Writing 101 – Em Rule

Dashes – the things you didn’t know you needed to know about Ens, Ems, and hyphens

3 Oct 2026

There’s been a tonne of conversation about em dashes over the last few years, most of it making the connection between using an em dash and content having been generated by AI. But here’s everything you didn’t know about em dashes – and dashes in general – and didn’t know you didn’t know. Hopefully, this … More Dashes – the things you didn’t know you needed to know about Ens, Ems, and hyphens

Remember to use “remember”

30 Nov 2018

How often do you send reminders to people saying “don’t forget x”, “remember y”? There’s some suggestion that our subconscious doesn’t hear the negative “don’t”, so doesn’t retain the following information. I haven’t found research that shows this (do let me know if you find some!) but I have noticed that people respond better to … More Remember to use “remember”

Writing for your audience

17 Oct 2018

Before you start to write, one of the first things you should think about is who your audience is. Who are you writing your document for? Who do you want to read it, and what are their needs? Who Ask yourself if you’re writing for professionals, or for the public. If you’re an engineer, and … More Writing for your audience

‘A historic’ vs ‘an historic’

18 Jul 2018

Why do some people say “an hotel” or “an historic moment”? Have you ever heard someone say this? They’re looking to book “an hotel”, or they consider an event to be “an historic moment”? (there’s an example at about 1.22 on the video in the article An ‘historic moment’ for the Green Party – James … More ‘A historic’ vs ‘an historic’

For example, that is, and etcetera

4 Jul 2018

We see and use the abbreviations ie, eg, and etc in documents so often that we can forget what they really mean and what the purpose of each one is. We all know that ie means ‘that is’, eg means ‘for example’, and etc is short for ‘etcetera’, but aside from using them as a … More For example, that is, and etcetera

Well-known style guides, and what they’re used for

27 Jun 2018

We’ve talked before about what a style guide is, but did you know that there are some famous ones that are used for specific purposes? The Chicago Manual of Style is a style guide for American English, and was started in 1906 by the University of Chicago Press. It’s used by a variety of publishing … More Well-known style guides, and what they’re used for

Using apostrophes for names ending in s

20 Jun 2018

We’ve already talked about apostrophes, and how to use a possessive apostrophe, but what about where someone’s first name ends in an s – like Jules, Thomas, Chris, Ross, Iris, James, Frances, or Charles; or their last name does – like Williams, Isaacs, Roberts, Phillips, and so on. Jules, Jules’, or Jules’s? Where should the … More Using apostrophes for names ending in s

Creating a Word template

6 Dec 2017

Having learned how to format a document using Word styles, you might find it useful to create your own Word templates for different styles of documents you create in your business. Why would you need a template? Having created all the styles for one document (say, a business report), you might decide you’d like to … More Creating a Word template

Creating a Word AutoCorrect

8 Nov 2017

Is there’s a word you’re constantly mistyping, and having to go back and correct? (Perhaps you always mistype the as teh … or maybe that’s just me.) Creating an autocorrect so that Word will correct it for you automatically means you don’t have to fix them up yourself. And remember those macrons we were inserting … More Creating a Word AutoCorrect

Using macrons

3 Nov 2017

Microsoft Word doesn’t make adding macrons to Māori words in your documents a straightforward exercise, or at least it doesn’t feel like one. There’s no key you can just type them in with, and increasingly we’re becoming aware of words that we should have been including macrons on. First of all – what’s a macron? … More Using macrons

Em Rule

Editing and Writing

Category: Writing 101