Directions: (a) Do not automatically assume you know the meaning of an essay comment abbreviation or symbol in the comments written or wordprocessed at the end of your essay. Look it up in this alphabetical listing to see how it is defined and explained. (b) Then look up the key words of the definition and explanation in the index and possibly table of contents of your composition handbook; read and study the relevant handbook material carefully. (c) Write out the exercises on the material in the handbook on a separate sheet of paper; do not write in the composition handbook itself (keeping the composition handbook free of writing will allow you to come back to the exercises later and do them again). (d) Abbreviation and symbols may be used for praise as well as to note problems; thus "good d in P3p.1" or "+ d in P3p.1" indicates that a word was or words were well chosen in the third paragraph on page 1 of your essay. (e) Non-alphabetical symbols can be found after the last alphabetical entries in this Appendix. (f) RETAIN MY WORDPROCESSED COMMENT, AND YOUR ORIGINAL UNMARKED PAPER, LEAVING YOUR ORIGINAL PAPER UNMARKED; I HAVE A COPY OF THE COMMENTS, AND I WANT YOU TO RETAIN A COPY, TO KEEP TRACK OF WRITING STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES. I ALSO WANT YOU TO RETAIN YOUR UNMARKED PAPER SO YOU CAN RETURN TO IT PERIODICALLY TO STUDY IT AND FIND AGAIN MISTAKES IN GRAMMAR AND USAGE NOTED IN MY ANNOTATION. (g) sample comment and decoding, using this Appendix:
 

[Brief paragraph wordprocessed at the end of the essay:]

4. Jim Calderwood (ICE1): +/- T-dev; +/- d; ap-n* (!); d* in P2p.1; frag (!) in S1P3p.2; tht-g in P2p.1; cs: P1p.3; frag: P3p.2; d in P4p.3; + sst in places; (due 5/5/02 or grade lowered 1/2 grade): (1) make a dark photocopy of your essay (2) and then correct the following specific problems AND ONLY THESE FOLLOWING SPECIFIC PROBLEMS in red pen (to stand out in contrast) on the photocopy: ap-n*, frag, cs; (3) retain the original of your essay, uncorrected (to return to periodically and see if you can find the errors); (4) retain also my wordprocessed comments, which I have a copy of, to study and apply in the next essays--all as per the directions on my General Syllabus
 

[This comment would mean: some spots in the essay were well developed but others weren't and more needs to be said; some good uses of words in places, but some problems in word choice elsewhere; repeated problems in the need but failure to use the apostrophe--this is important and must be gotten under control and added to your personal editing checklist; a sentence fragment (important grammatical problem) in the first sentence of the third paragraph on page 2; good observation in the second paragraph on p.1; good sentence structure in places] [the required editing copy (if the essay was wordprocessed) or photocopy (if the essay was handwritten) should contain the photocopy with only the following problems corrected in red pen: all apostrophe and fragment problems, and the comma splice -- as noted in the annotation]
 

ab - problem in the use of numbers or abbreviations

abst - the essay (or parts of it) too hypothetical; too little is based on the student's observation of his or her own personal experience and the real world (with examples drawn from these)

ad - use of adjective where adverb belongs, or vice versa

agr - error in subject-verb or pronoun-antecedent agreement

agr2 - inconsistent shift between singular and plural from one sentence to the next or one part of the paragraph to another part of the paragraph, or from one paragraph to the next (e.g., starting out talking about several individuals, but inconsistently shifting to "he")

AHD[2][3] - American Heritage (College) Dictionary (first, second, or third ed.)

