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Focusing on Words
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Subscription-based site for vocabulary development, showcasing the Latin and Greek roots of English words.
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11 Rules of Writing
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Concise guide to some of the most frequently violated rules of writing, punctuation, and grammar.
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WordWizard
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Portal for word lovers. Learn about word meanings, slang, quotations, insults, and famous authors. Wordwizard offers a round trip across the English language.
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Bartleby.com: Strunk's Element of Style (1918)
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For use in English courses in which the practice of composition is combined with the study of literature. It aims to give in brief space the principal requirements of plain English style.
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Writing For Multimedia
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Michael Butzgy's style guide for multimedia.
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Cliche Finder
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Special tool word-searches 3,300 cliches.
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Cliche
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List of 2000 English cliches with some statistical and literary notes on their use.
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Paradigm Online Writing Assistant
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Help in discovering, organizing, revising, and editing informal, thesis, argumentative, and exploratory essays.
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Online Classes in Rhetoric, University of Minnesota
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The University of Minnesota offers a number of Internet correspondence courses in rhetoric. Sign up here.
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Rhetorical Figures
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From alliteration to zeugma, and everything in between, all the figures of speech are here.
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Word Fugitives
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An interactive column by The Atlantic's Barbara Wallraff. Discovers needs in our language and recommends new words to fill them.
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Word Lab
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A message board where you can request and brainstorm unique words, names, titles, coinages, puns, phrases, slogans and slang.
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Cliche Site
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Clichés, sayings or phrases listed with definitions and explanations. Clichés are organized by subject and alphabetically and you can use the search function.
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The Tongue Untied
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Grammar, punctuation and style for journalists.
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Modern Language Association
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The Modern Language Association is the official guide to non-fiction writing. The site includes a guide to MLA style.
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Good Grammar, Good Style
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Articles and answers to frequently asked questions about grammar, mechanics, and style. Links and bibliography.
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Guide to Grammar and Style
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The information ranges from copy editing to elements of style to discussions. Practical information about the writing craft.
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The Book of Cliches
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A compilation of common phrases, euphemisms, and rationales for times of trouble. Organized by occasion.
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The Word Centre
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Consulting firm dedicated to training businesses to use plain English. Free newsletter and professional editing services.
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NoodleBib - The MLA Bibliography Composer
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A free tool to create, edit, and save your MLA-style bibliography online, then publish it to a Web page, email it, or save it as RTF and open it in Microsoft Word.
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SoYouWanna Avoid Common Writing Errors
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We compiled a list of the most common writing errors people tend to make. This is not a primer on grammar or essay-writing. This is a checklist of things which you might well do and which you must stop doing.
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E-dition: Dictionary of Concise Writing
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A look at word usage in popular culture. The Dictionary of Concision is a complete manual of several thousand wordy phrases.
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Grammar Slammer
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This help file indexes style and usage, capitalization, abbreviations, punctuation, letter writing, common mistakes and a grammar glossary.
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Common Errors in English
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Catalogue of writing or speaking mistakes and easily confusable words, with corrections.
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Plain English Campaign
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An independent group fighting for plain English in public communication. We oppose gobbledygook, jargon and legalese.
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Bartleby.com: The Columbia Guide to Standard American English
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Kenneth G. Wilson's handbook includes descriptive and prescriptive examples with hyperlinked cross-references.
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Top20Composition.com
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Online directory for grammar, spelling, punctuation, research, creative writing, and proofreading resources.
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Dr. NAD's Prig Page.
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Tests of usage, built interactively.
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Guides for Better Science Writing
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Bibliography of style manuals for scientific research, writing, and presentation. Guides for biology, medicine, chemistry, engineering, geology, and mathematics.
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Macedon's Taberna: The Craft of Writing
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Commentary on various technical aspects of writing: the nuts and bolts of narrative.
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That's Right Words
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Articles about grammar information and hints. New Zealand site. Errs on the side of "correctness," not that of modern usage.
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The Sports Cliche List
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A large, searchable collection of sports cliches, lingo, and jargon.
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Deadwood Phrases
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Prune the deadwood phrases from your writing. Site lists the worst from A to Z.
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Linguistic Phenomena/Devices
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A list of lesser-known features in English writing. Hendiadys, holonyms, and hypernyms.
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Frequently Asked Questions about English
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Answers to common questions about usage, style, grammar and punctuation.
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Words, Words, and More Words
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Discussions and articles concerning words.
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The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing
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Popular, award-winning online writing guide. Authoritative help with research, style, structure, major citation styles, mechanics, and revision.
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Suite 101: Communications Skills
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Archive of articles covering writing and speaking skills, with emphasis on clear communication, basic design, communicating with international and multicultural audiences.
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CBC News: Words, Woe & Wonder
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An in-depth look at the words we use from CBC News.
