To learn the history of the English language, I had to take an entire 15-week university course. (And read Baugh’s book shown in the photo here.) But you can get the big picture in an entertaining — if not entirely vetted by experts — way in only 10 minutes.
Enjoy getting fit!
I’m in Seattle at the Association for Business Communication conference. Erin Kane and I will present “Reader Perception of Workplace-Writer Attributes” this afternoon. (Our fellow researchers, Nicole Amare and Alan Manning couldn’t make the trip.) We had more than 600 working adults in the US tell us whether they preferred the more plain or less…
I am a linguist who studies workplace language. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to explain that I don’t speak lots of languages. (The fact that I wish I had learned to earlier in life is a separate issue altogether.)That definition of a linguist is used almost exclusively within government, especially in…
To celebrate my birthday with Pros Write readers, I thought I’d share some of the OTHER interesting things that have happened on March 28. On this date in 1960, when I was born, Time magazine’s cover was devoted to Jacques Cousteau. And a scotch factory in Glasgow exploded, burying 20 fire fighters. It gets worse if you look…
Check it out. The Center for Plain Language just released this 2013 report card for plain writing done by federal agencies. Details are available from their website. Two related media articles appear below. Sure makes me wonder what’s different in the USDA (Dept of Agriculture) and the DOL (Dept of Labor). Related articles The Worst…
Because I am busy preparing the Culverhouse College accreditation documentation for AACSB right now, I couldn’t travel to Waikiki Beach in Hawaii to join the Association for Business Communication (ABC) for the annual convention this week. I am especially sad about this because I am being honored as the winner of the Kitty O. Locker…
It’s the ability to write. I wholeheartedly agree with the author of this piece found on LinkedIn so I’m sharing it with Pros Write readers. Walter Chen uses three mega-successful business leaders to make his point. Ben Horowitz, co-founder of the venture capital company, Andreessen Horowitz; Andrew Grove, former CEO of Intel; Jeff Bezos, CEO of…
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Thanks for stopping by my site and for the kind words. I stumbled upon your site after reading the grammar blog post this week on WordPress. Professionally, I am a writer/editor, and I thought your analysis about how to teach writing was spot-on. Somewhere between journalism (my undergrad major) and good literature, there lies the elusive intersection of art and science that makes clear prose.
Btw, I thoroughly enjoyed this short video as it made me LOL several times. What DID happen to the Jutes, anyway? 😉
I appreciate hearing from folks — especially the ones who agree with me! I’m not sure why the Jutes’ name didn’t take on the same level of importance as the Angles’ and Saxons’ did. I think they might have appeared first — as mercenaries from modern-day Denmark. Maybe there were too few of them. Or maybe they more successfully integrated with other tribes. I’ve read that their most famous leaders, Hengist and Horsa, were actually Angles. Interesting stuff!