Should you use a comma before or? The answer depends on how you are using or. Always place a comma before or when it begins an independent clause, but if it begins a dependent clause, don’t. In a series (or list) of three or more items, you can use a comma before or, but this is a preference, not a rule.
People often get muddled about whether to place a comma before conjunctions like and, so, because, and or.
Whether you’re studying for the GRE (Graduate Record Examinations test) or just want to improve your vocabulary, these are ten words you should learn how to use right now.
Replete: filled or well-supplied with something. Our cupboard is replete with canned soup.
Harbinger: A person or thing that foreshadows or foretells the coming of someone or something. Some people believe that crows are harbingers of death.
It’s not a good look, but it happens: for busy, highly caffeinated workers in a deadline-driven world, it’s perilously easy to send an email that reads as callous and unfeeling.
Your humble blogger included, we’ve all been guilty at times, hurriedly mashing “send” and moving on without acknowledging whatever favor or question we’ve imposed upon a trusted colleague or potentially valuable contact.
Today is not going as planned.
A wave of unexpected assignments crashed across your desk this morning, forcing you to skip lunch. You’re feeling grouchy. Then, seeking solace in the breakroom, you discover an overloaded refrigerator shelf has chosen this very moment to collapse. After a terrible crash that surely captured everyone’s attention, you find yourself standing in a pool of broken glass, sorrow, and cold tea.
You know what to call a group of cows or sheep, but do you know the names for groups of animals in the ocean? Why neglect your friends under the sea? Learn which animals congregate in a cast today!
Attention! Most fish swim in schools, but herring swim in armies.
Buried in the sand of the ocean floor or on the beach, you can find a bed of oysters.
A gerund phrase is a phrase consisting of a gerund and any modifiers or objects associated with it. A gerund is a noun made from a verb root plus ing (a present participle). A whole gerund phrase functions in a sentence just like a noun, and can act as a subject, an object, or a predicate nominative.
If you look up the definition of gerund (pronounced JER-und), you will find that it means “an English noun formed from a verb by adding -ing”; that is, a present participle used as a noun.
Even the most hardened grammarians don’t condone capital punishment for grammar offenses, but we do tend to get hung up about hanged. Hanged can only refer to someone’s death by hanging. If you are wondering, “Is it hanged or hung?” establish whether a deadly action has taken place.
It’s one of the few times when grammar becomes a matter of life and death.
Hung is the past tense of to hang when it means “to suspend or be suspended.”