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Suite101: English Grammar and Style
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Archive of articles about English grammar and style.
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Exploring English
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An online tutorial for the parts of speech with style notes for the English Language.
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A.Word.ADay
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The music and magic of words. This is the website for the mailing list A.Word.A.Day (AWAD), which sends a vocabulary word and its definition to the subscribers every day.
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The Wonderful Writing Skills Unhandbook
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An interactive site that uses the writing process to teach writing skills.
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Pseudo Dictionary
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The dictionary for words that wouldn't make it into dictionaries.
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Verbage
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If you are looking for just the right word, you may find it here. If not, you can suggest your own.
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AskOxford.com
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For questions on English grammar, spelling, and usage. Search a dictionary of words, names or quotations.
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Language Wrangler
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Provocative essays on word usage, writing ideas and style.
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Glossarist.com
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A searchable directory of thousands of glossaries and topical dictionaries containing terms and definitions on hundreds of subjects.
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Plain Language Action Network
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Promoting clearer communication between the public and government. This site has resources for writers to attain that goal.
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The Philosophy of Punctuation
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Paul Robinson's classic essay on periods, commas, semicolons, dashes.
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How to Write an Explication
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Step-by-step directions to writing an explication. Good and bad examples provided.
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Phrases Thesaurus
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A generator of headlines and copy for journalists. Enter a word and the database is searched to provide a list of phrases related to that word.
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Word Quests
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Word lists that provide thematic units of English words derived from Latin and Greek sources.
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Yale Style Manual
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For the design of Web pages and Web sites. Covers graphic and information design, page layout, Web graphics, site organization, navigation, and Web multimedia content.
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Wordiness
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A list of words and phrases to purge from your writing.
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A Research Guide for Students
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How to write research papers, and do presentations. Virtual library of links arranged by Dewey Decimal Classification.
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NLRB Style Manual
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A guide for legal writing in plain English.
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Garbl's Editorial Style Manual
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Provides advice on abbreviations, capitalization, grammar, numbers, plurals, possessives, punctuation, spelling and word usage.
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World Wide Words
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Explores the history, evolution byways, quirks, and curiosities of the English language. New and recent words and phrases are often featured, as are books on aspects of English. A weekly newsletter is sent by e-mail and RSS.
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SecretariesUSA.com
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Reference for the home and corporate office, including capitalization, punctuation, spelling, grammar, sentence structure, forms of address, abbreviations, letter styles, and business forms.
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Findaphrase.com
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Free phrase database to help journalists, copywriters and content editors search common phrases.
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Einfoweb: Punctuation and Grammar
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Help on punctuation and another page on grammar.
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Crazy Colour Writing Skills Handbook
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Includes useful tips to help your spelling including homophones, words often misspelled, a dictionary search, an introduction to fingerspelling. Grammar, spelling and writing style guide.
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Wordelizer
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Delve deeply into a word or subject. Quick search of several word and language related sites.
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The Visual Thesaurus
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An exploration of sense relationships within the English language. By clicking on words, you follow a thread of meaning, creating a spatial map of linguistic associations.
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Society for the Preservation of English Language and Literature
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Bimonthly publication, SPELL/Binder, contains articles on grammar, usage, word origins, and other subjects of interest to language lovers.
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Writer's Dreamtools
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A series of useful tools to enhance writers' and students' creativity, spark ideas and fight writer's block.
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Ewriting
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Easy to learn electronic writing style that will speed up email and online chatroom discussions.
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Correct Punctuation
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A brief guide to correct English punctuation.
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The Well Bred Sentence
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This book offers an intensive course in sentence construction and punctuation.
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Braintique: The Natural Way to Write
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A process and system for helping people become better writers. The site includes exercises, examples, and information about descriptive writing and metaphors.
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Ralph's Manual of Style
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A guide to style, grammar, usage, and more by a guy named Ralph.
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Lingo Factory
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A cooperative effort to coin useable terms and then trick people into using them regularly as though they are real words.
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Tribe: Words of Power
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For people who love words, use them, feel them in their mouths as flavorful bursts of energy. This is the tribe for fun with words and receptive learning.
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Tribe: Word Freaks
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Group for people who love discussing words and writing style.
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Tribe: Linguistics
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Group for discussions of words and language.
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Word Rogues
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Tips on writing, English, and grammar. This site also contains active community college English syllabii and links to other writing, grammar sites.
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The Word Nerds
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A weekly podcast about words, language, and why we say the things we do.
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Verbivore
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Richard Lederer's page, with contact information and a handful of his language-loving articles.
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Just Language
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A casual and contemporary look at how we humans communicate with each other both at home and abroad.
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Guide to Grammar and Writing
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Digital handouts on grammar and English usage. From subject-verb agreement and use of articles to exercises in parallel structures and argumentative essays. You can submit questions about grammar and writing.
