When to Capitilise - Proper Nouns etc

[shaunk]

Being drawn upon frequently to write documents for the Business sector, I am quite often puzzled as to when it is appropriate to capitilise a word.
For instance, should I capitilise the first letters of analyst programmer ?
When should I capitilise proper nouns etc
When is it appropriate to italicise.

These and a host of other questions keep me awake at night.

 

[Dimandja]

Just because your job title is Analyst Programmer doesn't mean you are doing an analyst programmer job.

I italicise in order to avoid using single quotes, or to emphasize, or to lift a word out of a phrase. There are no specific rules to italics that I know of. Except one: do not overdo them, because they are harder to read than non-italics text.

 

[SF0751]

Common nouns are not capitalized, proper nouns are. See this Wikipedia article for more information.

Susan
"People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character."
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)

 

[SQLSister]

Overcapitalization runs rampant in the business writing.

Proper nouns are those items which refer to a specific name - a person, a place, a company or department in a company, software packages. This gets confusing because some words can be used both as a specific name and in a general sense. So you can properly refer to the Accounting Department or discuss an accounting practice.

The key is that it is a name, not just that it is specific. This gets confusing because sometimes it is a matter of intent that makes the difference as to whether something is being used as a name.

If I talk about the kiosk and there is only one kiosk referred to, yes, I am talking about a specific, but almost no one would think that it was the name of the kiosk. But if I talk about the government, the intent can make a difference. In ordinary writing or discussion, I would normally not capitalize if I refer to the government. But in legal or contractural language, the Government is the specific name I am using to refer to someone who is a party to the contract.

In the original post, Business is capitalized. In this case either Business should be lower case or, if you genuinely are thinking of the Business Sector as the name of a specific entity, both words should be capitalized.

If you are going to create an acronym, the first letters of all the words describing it should be capitalized when you spell them out before your first use of the acronym. (This is something you should do in business writing.)



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[ESquared]

I had a "boss" once who liked to put so many words in "quotes" in his emails that it was almost "silly." He would sometimes ask me for editing or style "advice" on an unsent email and I always "suggested" he limit it to a "max" of two "quote-emphases" per email. To his surprise the result always "flowed" better and by choosing only two, he ended up with a clearer and more forceful presentation for the real points he wanted to make.

I mention this because the Overuse Of Capital Letters can be a Similar Problem, where someone is Emphasizing So Many Words that it becomes Difficult To Read! Any Emphasis Or Intent which was Desired becomes Obscured by all the Extra Capitalization.



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It is better to have honor than a good reputation.
(Reputation is what other people think about you. Honor is what you know about yourself.)

 

[shaunk]

Thankyou all.
That makes things a little clearer, especially the distinction between common and proper nouns.
The wikipedia article on nouns did have me wondering what the collective noun for a group of analyst programmers is ?

 

[SF0751]

We call'em geek programmers.


Susan
"People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character."
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)

 

[JeremyNYC]

Capital letters and quotes should never be used for emphasis. Use ital or bold for that.

---
Jeremy Wallace
METRIX Project Coordinator
Fund for the City of New York

 

[Dimandja]

Capital letters and quotes should never be used for emphasis. Use ital or bold for that.

Are you making up this rule?

When I write longhand, I could manage bold, but italics...

 

[AnotherHiggins]

You can underline.

I'm pretty much with JeremyNYC here. Quotes shouldn't be used for emphasis. They can be employed to indicate sarcasm. But that doesn't belong in formal writing.

I can see using all caps, especially in long hand, to add emphasis. But how often do you write long hand for formal use?

I'm reminded by E²'s story about a "supervisor" who used to send out emails congratulating employees who had received compliments that would read something like,

"Great Job" Sheila!

It seemed more like an insult than anything else.

My name is John, and I approved this post.

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[JeremyNYC]

Dimandja,

No, I'm not making it up. Check the Chicago Manual of Style, Strunk & White's book, or any other well-respected style guide or grammar guide. Capitalization and quotes have very specific uses. Quotes for emphasis are often called "grocer's quotes", poking fun at all the signs that say things like:
"Watermelon"
$2.50 each

This implies that the thing that's being sold is _not_, in fact, a watermelon, just something that is being called a watermelon.

Jeremy

---
Jeremy Wallace
METRIX Project Coordinator
Fund for the City of New York

 

[Dimandja]

JeremyNYC,

I agree that quotes should not be abused.

I was a little taken aback by your unquoted quotation. You should attribute any quoted material, so as to avoid multiple posts to search for where it came from.

 

[donutman]

Capital letters and quotes should never be used for emphasis. Use ital or bold for that.

NEVER is a pretty strong word. Before the advent of word processors, caps was the fastest way to get the job done and consequently often used for that purpose by us illiterates.
-Karl

[red] Cursors, triggers, user-defined functions and dynamic SQL are an axis of evil![/red]
[green]Life's uncertain...eat dessert first...www.deerfieldbakery.com[/green]

 

[GwydionM]

Quotes mean either than someone else said it, or that the thing described is different from the word's normal meaning. Saying your helpful comments is praise whereas your "helpful" comments is an insult.

Worth reading Eats, Shoots & Leaves for a sensible guide to good use of punctuation.

------------------------------
A view from the UK

 

[ESquared]

There's a whole thread in this forum about that book. Evidently, the author does get a lot of things right but also makes a fair number of mistakes.

-------------------------------------
It is better to have honor than a good reputation.
(Reputation is what other people think about you. Honor is what you know about yourself.)