Keep your writing sharp by following the rules.

Please welcome author Debra Brenegan with an insightful guest post about grammar and writing.

We are all a little sloppy when we speak. We skip some of the basic grammar rules in order to create intimacy and shortcuts — like secrets between best friends. Such conversation helps us connect to others. But when casual phrases and speaking patterns seep into your writing, it can reflect negatively on you as a writer.

What Your Writing Says About You

In these Internet times, written communication is king, and the proper use of it separates the pros from the wannabes. Readers take writers’ messages more seriously when those messages are properly punctuated and correctly written. Readers don’t want to work to understand meaning. They might not realize it, but readers feel calm, serene, and cozy when you don’t make them strain for understanding. Realistically, the only time most people want to struggle with written language is when they’re stopped in traffic and faced with a vanity license plate.

In our split-second culture, time is essential. You want your message to get there fast and without misinterpretation. If the reading is easy, then the argument you’re making is easier to follow and easier to agree to. Let’s face it: All writing contains an argument, even if that argument is simply, “Read me – you won’t regret it.”

Good writing communicates that you are smart, or at least educated. This is not a bad impression to give – really! It makes what you’re trying to say more credible if you know how to say it.

In addition to demonstrating your education, you help educate others when you write correctly. Bad language/grammar usage is like a cold – it spreads until everyone is cranky and sick, and nobody remembers the days of clear-headedness. Don’t be afraid to counter this.

Remember Your Audience

Proper grammar matters most when you’re trying to communicate with people who aren’t your best friends, people who might judge you or think you’re unintelligent. Instead of giving you what you want – a job, attention, a vote — you end up turning off people because of your “spoken word” writing. Many people understand this regarding professional writing. Of course you want your résumé, application letter, and business memos to be clearly written and easy to understand, but creative writers need to know – and use – proper English, too.

Even in creative writing, editors and readers judge the writing. They want gorgeous prose, but they also want to be able to read it, to disappear into it, to forget that there are any mechanics behind the spin. Proper grammar and writing provides that invisibility and lets readers slip into your ideas, your story, and your writing.

Know the Rules before You Break the Rules

One of the underlying problems with rule-breaking is the question of its cause. Are you breaking the rules because you’re exercising your poetic license or because you can’t remember the difference between insure and ensure? If your reader can’t tell, you’re in trouble.

There’s certainly room for realistic-sounding dialogue and conversational prose, but underneath any stretching of proper rules are – the rules. You have to know the rules before you can break them. Good creative writers break the rules all the time, but they do so with purpose. It is unknowing breakage that damages credibility and your ability to communicate.

If you’re not feeling overly confident in your grammatical understanding, pick up a copy of the book Eats, Shoots & Leaves (aff link) by Lynne Truss [Editor’s note: this book uses British grammar] for a fun and simple review of the basics. In the meantime, here are a few common errors you can watch out for (and avoid!).

Common Mistakes

Misuse of prepositions has spread like the plague. I fumed one day when I was standing in the check-out line at Wal-Mart. After I swiped my credit card, the automatic display read, “Waiting on authorization.” It should be waiting for. Another misuse is “meeting up with” someone. People meet other people. They always have, and they always will. Only in a brief period of history (now) will anyone know what it means to meet “up” with someone else.

It is also common for people to say, “A student needs to learn all they can.” This is mixing a singular subject with a plural pronoun. Realistically, it should read, “A student needs to learn all he or she can.” The he/she construction, although correct, is bulky. You can usually avoid this type of confusion by making the subject plural so that it reads, “Students need to learn all they can.” [Editor’s note: using they as a generic pronoun is becoming more acceptable, though it’s still technically incorrect. Grammar Girl has a detailed article that thoroughly addresses “Generic Singular Pronouns.”]

And finally, it seems too obvious to even include here, but people often use texting shortcuts in professional settings. “OMG” and “UR Gr8” have no place outside of texts and Twitter. And even in an email, don’t forget to capitalize things like my name. I’ll be much more likely to finish reading what you wrote.

Outdated Rules You CAN Break

Comma use has become more streamlined, thanks to widespread Internet copy and Associated Press (AP) style for journalism. Moreover, colons and semicolons seem like daguerreotypes of great ancestors, especially in modern writing. Yes, they are sometimes needed, but often, a comma or a dash will do instead. Don’t use a hyphen (also known as an en dash) instead of a dash (the big one, or em dash) or vice versa. Hyphens bring together, and dashes separate.

The rule most commonly broken without freaking people out is the one about fragments. They are now considered almost cool. As long as they’re not overused. Or senseless. Or too repetitive. Or used when someone is allergic to verbs. But other than those occasions, fragments are a nice way to occasionally break the rules. Just don’t use comma splices, which is the fancy word your 5^th-grade teacher meant when he/she wrote, “run-on sentence,” over and over, down the right margin of your essay.

The English language is beautiful and complex, but it can also be a little daunting if the rules don’t come naturally to you. Take the time to relearn some of the rules you may have forgotten. Your readers will appreciate it, and there will be more of them!

About the Author: Debra Brenegan is the author of Shame the Devil (aff link), a historical account of nineteenth-century American writer Fanny Fern. Debra is also an English and Women’s Studies professor at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri.