Writing tips – when to use capital letters
This blog post has been inspired by my daughter who last weekend was writing thank you letters to family in the UK and who kept using lower case “i” when referring to herself and mixing up her “mr” and “Mrs” and “melbourne” and “Australia”.
I know the teacher will be back on the case now that term has started, but in the business world, it’s surprising the number of people who don’t know when to use a capital letter in their writing. Maybe this blog post will help. This information has been summarised from the Style manual, published by John Wiley & Sons.
- Let’s start with the obvious – sentences should always begin with a capital letter.
- Initial capitals should be used for proper nouns and proper names, for example, Ruth Barnard, Purple Chameleon Communications, Melbourne, Australia
- In quoted speech, the first word should be capitalised, eg: The doctor said “I don’t administer drugs on the premises”.
- In direct address, a capital letter is used to make titles and honorific names used as a form of address: ” Yes, Minister, I agree that is correct”.
- Nationalities and distinct groups of people, ie Queenslander, Christian, English
- Titles and modes of address. The official titles of the principals or chief executives of many Australian institutions are capitalised, eg the Governor-General, the Prime Minister of Australia. In modes of address, initial capitals are always used, eg Her Majesty the Queen, Dame Judi Dench.
- The official names of countries are always capitalised as well as any commonly used shorter forms. Names that form a group of nations geographically or politically are always capitalised, eg South-East Asia, the Balkans.
- The names of days and months are always capitalised but the names of seasons are usually left in lower case.
- Holidays, religious days and public events are given capitals, eg Australia Day, Easter Monday, the AFL Grand Final.
- In commercial terms, trademarks, proprietary names and brand names should be capitalised, eg Band-Aid, Kleenex, Coca-Cola, Thermos. Brand and model names should also be capitalised, eg a Harley Davidson, a Boeing 767
- The names of items of computer software and hardware, which are usually proprietary names, and related terms are capitalised and sometimes even fully capitalised, eg IBM PC, Microsoft Word. Some more general words also have initial capital letters, eg Internet, the Net, but there appears to be a growing use of lower case for these word, eg web site
- Titles of books and other publications: these generally begin with a capital letter. Whether you choose to use a capital letter after that is a matter of house style or individual preference. You can either go for minimal capitalisation where only the first word of a title and any proper nouns and names are capitalised, eg Style manual, or maximum capitalisation eg Style Manual.
If you have a question about the use of capital letters that is not covered here, please leave a comment or send me an email via the Contact Us page.