amb - word or phrase marked is ambiguous; can be read two ways

ap - problem(s) with the apostrophe

ap-n - apostrophe(s) needed

ap-p - apostrophe placed wrongly (e.g., after an s at the end of a word, rather than before) or ambiguously (e.g., exactly over an s at the end of a word, so that it is unclear whether the apostrophe is supposed to come before or after the s)

ap-x - apostrophe used incorrectly, e.g., for the plural, where just s should be added

arg - problem with the overall approach to the format, or ts, of the argumentative essay

arg-ov - incorrect treatment of an argumentative topic (two sides) as if it were purely expository (just explaining one side)

art - mistakenly reversed use of the indefinite articles a and an

art-def - confusion between the definite article (the) and indefinite article (a, an)

art-ex - article (a, an, the) added where it shouldn't be

authn - faulty way of referring to an author's name; see NNRRE (Engl. 1101) or pep2-V.F and RJ Ch. 1, special box, about handling authors' names

ca - mistake in the use of pronoun case

cap - problem with capitalization

chb - composition handbook

colloq - use less colloquial expression or level of usage

comb - combine these sentences into one sentence; combine this sentence with the one(s) preceding it

comp-il - illogical comparison

comp-inc - incomplete comparison

comp-inct - incomplete comparison in the use of an intensive like so or such (not: "her dress was so pretty"; not: "he was such a good friend"; both need the comparison completed, or a different adverb used; see chb, including the glossary of usage, and collegiate dictionary)

comp-ov - faulty handling of comparison-contrast method of development and organization

comp-s - faulty handling of comparative vs. superlative forms of adjective or adverb (see composition handbook)

con - misuse of connectives (wrong: "Arnold was willing to pay the bill, and his billfold was empty"; corrected: "Arnold was willing to pay the bill, but his billfold was empty")

concl - conclusion too repetitious or vague for a short essay; make concl grow out of (last specific main point of) essay; see pep1 or pep2, XII.B

concl-dev - new idea or point raised that is not prepared for by the rest of the essay; concluding idea not at all prepared for

concl-n - conclusion needed; present conclusion too weak

constr - revise faulty construction

coord-ex - excessive coordination (too much stringing together with "and" or "but")

coord-n - coordination needed in sentence structure

cs,cf - comma fault, comma splice; about one out of five comma splices results from failure to use the colon where it should be used, for a clause that amplifies or explains a preceding clause; consult your composition handbook about this use of the colon, as well as about the comma splice; PSOG (for Engl. 1101)

ctd - contradiction; contradictory (in itself, or to something said elsewhere in the essay)

cw - counter word (LTUFW--in all except WNCD); cf. gob, vw, wdy

d - problem in diction (word choice); more exact, precise word(s) needed

d-abst - diction too general or abstract

d-ov - overall problems in the essay at the level of individual words (e.g., sp, ap, ad, d, id, nom, prep, gl, usg, vw, wdy, ww)

dc,ds - double comparative ("more better") or double superlative ("most largest"); just use one comparative or superlative ("more" or "better"; "most" or "largest")

def - define technical terms, obscure terms or names, abbreviations, or key abstract words briefly (phrasally, parenthetically, if possible)

def-ap - apply literary terms or terminology in analysis; do not repeat the textbook's definitions

def-triv - no need for a dictionary definition of this word

dev - faulty development: word, term, item, or idea not prepared for or introduced too suddenly

dir - failure to follow or pay close enough attention to oral or written directions for the assignment

disc - begs discussion; idea or assertion needs more explanation or clarification, further discussion

disc-ev - evades or sidesteps rather than answers the question

disc-s - expand this one sentence to include in it further explanation or illustration or both

disc-sh - stops just short of analysis or interpretation (in literary-analysis paper)

dm - dangling modifier (cf. mm, sqm)

dn - double negative ("I don't have no money"; "I don't hardly make any mistakes in writing")

dn-con - confusing shift from doubled-up contrasting conjunctions ("Even though we won't admit it, but we do"); or confusing doubled-up negative transition words or phrases ("However, . . . . However, . . . ")

doc - document such outside information or such an assertion with formal bibliographical detail (source, author, title, publisher, etc.)

doc-aut - such an assertion needs to be backed up or supported by reference to an authoritative source

e.c. - extra credit

edt - more time needed to be allotted to editing for matters of grammar, usage, spelling, and punctuation; two pages carefully proofread will be superior to three pages with multiple unedited errors in grammar, usage, spelling, and punctuation; see pep1 or pep2 X-C and XI.G

edt-lst - you need a personal editing checklist of your top five or six usage (including punctuation) or grammar problems to edit for, and make sure you edit for them; study my essay comments for which problems seem to be most serious or most numerous or both; see pep1 and NNRRE

ellip - elliptical too much left out of the sentence or discussion (and in the writer's head); too many steps skipped from one part of the sentence to the next, one sentence to the next, one point or thought to the next; too many ideas or conclusions or stages in the thought process remain as hidden assumptions and consequently are left undiscussed)

ellip-inf - not clear how your conclusion or inference was reached from the evidence cited or details of the text quoted:
 

