65 research outputs found
Index to Tenielle Fordyce-Ruff\u27s Advocate Articles
No full textThis document functions as an index to help readers to navigate Professor Fordyce-Ruff\u27s Advocate column articles better
My Inbox: Follow-Up Advice for Readers
No full textForsdyce-Ruff answers readers\u27 questions about dashes and colons; en dashes, em dashes, and hyphens; serial commas; sentences beginning with conjunctions; and sentences beginning with \u27hopefully.\u2
Three Tips for Concise Writing
No full textI\u27m just wrapping up the first unit of my legal writing class. During this time every year, I introduce my students to the 4 C\u27s-four characteristics that should be present in every legal document.\u27 Yes, every legal document should be clear, correct, complete, and concise.
In our class, we emphasize these principles repeatedly. All legal writers should strive to attain the 4 C\u27s. To that end, this month I offer some tips for concision. After all, I don\u27t know anyone who isn\u27t a little too wordy in the first draft.
Let\u27s look at three tips to remove wordiness that I have not previously covered: using possessives, omitting redundancy, and removing ostentatious, abstruse, and infrequently used words. [excerpt
Back to Basics II: Parts of Speech
No full textIn English, we classify words into eight parts of speech: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection. These classifications are based on how a word functions within a sentence, not necessarily on the word itself. Think about the last time you looked up a word in a dictionary— remember how a single word could be both a noun and an adverb, for instance....
When a word trips you up as you write or edit a sentence, you just might have a problem with its usage as that part of speech. So, we will look briefly at each of the eight parts of speech to help you understand how the words on your page are functioning. [excerpt
Laughing All the Way to Court: Avoiding the Humor and Headaches Created by Misplaced Modifiers
No full textModifiers can create unintended humor, or hurl unintended insults, when we forget that they need to be near the word they modify and let them drift [elsewhere]. [excerpt
Odds and Ends: My Inbox Part II
No full textOne of the joys of writing this column is hearing from my readers. Every month a loyal Advocate reader contacts me. Some just let me know about a topic they particularly enjoyed. Others, though, ask for advice or answers to specific questions.
This month, I’ve decided to share some of the tips, tricks, and answers that have gone out to individuals. We will look at when e-editing isn’t particularly helpful, combating verbosity, using numbers correctly, and how to correctly identify a nickname. [excerpt
Typography Matters: Document Design
No full textThis month, I am turning to what I hope is [a] ... helpful topic: document design. Sit back and enjoy learning more about spaces after periods, cueing devices, point size, justification, and paragraph breaks. [excerpt
A Pro\u27s Woe: Overcoming Writer\u27s Block in a Hurry
No full textEven though attorneys spend much of their lives writing, we are not immune to writer’s block. Some of us have triedand- true methods for overcoming these slumps, but even then there might be times when the go-to trick that has worked in the past fails to put words on the page.
So for this month we are going to look at some tips for overcoming even the worst episodes of writer’s block. [excerpt
Alphabet Soup: More Confusing Word Pairs
No full textI’m writing this over my Spring Break. By the time you read this, the weather will be lovely, but today it’s classically blustery. I decided to make soup before sitting down at my computer. Filled with a lovely, warm homemade concoction, I realized that I didn’t have a topic ready to pour out of my head.
So as sometimes happens when I have a bit of writer’s block, my mind began to wander. I remembered lunches of alphabet soup on blustery spring days long before I hit law school (or high school for that matter). And then it hit me—I should write about all the odd ball confusing word pairs that didn’t fit with my letter-themed past columns! [excerpt
Some February Fun: F Words
No full textI’ve wanted to write another column on word pairs for a while. 1 I decided that this month is it. Let’s celebrate the shortest month of the year by looking at “F” words[--first/firstly, farther/further, feign/feint, fictional/fictitious, flair/flare, flammable/inflammable, flaunt/flout, forbear/forebear, founder/flounder, forgo/forego, fortuitous/fortunate]. [excerpt
- …
