Donna Richoux wrote on 17 Jan 2005: OK, your question is getting clearer. But to ask ... think your teachers or texts have identified a useful generalization. How is this useful, Donna? Please provide a context in which your response makes sense

How "fake" does something have to be to be considered ... stopping just this side of banning all contractions in writing As the man who coined "eye dialect," linguist George P. Krapp, put it, in eye dialect, "the

How "fake" does something have to be to be considered eye dialect? Some 'lists' i've seen online are very zealous, stopping just this side of banning all contractions in writing As the man who coined "eye dialect,"

I would argue that is a common pronunciation spelling ... of . All three dictionaries add the usage label "informal." Being mentioned in anybody's dictionary doesn't stop this kind of nonsense from being nonsense (as, I'm

Remember Guns N' Roses? I'm not sure that it is wise to justify one's punctuation by citing thename of a rock 'n' roll band. Actually, the fact that the apostrophe is after the N might indicate that it is a contraction for

Over the holidays I ate at the chain restaurant Carlos'N Charlie's. Shouldn't that 'N be an 'N'? Yes, and it shouldn't be capitalized. Remember Guns N' Roses? http://www.cncaustin.com/calendar.asp

Over the holidays I ate at the chain restaurant Carlos'N Charlie's. Shouldn't that 'N be an 'N'? Yes, and it shouldn't be capitalized. Remember Guns N' Roses? I'm not sure that it is wise to justify one's

Over the holidays I ate at the chain restaurant Carlos'N Charlie's. Shouldn't that 'N be an 'N'? Yes, and it shouldn't be capitalized. Remember Guns N' Roses? http://www.cncaustin.com/calendar.asp

Jack Hird: The basic answer is that there isn't an established standard term for this; even though personal names like McGee have been around for a long time, people used to be satisfied with just saying where the capital letters were.

(Replying to a post by Raymond S. Wise) I'd say this qualifies as a perfect example of stipulating definitions so that you can call anything anything you want ... language, which we categorically imperatively reject. Franke: EFL teacher &