(text detail/quote)             [  (how you get what you do from it)  ]              (what you get you from it)
 

------------------>                             [ - - - - ->]                                              ------------>
 

                                                             [missing]
 

ev - elegant variation: using synonyms--especially longer or fancier than the original term--where they are not functional

ex-f - inexact, inaccurate, not exactly true as stated; a factual error

ex-r - point or idea from the author or reading misstated or misleadingly put

expos - inconsistent shift from expository to argumentative writing

expos-adv - shift from impartial explaining (usually in the third person) to giving advice (usually a shift to use of "you")

expos-nar - the essay is too much mere narration, storytelling, and not really exposition, with narration or description used to help explain main, explicit generalizations

FANBOYS - the seven coordinate conjunctions: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so

5 w's & h - need to provide more explanation or detail by answering the questions from the 5 w's and h (who, what, when, where, why, how)

fl - obvious b.s., flatulence, padding

fo - faulty outline form or logic

font-s - printer font size either too large or too small; use between ten to twelve characters per inch (cpi) on dot matrix or 10 to 12 point on inkjet/laser printer

font-t - wrong font style: use only something like Times Roman for academic papers

frag - sentence fragment, period fault

fw - overly ornate writing, "fine" writing

genl - too sweeping, excessive, or unwarranted generalization; needs serious limiting (use words like some, several, many, probably, may very well, could, almost, nearly, virtually, perhaps)

gl - find the problem in the glossary of usage in the composition handbook

gob - gobbledegook: officialese, journalese, jargon of a particular academic discipline (e.g., sociology or psychology)

gr - error in grammar

GSCP2 - not adhering to, or needing to review a section of the "English 1102 General Syllabus and Class Policies" pamphlet

hw - handwriting illegible

hw-cur - in handwritten essays, use cursive rather than printing (for speed, flow of words onto the page)

hw-l - handwriting too large or has too large spaces between words

hw-s - keep letters separate and distinct from each other; do not overlap letters in handwriting

hw-t - dot i's, cross t's, complete loops of letters, etc.

ICE - in-class (extemporary, impromptu) essay

ICE dir - not careful enough adherence to the written directions for this particular ICE

id - not idiomatic English, faulty idiomatic phrase

illus - provide illustration(s), example(s), detail, specificity

illus-ctd - this illustration does not apparently support (or even contradicts) the preceding statement

illus-gen - greater number of general examples needed

illus-lit - see pep2-V.H7; don't introduce an illustration by page or line number; rather, use the context and function in the literary work; cf. qt-con

illus-rdg - same problem as in illus-lit: see NNRRE about the OCE in Engl. 1101

illus-mu - avoid puerile made-up examples or what appear to be made-up examples; briefly indicate (in a phrase or subordinate clause) how or where you heard about the instance you're citing or how you know or know about the person you mention

illus-one - avoid the all-in-one example or illustration; use several examples or multiple details in the paragraph(s) (this is especially important in argumentative essays)

illus-spf - within examples, more specifics and concrete, vivid details ("proper nouns," brand names, names that have to be capitalized) needed

illus-sup - specifics, support, evidence needed to back up this assertion or generalization

inc - incomplete coverage of the literary work, editorial material from the textbook about the literary work, Prinsky's Notes and Questions, Prinsky's test material

ind - problem with indirect versus direct discourse; see index of SFHW; ind includes word order (NOT: I asked could I have the car keys; RATHER: I asked if I could have the car keys OR: I asked whether I could have the car keys)

inf - revise this sentence to make it an informative, interpretive, informational, or factual observation, statement, or assertion

info - failure to briefly indicate in the essay (parentheses will usually do) how or where technical information or facts cited were learned

