Your Own Words
If you have a language question, where do you go for the answer? How do you keep proper syntax from sounding stiff, and, on the other hand, how do you keep conversational language from being embarrassingly incorrect?

Barbara Wallraff, the author of The Atlantic's Word Court column, offers answers to these crucial questions. On one level, Your Own Words is a guide to using and understanding language references—dictionaries, thesauruses, stylebooks, usage guides, grammars, writing guides, and the Internet—with emphasis on how the different kinds of resources can help you answer different kinds of questions.

On a deeper level, however, Your Own Words is about how to make good form your own. It helps you turn these various, often contradictory references into the tools that every experienced and confident user of language needs.In the world of language commentary, Barbara Wallraff offers an unequaled combination of authority, accessibility, and popularity. Her book shows you how to develop a genuine style that's both correct and personal–a style that expresses you at your best. Illuminated throughout with anecdotes and selections from the Word Court columns, Your Own Words does what very few books on usage even attempt: It shows every reader—amateur, professional, student, or graduate—how to think about what goes into good style.

"I think her judgment is flawless. I never disagree with her." —Jack Miles, author of God: A Biography
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Your Own Words
If you have a language question, where do you go for the answer? How do you keep proper syntax from sounding stiff, and, on the other hand, how do you keep conversational language from being embarrassingly incorrect?

Barbara Wallraff, the author of The Atlantic's Word Court column, offers answers to these crucial questions. On one level, Your Own Words is a guide to using and understanding language references—dictionaries, thesauruses, stylebooks, usage guides, grammars, writing guides, and the Internet—with emphasis on how the different kinds of resources can help you answer different kinds of questions.

On a deeper level, however, Your Own Words is about how to make good form your own. It helps you turn these various, often contradictory references into the tools that every experienced and confident user of language needs.In the world of language commentary, Barbara Wallraff offers an unequaled combination of authority, accessibility, and popularity. Her book shows you how to develop a genuine style that's both correct and personal–a style that expresses you at your best. Illuminated throughout with anecdotes and selections from the Word Court columns, Your Own Words does what very few books on usage even attempt: It shows every reader—amateur, professional, student, or graduate—how to think about what goes into good style.

"I think her judgment is flawless. I never disagree with her." —Jack Miles, author of God: A Biography
15.95 In Stock
Your Own Words

Your Own Words

by Barbara Wallraff
Your Own Words

Your Own Words

by Barbara Wallraff

Overview

If you have a language question, where do you go for the answer? How do you keep proper syntax from sounding stiff, and, on the other hand, how do you keep conversational language from being embarrassingly incorrect?

Barbara Wallraff, the author of The Atlantic's Word Court column, offers answers to these crucial questions. On one level, Your Own Words is a guide to using and understanding language references—dictionaries, thesauruses, stylebooks, usage guides, grammars, writing guides, and the Internet—with emphasis on how the different kinds of resources can help you answer different kinds of questions.

On a deeper level, however, Your Own Words is about how to make good form your own. It helps you turn these various, often contradictory references into the tools that every experienced and confident user of language needs.In the world of language commentary, Barbara Wallraff offers an unequaled combination of authority, accessibility, and popularity. Her book shows you how to develop a genuine style that's both correct and personal–a style that expresses you at your best. Illuminated throughout with anecdotes and selections from the Word Court columns, Your Own Words does what very few books on usage even attempt: It shows every reader—amateur, professional, student, or graduate—how to think about what goes into good style.

"I think her judgment is flawless. I never disagree with her." —Jack Miles, author of God: A Biography

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781582432830
Publisher: Catapult
Publication date: 03/09/2005
Edition description: Reprint
Pages: 292
Product dimensions: 5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

Barbara Wallraff, a senior editor and the back-page "Word Court" and "Word Fugitives" columnist for The Atlantic, has worked for the magazine since 1983. In the world of language commentary, Barbara offers an unequaled combination of authority, accessibility, and popularity. Besides her work for The Atlantic, she is a weekly syndicated columnist for King Features. She is the author of the nationally best-selling book Word Court and Your Own Words.

What People are Saying About This

Eric Schlosser

Anyone who cares passionately about writing should read this book. Words matter, and there's no expert on their proper usage more enlightening or more charming than Barbara Wallraff.
—(Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation and Reefer Madness)

P.J. O'Rourke

I write for a living, but my spelling, my grammar, and my sense of whether there should be a comma before the conjunction at the end of this series are sketchy. Thus Barbara Wallraff is invaluable. She also knows why invaluable means 'priceless' when if I were writing dictionaries, both words would mean 'free.' Plus she understands the subjunctive mood.
—(P.J. O'Rourke, author of Give War a Chance and Eat the Rich)

Christina Schwarz

At last, the secret handshake revealed! Clever, tart and even a bit sly, Barbara Wallraff is the ideal guide for those who wish to say exactly what they mean.
—(Christina Schwarz, author of Drowning Ruth)

Dr. Eric Schmidt

Dr. Eric Schmidt, Chairman & CEO, Google Inc.
Clearly, the World Wide Web has spawned a linguistic tour de force. The powerful insights and pragmatic approach of Your Own Words make it the perfect guide to this new networked world.

Bryan A. Garner

If you like thoroughgoing good sense and a light touch backed up with solid scholarship, you'll relish Barbara Wallraff's approach to language. She's a virtuoso. And in these pages she'll teach you how to achieve your own brand of virtuosity.
—(Bryan A. Garner, author of Garner's Modern American Usage)

Glenn Mott

Barbara Wallraff has given us a bestiary of English usage. Your Own Words suggests Edward Gorey in type, revealing the ghastly tinies and grisly goings-on that our language fears are made of. Wallraff reminds us that language itself is exceedingly, delightfully peculiar, and getting more so.
—(Glenn Mott, Managing Editor, King Features Syndicate)

Bill Walsh

Barbara Wallraff has long been a great source of answers. In Your Own Words, she provides a compelling look at the answers behind the answers.
—(Bill Walsh, author of The Elephants of Style and Lapsing Into a Comma)

Justin Kaplan

Your Own Words is Barbara Wallraff's Universal Guide to (Almost) Everything Verbal. It tells you how to look things up, which authorities to put your trust in, where to find what you need to know, and how to put into words what you have to say with a minimum of confusion. Her book is useful, entertaining, and full of surprises.
—(Justin Kaplan, editor of Bartlett's Familiar Quotations and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain)

Margaret Mahan

Margaret Mahan, former managing editor, University of Chicago Press
With courtesy, patience, and humor, Wallraff provides sensible answers to bothersome questions, never disrespecting (see page 16-thanks for that one!) her questioners.

Anita Diamant

Barbara Wallraff is my language and grammar guru; she ought to be yours, too.
—(Anita Diamant, author of The Red Tent and Pitching My Tent)

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