Tuesday 19 January 2010

Grammar: Double Talk Over and Over Again


Each and every writer in the whole wide world, really truly have the problem of double talking over and over in their writing. The reason is because writers first start writing as beginners and the end result is double talk.

In conversation we double talk a lot, so if we write how we speak...



What are some common usages?

first time ever
return again
completely destroyed
revert back
usual customs
rock back and forth
month of June
advance warning
true fact
rarely ever
important essentials
tuna fish
free gift
small in size
red in color
few in number
regular routine

Sometimes it's difficult to catch these problems because we use them so often it becomes normal. But, when editing, look for these redundancies.

14 comments:

Sandie lee said...

I Like your Blog :)

Kimberly Franklin said...

Thanks! I'll keep a watch out for these. Great post. : )

Ann Elle Altman said...

Thank you, Sandie.

Kimberly, glad you liked the post. I need to watch these too.

ann

Elspeth Futcher said...

Nice list: here's another - really unique.

Bisi Adjapon said...

Hahahahaha! And how about "free gift"?

Tony Anders said...

Ann Ellen,
Thanks for the follow and I look forward to following your blog as well. I have a completed book and it was professionally edited and I was at first suprosed at the amount of red ink. Live and learn I guess, but these things are helpful. We do indeed write as we speak, but people don't always read as we write. Lol
Tony

http://artisanofthehumanspirit.blogspot.com/

Ann Elle Altman said...

Elspeth, thanks for your comment. You have a really unique name, by the way. I like it. :)

Bisi, I love free gifts. I just laughed so hard at some of these, I say them all the time.

Tony, I will check out your blog. I follow a lot of blogs but I love stopping in at many.

ann

UNAUTHORIZED. said...

It's sad. Yeah, I'm definitely in that boat. LOL I actually find this post really funny because you're right many people do it.


lol. side note, my word verification for this comment was fester. Like Uncle Fester. Mmkay. That was just silly.

Ann Elle Altman said...

Unauthorized, I love when it asks for word verification, what identity would you like. Oooh, I can have more than one identity.

ann

Anonymous said...

Ann,
Cute post!

I will remember this information about redundant double talk again and again, each and every time I write, from here on out, to infinity and beyond!

~ Tina ~

Ann Elle Altman said...

Thanks for commenting. I love your comment.

ann

Anonymous said...

I'm sure I double-talk! In some of these I couldn't even see the double for a moment. :D

Now I have an eerie feeling the above sentence needs editing.

And also this one. :)

Great post!

~ Corra

from the desk of a writer

Ann Elle Altman said...

Corra, your so funny. I'm sure if we wrote half of the ones above, no reader will give it a second thought because we say them so often. But, it's good to watch that we don't use too many of them.

ann

rsw said...

Each and every writer HAS...

each is singular
writer is singular
the "one" is understood in the phrase each and every one