info-bak - indicate in a phrase, subordinate clause, appositive or parenthetical construction how you know this person or where you learned about events in this person's life; without this information, illus-mu is created

intro - phony, flatulent, irrelevant introduction or introductory paragraph; if this is all you can generate on this topic, or in general, use the straight-to-the-point format instead

intro-b - avoid the barebones outline introductory paragraph (each main point explained in a separate sentence, each one of these sentences repeated verbatim later in the essay); this creates rep; if you want to use the fleas-ticks-lice format, all points belong in one sentence (each point stated in a longish phrase) at the end of an introductory or funnel paragraph; cf. tsb-rep

intro-el - too elliptical an opening for the reading-response essay in Engl. 1101 or the literary-analysis paper in Engl. 1102; author and title of literary work not identified early enough in the paper; see NNRRE and pep1 or pep2 on introductions and introductory paragraphs

intro-mu - avoid a made-up story to justify an assigned topic; just straightforwardly answer the question

intro-t - the first paragraph of the essay should indicate both the assigned topic as well as the main thesis and topic sentence about it; in a literary analysis paper, the author(s) and title(s) of the literary work(s) being analyzed should be explicitly identified; the test is whether a friend of yours not in this class determine from your title and introduction what the assigned topic of the essay was

intro-ti - introductory paragraph and topic sentence elliptically assume information in the title; explicitly provide this information in topic sentence or paragraph

inv - better invention (inventorying or discovery of what you know, think, and feel about a subject) or prewriting analysis of the general components of the topic or subject needed; more time necessary in the scratch notes and informal outlining stage, for more comprehensive and logical coverage of the topic, arrangement of points, and so on

irr - irrelevant material or appears irrelevant as put (in this second case, the relevance of this material to the main point or points needs to be explicitly shown or shown more clearly)

irr-lit - irrelevant material from literary work--mere plot summary

itl - study the use of italics (underlining) in the required composition handbook

lis-cl - shows failure to listen in class to lecture, class discussion, or class reports

lis-cor - failure to heed my correction of or annotation on this problem on your preceding work or draft

LTUFW - look that up in your Funk and Wagnalls (i.e., your collegiate dictionary)

MLAf - faulty MLA format; study first and second pages of non-separate title-page format of MLA format research papers in chb, as well as explanations in chb; see also comments (and models) in NNRRE or pep2

mm - misplaced or misrelated modifier (cf. dm and sqm)

mng - meaning or idea(s) unclear

mng-dgr - problems in the writing (gr, d, etc.) inhibit the writer's own insights about the text or topic, as well as the clear communication of these to the reader

MS - faulty handling of manuscript conventions (matters such as where to put writer's name on the first page, numbering of pages, placement of page number, capitalization or whether to use quotation marks around a title, etc.)

MSB - write down to the last line of each sheet of lined paper

MS-ICE - problem with MS for in-class essays, as specified in pep1, NNRRE, or pep2-VIII.B

MSP - within manuscript conventions, faulty handling of pagination or header (numbering the pages, placement of the number, where to start, kind of number to use, etc.; note that the header or surname/arabic numeral appear in the right corner one line above the identifying material in the left corner; study the first and second page of the sample research paper, MLA format, in the chb)

MSR - within MS conventions, improper way of making inserts, revisions in the essay (e.g., how and where to use the caret)

MST - within MS conventions, faulty handling of essay title (placement, capitalization, whether to use quotation marks, etc.)

MST-spc - wrong spacing above or below essay title

MS-tear - separate all sheets of continuous-feed computer paper (as per pep2-VII and chb), as well as detach the sprocketed sides

nc - problem not corrected from preceding draft(s) or essay(s)

NC - grade unchanged because of not fully revising, as per the directions in the sections on revision in the "Prinsky's English 1102 Pamphlet" or "Prinsky's English 1101 Pamphlet"

NNRRE - failure to adhere to directions on the handout "Norm's Notes on the Impromptu Essay on an Assigned Topic on a Required Reading" ("Norm's Notes on the Reading Response Essay")

nom - avoid using nouns as adjectives ("grammar problem" vs. "grammatical problem")

nom-x - avoid clogging sentences with nouns at the expense of verbs

ns - non-stop or sausage-string sentence; sentence has excessive coordination or excessive subordination or both