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The Archive of Endangered, Special, or Fun Words
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Writing about and classifying words and language.
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Slang City
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Writing about American slang.
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AllInfoAbout: English Language
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Lessons and information about everything related to English as it is used around the world.
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Web Typography
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The elements of typographic style applied to the web.
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Ask Oxford
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Word of the Day, Quote of the Week, and several word games. In addition, there is a question form to Ask the Experts and receive the Final Word on English language questions.
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Literary Terms / Rhetorical Devices
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"A Glossary of Literary Terms and A Handbook of Rhetorical Devices including an Introduction and a Self Test."
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World Wide Words
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More than 1400 pages which explore the history, evolution, byways, quirks, and curiosities of the English language. A weekly newsletter is sent by e-mail and RSS.
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Common Errors in English
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Clear and concise explanation of the difference between correct and incorrect usage in American English spelling, grammar and idiom, with entertaining examples.
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Society for the Preservation of English Language and Literature (SPELL)
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An organization of people determined to resist the abuse and misuse of English in the news media and elsewhere.
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Modern Language Association (MLA)
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Nonprofit membership organization that promotes the study and teaching of language and literature. Includes bibliography, style guide, job board.
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Wordlab
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Creating meaningful names from ordinary words.
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Secretaries USA
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Reference for the home and corporate office, including capitalization, punctuation, spelling, grammar, sentence structure, forms of address, abbreviations, letter styles, business forms, and metric conversions.
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Yale Web Style Guide
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A manual covering graphic and information design, page layout, graphics, site navigation, and multimedia content.
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Glossary of Rhetorical Terms
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Rhetorical figures that come with examples. From the Classics Department at the University of Kentucky.
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NLRB Style Manual
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A guide for legal writing in plain English.
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Society for the Preservation of English Language and Literature
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Bimonthly publication, SPELL/Binder, contains articles on grammar, usage, word origins, and other subjects of interest to language lovers.
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Plain English Campaign
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Dedicated to the destruction of gobbledygook, legalese, small print and bureaucratic language. Crystal Mark Award for good use of plain English.
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Richard Lederer's Verbivore
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Covers wordplay and puns plus his works, analyses of language and links. Invites email on the subjects.
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Guide to Grammar and Writing
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Contains scores of digital handouts on grammar and English usage, computer-graded quizzes, and recommendations on writing in various issues. [Acrobat Reader, sound card, and PowerPoint recommended but not required.]
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11 Rules of Writing
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A concise guide to some of the most frequently violated rules of writing, punctuation, and grammar.
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The MLA Bibliography Composer
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Free service that simplifies the process of creating and editing MLA-style bibliographies.
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Paradigm Online Writing Assistant
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Offers step-by-step tips for various writing assignments. Includes organizing, editing, rewriting, documenting, and help for specific types of essays.
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Common Errors in English
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An explanation of common English usage errors and how to avoid making them.
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Deadwood Phrases
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Offers a list of alternatives to common deadwood phrases to help make writing clearer.
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Plain English Campaign
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Working internationally to try to get public information written in plain English, instead of using gobbledygook, jargon and legalese. Includes examples, with annual awards for the worst offenders.
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Right Words
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A series of short articles about grammar and punctuation, with light hearted examples of common mistakes.
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Cliche Finder
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A searchable database of overused expressions, with a fun feature creating a random list.
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The Sports Cliche List
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A searchable collection of cliches used by American teams, fans, coaches and commentators, with humorous comments and sound clips.
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Plain Language
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A guide to help writers avoid confusing language and long-windedness. Can be viewed online or downloaded as a PDF.
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Beverly Lucey: Language Wrangler
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Beverly Lucey's articles on education, marriage, society, consumers, politics, media, and language. Playful and serious work.
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Phrases Thesaurus
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A resource for writers. Enter a single word and it will return a list of phrases and sayings that are related to the word in some way. In English.
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The Glossarist
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Searchable directory of glossaries and topical dictionaries containing terms and definitions on hundreds of subjects.
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Focusing on Words
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An advanced Latin-Greek-English vocabulary source of etymologies with thematic units of roots, prefixes, and suffixes, and vocabulary quizzes.
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World Wide Words
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Michael Quinion writes about International English from a British viewpoint. Hundreds of pages on the history, origins, evolution and idiosyncrasies of English, with features on new words and words in the news.
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Word Quests for Word Seekers
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Searchable dictionary of word origins, organized in cross-referenced thematic lists by Latin and/or Greek roots. English entries are also defined.
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Richard Lederer's Verbivore
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Linguistic fun from, Richard Lederer, the best-selling author of The Word Circus and the new Sleeping Dogs Don't Lay, a helpful guide for grappling with vexing grammar questions.
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AskOxford.com
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For questions on English grammar, spelling, and usage; to search a dictionary of words, names or quotations; for help with writing; for crosswords and puzzles.
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