Welcome to the blog – advice, opinions and musings on how to make words work
An embarrassing mishap befell me during my recent summer break. It happened when I was searching for the bathroom in an unfamiliar West Country pub. Following several signs had led me to a glass door, which was labelled with what I read as the word 'TOILETS' in large,...
I found myself in a strange situation recently – I was approaching a long Zoom call with genuine excitement. It was a webinar by an expert I'd just...
Telling someone they need help with their writing rarely lands well. You may be right. They may even agree with you. But they'll still probably feel...
One of the biggest dangers of relying on AI writing bots is perhaps not the most obvious. It’s not that what they produce is inferior to human...
Most of us don't like the way we look in photos. We wince slightly when we glance at a picture that includes us. Despite how it might feel, though,...
Let's start out with a quick question. Look at the line on the left in the image below. Which one on the right do you think is most similar: A, B or...
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Much of what we write often sails way over our readers’ heads. The problem is that we take our own knowledge for granted and assume that everyone...
The headline almost leapt out of my screen. It was June 2020. Every day was bringing another batch of harrowing news stories. Yet this one, on the...
One of the biggest killers of great ideas (and even greater careers) has to be impostor syndrome. I've met countless professionals who were held...
I've got a quick question for you. How many people live in the Australian capital of Sydney? Is it two million? Five million? Seven million? The...
It probably won’t surprise you to find out that we’re pretty keen on the English language here at Emphasis. And we like to know that...
Recent eyetracker research reveals that users of news websites look at the headlines first, rather than the images. The study, called Eyetrack III,...
English can be a confusing language. Swapping one word for another that sounds exactly the same (a homophone) can alter the meaning completely....
The next edition of The Oxford English Dictionary probably won’t appear in print, according to the Oxford University Press (OUP), the dictionary’s...
Ask most scientists, engineers and technologists why they got into the profession and they're unlikely to say it was because they love writing. But...
Grammar sends many people into a panic, as they desperately try to recall what they learned in English lessons at school. But grammar doesn't have...
...They risk losing business. (Isn’t that what they say?) One in five consumers think if an item is ‘organic’ it means it is low...
Today, it’s exactly two years until the opening ceremony of the Olympics and the moment the eyes of the world turn towards London. However,...
On misusing or fumbling a word, is it better to hold your hands up to it or to compare yourself to the world’s greatest playwright? For Sarah...
Click here to listen to Emphasis CEO Rob Ashton explain how to overcome writer's block. Learn how to: Get started Plan your document Use a...
How do you avoid confusing your reader when you're writing for non-native English speakers? Expert business-writing trainer Janet Bateman explains:...
Writing skills is a subject that many trainers claim to be able to provide. Here’s our guide to sorting the wheat from the chaff. Writing...
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