OCE - out-of-class paper or essay

OCE dir - not careful enough adherence to the written directions for this particular OCE

om - omission of word or words necessary for grammatical completeness of the sentence

org - position or order of observation, topic, or paragraph is questionable; problem(s) with organizational matters

org-lit - organize essays or papers about required readings or literature not slavishly paragraph by paragraph; by incidents in the plot; line by line in poems; or literary component by literary component; instead, organize by main ideas -- ideas in the assigned topic, for Engl. 1101, or by the literary work's ideas and themes in Engl. 1102; derive some main points or ideas about the work and then put them in some sort of logical order, as you should in an Eng. 1101 essay

oww - word or phrase marked is overworked; too much trying to be done with one word or phrase--expand into phrase, clause, sentence, or group of sentences

oww-s - expand this particular sentence to clarify ellip or add supporting detail

P - paragraph; P1 = first paragraph; P2 = second paragraph; etc.

p. - page

P-coh - problem in paragraph coherence (organization and continuity of the paragraph)

P-coh/org - points or examples in P not (apparently) arranged in the best or most logical order

P-coh/ts - problem in paragraph coherence between ts and first main point (needs connecting material)

P-dev - paragraph is or paragraphs are underdeveloped (in need of disc or illus or both); no one-sentence paragraphs (paragraphs should run about half a typed page)

P-dev-comb - combine too-short paragraphs into larger one(s)

P-dev-ic - avoid the short, choppy first or concluding paragraph of only one or two sentences (usually just the ts or concl); combine with what follows or precedes

P-dev-l - overly long paragraph, which needs to be broken up into smaller units

P-i - indent at the beginning of each new paragraph; make indention clearer

P-sense - essay lacks paragraph sense, a sense of where to paragraph; study material about paragraphing in the composition handbook

P-u - problem in paragraph unity: either extraneous material or explicit explanation needed about how and why this/each illus supports the main point(s) of the paragraph

pass - overuse of the passive voice or passive constructions

pep1 - failure to follow directions in Prinsky's Engl. 1101 Pamphlet

pep2 - failure to follow directions in Prinsky's Engl. 1102 Pamphlet

pers - more personal details and illustrations from personal experience and observation needed; see pep1 or pep2-XI.B.1

pl - pleonasm (wrong: "my brother he gave me a dime"; correct: "my brother gave me a dime")

pll - faulty parallelism

pll-wdy - unnecessary or wordy repetition of a parallel element in a series; example (the unnecessary words are in the brackets and should be deleted): The Marshal is a coward when he does not put the girl behind him, try to take the gun, and [when he does not] offer to have a showdown with Wilson

pn - faulty punctuation; study material about pn in composition handbook

pn-br - square brackets misused; square brackets needed

pn-c - comma(s) needed

pn-c2 - one of a pair of commas omitted

pn-chb - study material on comma in composition handbook

pn-cp - misplacing comma by putting it before or after where it should be placed (e.g., not: -------- but , -------- rather: --------- , but -----------)

pn-cx - overuse or misuse of the comma

pn-cx/lit - see NNRRE or pep2-V.C4 about misuse of comma when referring to the title of a required reading (Engl. 1101) or a literary work (Engl. 1102) (a case of restrictive vs. nonrestrictive, about whether to use the comma)

pn-cx/conj - don't use pn-c immediately after FANBOYS or immediately after subordinating conjunctions like Although, including when these head a sentence

pn-co - colon needed

pn-cox - colon misused

pn-d - dash(es) needed

pn-df - wrong format or printing of the dash (two hyphens; and on spacing before and after the dash see the chb)

pn-dx - dash misused or overused (not to be used on top of comma or parentheses)

pn-d2 - corresponding (second) dash omitted

pn-ex - exclamation point overused or misused; exclamation point needed

pn-p - ending period of sentence omitted or too faint; problem with period use

pn-pr - parenthesis marks needed; parenthesis marks misused

pn-prc - do not use both parentheses and commas here

PNQ - Prinsky's Notes and Questions on assigned reading

pn-q - question mark needed (required for direct question)

