite possible. The amount of people who have suffered tragedies[/b] on this mysterious island is unknown."

via "Survive on the Island of Tragedies" roleplay by Kagamine Rose.

Now once again, I am not picking on Kagamine Rose, but I just needed a good example, for an example created by myself would be exaggerated, unrealistic, and probably ignored. There are about twelve sentences in those four paragraphs, and the word is used eight times.

The overuse of the words tragic and tragedy are evident. It is not as bad as, say, the numerous comma splices found in the piece, but still, a problem. They are nice words, yes, but perhaps something could have been done to prevent the overuse?

Showing an example will be very wordy and cause me to do way too much work, so I'm not going to provide one. You may visit thesaurus.com by yourself.

[dzetsu]

Day 7: Commonly Confused Words - Part Two

Confusion vs. Confusement

Confusion is a noun used to describe a state of something a bit less dramatic than pandemonium. If you've ever been lost and utterly disconcerted, then you should understand its meaning. Also, if you have no idea what events had just unfolded and so on.

I'm sure most on the site understand what the phrase "I'm confused." means, especially if they had played Pokemon and have encountered a Zubat.

Confusement on the other hand, is a word that does not exist. It is probably a mix between confusion and amusement.

Aswell vs. As well[/b]

More ways to say "as well" are "too" and "also". It is a common way to add another thought to a statement or group of statements.

Aswell, on the other hand, does not exist either. It is a word probably created by one who used as well often enough and found it important that it could become a word. It, unfortunately, is not.

[dzetsu]

Day 8: Confusing Words - Part Three

Apart vs. A part[/b]

These words may be very, very similar, and in fact sound the same, but they are very different in meaning. While 'apart' means to not be attached to something, 'a part' states that something is actually an appendage of another item. Already you can see the problem that may arise from mixing these two things up!

Ex: "I am apart of that group."
While you may be thinking that it means that the speaker is a member of that group, what it actually is stating is that they are NOT a part of that group that all! Perhaps this will clear things up.

Ex: "Hey, are those guys your friends?"
"No. I am apart from that group."

When speaking, using apart and a part sound very similar, and it is actually nigh impossible to tell the difference between the two, even if you can differentiate in writing. Most of the time, it is 'apart from' and 'a part of', and it's easy to find your intention.

But even if you do put the correct term of 'from' against 'of', the use of 'apart' vs. 'a part' will no matter be the main source of implication in writing. So be careful!

I don't feel that describing 'a part' is necessary. Especially from what I have explained thus far, I feel it should be obvious.

[dzetsu]

Good morning, day, or evening. This is a waste of my time. >< I have much homework to do and it's not helping anyone, so I'm just going to... go sit in that corner and study some parabolas.

[Chloe]

I check this everyday... I was enjoying the help...