BEST GUIDE TO WRITING STYLE

H
Haarlem habeas corpus Haberdashers Askes School haemorrhage hail hale half Halloween The Hague Halleys comet haloes hangar hanged Hapsburg hara-kiri harass having said that he head hearing-impaired heraldry herculean heuristics hiccough means solving problems through trial and error; a word used by consultants and generally avoidable for public consumptions the Oxford English Dictionary implies this spelling was a genteelism or pedantic attempt to reinterpret the etymology of the word in the 17th century, should be abandoned as a mere error, and we should revert to the ancient spelling hiccup which is indeed now generally accepted highfaluting high flyer hike Hindi hindrance hippie historic hitchhiker hoard Hobsons choice is a stash, pile or hidden store; horde is a rabble or crowd means no choice at all and derives a Cambridge ostler called Thomas Hobson who hired horses in rotation so the customer could take the one in the stable next to the door or go without, so it does not mean the lesser of two evils; the play with that title was by Harold Brighouse for a 1960s-style drop-out, hippy possibly for somebody with ample hips is for something that is part of or makes history (signing Magna Carta was a historic act); something that derives from or describes events in history is historical (Georgette Heyer wrote historical novels) means a walk or ramble, and not an increase (as in prices) is one of the main languages of India; Hindu is a follower of the Hinduism religion (can be used without the final g) means absurdly pompous, bombastic behaviour or speech of uncertain etymology is itself a touch pretentious with tinges of inverse snobbery, so best avoided generally a meaningless space filler so avoid; if you mean but, say but as a pronoun denoting both genders goes back to the dawn of the English language; political correctness should not force a change when the alternative entails using they as if it referred to a singular or he/she not head up, to indicate the senior person of an organisation is flabby political correctness, say deaf or hard of hearing has its own language which is a quagmire for the innocent: coats of arms consist of shield and a crest, and the whole of it is referred to as an achievement is where they park aircraft; hanger is for clothes is for people, hung is for game or pictures not Habsburg is the spelling for term in vulgar Japanese for ritual suicide by self-disembowelment; the polite Japanese term for it is seppuku is the correct spelling, bleed is the preferred word is the greeting and ice falling from clouds means healthy more than halved may be correct but is confusing so it is better to say less than half; half-hearted, halftrack, half brother, half size; half-baked, half-cocked, half-hour, half-life, half-moon, half-truth, half-mast needs the apostrophe requires the definite article is in Holland, Harlem in New York a writ demanding of the appearance in court of a detained person, to establish whether detention is legal if the phrase is used it will almost certainly require a brief explanation

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hoi polloi -holic

is Greek for the populace or rabble and does not require the definite article (hoi is the Greek for the); the phrase is itself also usually pretentious and unnecessary since there are several adequate English words for it is not a suffix indicating addiction (shopaholic, chocaholic etc) and its use as such is sloppy and increasingly clichd; worse still, it is a woolly acceptance of the excuse that some conduct is not the fault of the perpetrator but of an addiction over which there is no control the modern equivalent of the devil made me do it

holocaust

originally meant completely burnt; figuratively a complete or large-scale sacrifice, and thence to widespread destruction or great slaughter; hence the Nazi killing of Jews during World War Two is just one example of many holocausts in this last sense; it is however so emotionally loaded and often tied to Nazi atrocities only so seek a less grandiose alternative

homogeneous homosexual Hong Kong Hoover hopefully

having consistent parts; homogenous means having a common originator applies to both men and women, so do not write homosexuals and lesbians; homosexual men and women is all right; avoid the label gay two words is a trade name and requires the initial capital refers to a state of mind meaning full of hope (he travelled hopefully); when used as a sentence adverb to indicate an opinion of events (hopefully we will win as opposed to sadly we lost), the principal objection is not that it is misused, ambiguous or left dangling - though all three of those are true - but that it is a weasely way of avoiding authorship of the thought. Technically it is a modal auxiliary misapplied - it does not modify the words it is intended to. Hopefully I shall catch the 10 oclock train, means I shall catch the 10 oclock train in a hopeful state of mind, not that with luck I shall catch it (a better way of phrasing it). There are many other similar usages of such words which are less ambiguous and so generate less heat, eg presumably, apparently, admittedly. If for no other reason however than that many people agree with Philip Howard that is ambiguous and obscure as well as illiterate and ugly it is best to avoid the incorrect usage of hopefully. It is thought to have crept into the language through emigrant Germans in America misapplying their native word hopfendlich

horde horse riding hostile bid hotel hotelier humorist hung huntsman hurricane

disorderly mob; do not confuse with hoard avoid, use just riding on its own is a misnomer: the bidder is friendly enough to want to own the other company, but the target of the approach is the one that is hostile; so it might be best to say the bid has been rejected or unwanted the h has been aspirated for over 150 years hence a hotel, not an hotel runs a hotel is the word for things like pictures; hanged is used for the execution of people is the paid hunt servant, the rest are members of the hunt in foxhunting in America hunting is used to describe shooting game is a wind of great force in the Caribbean and eastern United States which others call a cyclone; meteorological offices give tropical storms the male and female names in alphabetical sequence so these get capital letters: Hurricane Katrina. but they are still it and not he or she

hyena hygiene hyperbole hyperinflation hyphens hypothesis exaggeration means very rapidly rising prices; just how rapidly is a matter of debate but many reckon over 20% as an annual rate may qualify, some say over 25% do not inflate the emotions by overemphasis see entry for punctuation starts with an aspirated h so preceded by indefinite article a

Copyright 2012- BecketsBest- Best Guide to Writing Style