Common Grammar Mistakes

(and how to avoid them)

Grammar may sound boring, but if you want to be taken seriously, you can't afford to make many mistakes. Here's a list of problems we've found are common, as well as easy explanations and solutions.

Double Negatives
Quotation Marks
Parenthesis

Communication
Planning to Write
Proofreading
The 8 parts of speech

Tips for Perfect English
A tongue-in-cheek guide
Common mistakes and how to avoid them

Double Negatives

Two negatives cancel each other out.

I'm ~~not~~ gong to no zoo = I'm going to the zoo
I ~~don't~~ have no money = I have money.

Some words you might forget count as negative:

nor
just
but
ever
quite
almost
merely
scarcely
only
nearly

Quotation marks (" ")
Quotation marks are used to show something someone else said. They are used extensively in written conversations, for one thing. But where do you put them? After the period (or comma, or whatever), or before it?

Periods (.) & Commas (,)

Always put these before the ending of the quotation marks.

Examples:
"We are going now."
"We are going now," he said.

Question marks (?) & Exclamation marks (!)

Put these before the ending of the quotation marks only if the question mark or exclamation mark is part of the quote. If the punctuation mark is not part of the quote, it is placed after the ending of the quotation marks. The same thing goes for colons and semicolons.

Examples:
Then she asked me, "Are we going now?" and I told her to wait.
Did she tell you to "Wait outside"?

Single quotation (‘')

A single quotationis used for a quote inside a double quotation.

Examples:
Then she told me "Mary, if you're going to let Janice take Bill to that ‘swanky' restaurant without me, then you've got a surprise coming."
Jane cried "Then Mary said to me 'I hate you Jane' and I was so upset!"

If you're quoting a number of paragraphs, start each with an opening quotation mark, but only close the quotations at the end of the last paragraph.

Parenthesis [ () ]

Punctuation marks go after the parenthesis if they are part of the sentence, and inside the parenthesis if they are part of that phrase.

Examples:
Then the turtle (slowly, surely, and steadily) crossed the finish line.
Well if she thinks that (and she does), then she's stupider than she looks.
I took my toys home (Tim didn't want them anymore).

Sources
Click here for a list of sources used in this project.
Glossary
All the words in bold are found in the Glossary. If you don't understand a word, click on the beside it, to go directly to the Glossary Page.
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