pn-qx - question mark misused or overused (not used in indirect question or indirect discourse/statement)

pn-s - semicolon(s) needed

pn-shb - study chb about use and misuse of the semicolon

pn-sx - misuse or overuse of the semicolon

pn-sxp - misplacement of semicolon either before or after where it should be placed (not: --------, therefore; ------ rather: -------- ; therefore, ---------- )

prep - use correct, idiomatic preposition (see AHD, SCD, WII: "acquiesce"; RHCD, WNW2C: "agree"; WNCD: "capable")

prep-x - addition of unnecessary preposition ("the countryside was dotted with sights in which we lazily scanned"; omit the "in"); a kind of shifted or mixed construction

prn-w - wrong pronoun (among the eight kinds of pronouns): e.g., use of myself, the reflexive or intensive pronoun, versus the objective case of the personal pronoun, me

prim - primer prose: too many short, disconnected sentences

PSOG - a need to better study and apply "Dr. Prinsky's Snake-Oil Grammar"

pt - stick to present tense in discussing printed matter

pv - awkward shift in point of view, particularly in personal pronoun or verb tense

pv-ft - stick to first or third person singular; see the chb about using you in an essay

qt - quotation marks needed

qt2 - one of a pair of quotation marks omitted

qt-con - failure to give context of quotation in the literary work; do not identify a quotation by reference in words to the page or line number of the quotation (reserve this reference material for parenthetical documentation); see also qt-em, below

qt-d - mistaking of single quotation marks vs. double quotation marks

qt-ellip - faulty use of ellipsis or ellipses ("suspension points": . . . ) within a quotation; see pep2-V.H9 and composition handbook

qt-em - embed quotation in your own sentence; don't let a quotation stand alone or begin a sentence; see NNRRE on the OCE (Engl. 1101) or pep2-V.H5 (Engl. 1102)

qt-gr - grammar of the quoted material doesn't match the grammar of your containing or lead-in sentence; see NNRRE on the OCE (Engl. 1101) or pep2-V (Engl. 1102)

qt-hb - study material on quotation marks in the composition handbook

qt-MS - faulty handling of quoted material, in terms of MS

qt-os - study remarks on longer, offset quotations in the chb

qt-ov - overquotation; see NNRRE on the OCE (Engl. 1101) or pep2-V.H3-4 (Engl. 1102); too much quotation, overlong quotation, not enough analysis of the material cited and quoted

qt-plg - words or phrasing close enough to printed material that it should be in quotation marks and credited, to avoid plagiarism

qt-pn - placement of punctuation relative to quotation marks (inside, outside) incorrect

qt-v - faulty handling of the quotation of poetry, including the need for using the virgule (slash mark); study this material in the chb as well as Roberts-Jacobs

qt-wl - should quotation marks or italics (underlining) be used when referring to words as words, terms as as terms, or letters of the alphabet as letters of the alphabet? look up "titles," as well as quotation marks and italics in the index of chb

qt-x - quotation marks used incorrectly or where they shouldn't be

rdg - an indication from the writing in the essay that the student needs to do more reading of college-level material, attending to spelling and vocabulary in the reading; begin reading all the essays in the (or an) essay anthology from English 1101 or essay anthology on reserve at the library for English 1101 or the short stories in the literature text-anthology in English 1102; reread at least three times each essay or short story

ref - faulty pronoun reference; one useful device is to use the pronouns former or latter to keep the antecedent clear; see the entries for former and latter in the gl of chb

ref-comb - beginning sentences with vague "This"; see pep2-V.f; ref results from not using -ing construction or not combining sentences enough (and not achieving enough sub)

ref-lit - faulty pronoun reference in literary analysis, stemming from use of the author's name with apostrophe and s, making this an adjective; see pep2-V.C and pep2-V.H or NNRRE

ref-rdg - faulty pronoun reference in citing the author and title name of the required reading in the reading-response essay in Engl. 1101; see NNRRE

reflx - incorrect use of the reflexive or intensive pronoun, especially myself, where the personal pronoun should be used (I, me): see chb

