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3 Tips to Achieve Your Writing Goals
1. Make your goals achievable.
By achievable, we mean realistic and attainable. You might unconsciously have set a goal even others will have a hard time achieving, even if they had the means and the time to do so.
Here's what you can do:...
"Business Writing Checklist"
You're ready to do it. You've accepted an assignment from your boss, agreed to put together a sales presentation, or were asked to write a report about last week's meeting results. Where do you begin? Before you venture off into the land of writing...
Hotel Internet Marketing and the Secret of Copywriting
Are you a Hotel Marketer? Do you want to improve your Hotel Internet Marketing Sale? Here are the suggestion: revise your website copywriting!
I've seen many websites in our hotel & hospitality industry crowded with copywriting mistakes. These...
New to Article Writing - Start Here
The internet articles writer can find thousands of tips and endless advice, much of it is good and some is worth its weight in gold. Sometimes writers get too complicated and try to produce articles that reflect all the great advice they have...
The Secret to Good Writing
Skilful business writing involves getting your message across simply and quickly. This often means writing in a style that is easily read and understood by a broad audience. Yet, writing simply is often difficult for most of us. Why? The answer...
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Business Writing Skills Part III: Avoiding Sexist Language
Many businesspeople are unfamiliar with business writing.
Concise writing will build your business because you will better
connect with customers and prospects. In this four-part series,
I will teach you how to make your writing and other business
correspondence clearer, understandable, and more direct.
Avoiding Sexist Language in Writing By Linda Elizabeth Alexander
Why avoid sexist language in your business writing? Biased
language can alienate any potential reader. If you alienate your
readers, you lose credibility. Without their faith in your
words, you have lost your audience and cannot make your
argument. Therefore, avoiding sexism in your writing benefits
everyone.
Here are some tips for avoiding common mistakes regarding sexist
language.
He/She
The use of a masculine pronoun to refer to both genders is
offensive to many people. Also, using terms such as "man" to
define people can often be confusing - are you referring only to
"men" or to "all people"? The easiest and best way to get around
this is to rewrite the sentence in the plural, or avoid using a
pronoun altogether.
Example: The executive cannot do his job properly until he
understands how. Correct to: Executives cannot do their jobs
properly until they understand how.
You could also say "The executive cannot do his or her job
properly until he or she understands how." However, this tends
to be clumsy, especially after being used
repeatedly.
Ms./Miss/Mrs. Miss refers to an unmarried woman. Mrs. Refers to
a married woman. Ms. is a universally accepted form of
addressing a woman regardless of her marital status. This should
be adopted whenever possible.
However, there are women who indicate a preference for either
Miss or Mrs., and that preference should be honored if known.
When addressing general audiences, or if you are not sure of the
woman's marital status, always use Ms.
Other ways to avoid sexism in your writing:
Don't assume that a particular job is filled by a particular
gender: there are many female constructions workers and doctors;
there are also many nurses and office assistants that are male.
Instead, talk about "mail carriers" instead of mailmen, "flight
attendants" instead of stewardesses, and "police officers"
instead of policemen. Certain job titles refer to both men and
women; "lineman" is one such example.
Try not to be confusing by going overboard with terms such as
"saleswoman" or "salesman" or "salesperson." Instead, use simple
words like "sales associate" or "chair" instead of
"chairman/woman/person."
About the Author
Linda Elizabeth Alexander is a business writer and marketing
consultant based in Longmont, Colorado, USA. Improve your
writing skills at work! Subscribe to her FREE ezine. Write to
the Point at lalexander@write2thepointcom.com or visit
http://www.write2thepointcom.com/articles.html.
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| owl.english.purdue.edu |
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| OWL at Purdue University: General Writing Concerns Handouts |
| This page contains important links to the writing: planning/writing/revising aspects of the OWL website. |
| owl.english.purdue.edu |
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| Poynter Online |
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| Menu of articles on writing written by professional SF/F writers. |
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| Free online English dictionary and reference guide. List of sites writers can use. |
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| Daily and interactive writing prompts. |
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