Awe:Articles to be written

From Awe

This page is designed only for the Research Team.

(Peter writes:) This is just a list of subjects on which the team can work. There are various categories I have begun, but left on the back burner while I struggle with grammar. (Hint: leave any article approaching the technical side of grammatical language until I have finished that set.)

If you see something here about which you feel competent to write, write about it. That is, produce a draft in an appropriate new page. If you think then it is controversial, let me know specifically, so that I can approve (or improve) your writing. Otherwise, bang it in the Wiki and hope someone else catches any problems, even typos. Please try to research even things you think you know: 'primary education' for example is not the same in all parts of the UK. (I use Wikipedia as a starting point for this; and OED for all matters etymological.

Look in the category UK education system, and follow the links to 'wanted pages' in there. (Sixth Form, 'A' level, GCSE etc; and a whole can of worms around 'comprehensive', including 'comprehension' and prob a disambig page; etc)

Joachim has set up a category for category:Fix IPA, which will be a good thing for people who know IPA to improve for us.

The computerate among us (geeks) should be able to add to the category ICT advice, which is the sort of thing that worries technophobics. Read the text in that category.

Two big groups need to be dealt with - punctuation and spelling rules. Both of these will be easier for those who have taught English, in that the complexities of explaining them are legion (mostly because English has so many exceptions). A rather strange book Understanding English Spelling by Masha Bell may be a suggestive place to start researching the latter. There is now a copy in 'my' office on campus. For punctuation, all usage guides have advice. Look at a lot more than one - and Lynne Truss Eats, Shoots and Leaves is probably too wordy to be a model for us. For punct, use names like 'colon' for the article heading - and redirect from a page with the sign, e.g. :.

Another mechanical job is to write redirect pages for all the items in the Table Abbreviations – Academic, (Latin), and indeed any tables that turn up: unless there is some clever way of wikifying such things.

See also AWE:Words for new articles - a separate page, for ease of access; and to keep looking at it short. A group of them belong to a category which I must think about called category:phrasal verbs (that's phrasal verbs) and possibly a second called category:prepositional verbs (that's prepositional verbs).

Euphemism, as an article and a category.

There is also an SAS leaflet on Academic Writing which needs to be wikified. (Further: this has been done in broad strokes, but the final editing is yet to be done. See leaflets - Academic writing.rtf)

Negatives with 'everybody' (look up 'Term logic' for a possible term to use as an article title). basically, it is unidiomatic to say "Everybody can't swim" in English -- we say "Nobody can swim". (universal negative?)

Do we want an article on the problem of repeated words concealed by abbreviations? "and etc", "PIN number", etc.?

Metrical Feet -- A Lesson for a Boy

Trochee trips from long to short;

From long to long in solemn sort

Slow Spondee stalks, strong foot!, yet ill able

Ever to come up with Dactyl's trisyllable.

Iambics march from short to long.

With a leap and a bound the swift Anapests throng.

One syllable long, with one short at each side,

Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride --

First and last being long, middle short, Amphimacer

Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high-bred Racer.

If Derwent be innocent, steady, and wise,

And delight in the things of earth, water, and skies;

Tender warmth at his heart, with these meters to show it,

With sound sense in his brains, may make Derwent a poet --

May crown him with fame, and must win him the love

Of his father on earth and his father above.

My dear, dear child!

Could you stand upon Skiddaw, you would not from its whole ridge

See a man who so loves you as your fond S.T. Colerige.

	-- Samuel Taylor Coleridge