The Most Common Usage Problems

Never use language that denigrates people because of their age, gender, race, or physical condition.

• True

• False

Long-winded writing may sound educated and impressive, but it actually turns off your audience because it wastes their time.

• True

• False

Avoid the passive voice because the active voice is stronger and clearer.

• True

• False

A sentence fragment occurs when two complete sentences (“independent clauses”) are incorrectly joined.

• True

• False

Parallel structure means that sentence parts match, singular to singular and plural to plural.

• True

• False

Writers often misspell words because they mispronounce them.

• True

• False

A modifier is said to “dangle” when the word it modifies has been left out of the sentence.

• True

• False

An idiom is a verb ending in -ing. Idioms always have literal meanings.

• True

• False

For a metaphor to be effective, it must compare images or objects that go together.

• True

• False

Accidently is spelled correctly.

• True

• False