rem - need for remedial work on d-ov or ss-ov problem or problems; see GSCP-VI.8

rem-es - mandatory written-out analysis of specified errors in the essay; see pep2-IX.B1-B2 (the whole essay is NOT required to be revised; only specific errors are to be identified, analyzed, and fixed by you, as noted: e.g., just the apostrophes you should have used or used incorrectly)

rep,red - repetitious, redundant

rep-pr - repetitious: use pronouns rather than repeating this word or phrase so soon after its preceding use

rev - error introduced in revision or rewrite

rev-ch - a cheating correction, still counted as an error; e.g., an a is overlaid on an e or vice versa in the word affect or effect in such a way as to make unclear what the initial letter is, and thus cheat on the spelling, as well as whether the word is affect or effect

RHCD - Random House College Dictionary

RJ - same as Roberts-Jacobs

ro - run on (run together, fused) sentence

Roberts-Jacobs - Edgar Roberts' and Henry Jacobs' Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing, latest ed.

rp - wrong relative pronoun (use "who" for persons, "that" for things)

rp-rs - confusion between that and which, relating to restrictive vs. nonrestrictive clauses (see this material in chb, plus the entries in the handbook's Glossary of Usage for that and which)

RPH - problem in following Documented (Research) Paper Handout

RPH-ov - far too little heed of and adherence to several directions in Documented Paper Appendix in pep2

RTP - Regents' Testing Program Examination

S - sentence; S1=first sentence; S2= second sentence; etc.

same - same comment made above applies here

SCD - Funk and Wagnalls Standard College Dictionary

sent. - sentence

SFHW - Scott, Foresman Handbook for Writers

shift - shifted or mixed construction, faulty predication: (a) shifted topic (e.g., "One skill I envy is a person who can study despite noise and other distractions"), (b) shifted structure (e.g., "Because the new television show did poorly in the ratings explains why programming executives decided to move it to a slot between two hit shows"; "In Bob Dylan's rock song Subterranean Blues is about the conflict between youth and adult authority"; "By designing the questionnaire carefully made Valerie's psychology study a success")

sp - error in spelling

sp2 - words sometimes confused by apprentice writers (e.g., affect-effect, to-too, their-there); see the Glossary of Usage and the chapter on spelling in the composition handbook

sp-h - problem with hyphenation, within spelling

sp-j - problem with the juncture of words: whether there should be a space between the words (NOT: eventhough; RATHER: even though; everyday vs. every day--these are different; look up in the glossary of usage in your composition handbook and your collegiate dictionary)

sp-ml - medial letter(s) omitted or wrongly added to word(s)

sp-rdg - misspelling of author's name, title of the work, or character's name, or something else in the printed material referred to

sp-x - spelling problems too numerous; study the chapter on spelling in the composition handbook

spc - incorrect spacing between words (in typewritten or word processed essays)

spc-v - problem in vertical spacing

spc-vP - don't skip extra lines between paragraphs; pep2-VIII.B1h

spc2 - maintain doublespacing everywhere (no single spacing, quadruple spacing, triple spacing, etc.)

ss - problem with sentence sense, sense of what a complete and grammatically correct sentence is

ss-ov - overall problems in the essay at the level of the sentence and grammar (e.g., frag, cs, agr, ad, ca, dc-dn, gr, om, pll, prep, prep-x, prim, ro, shift, vf)

sst - sentence structure

sub-n - (grammatical) subordination needed

sub-f - weak, faulty subordination

sub-lit - too much narrative summary of the literary text and too little interpretation; subordinate summary to interpretation (try to subordinate summary details to a subordinate part of a sentence--phrase, appositive, subordinate clause--and devote the rest or main part of the sentence to your analysis or discussion); see T-u/sub

sub-x - excessive subordination

T-coh - problem in overall essay coherence (organization or connection between, or movement or continuity of, one point or paragraph to the next)

T-coh/lap - illogical overlap in the main points of the essay

T-coh/org - main points or illustrations in essay not apparently arranged in the best or most logical order

T-cohP - transition needed between this P and the preceding one; see "transition" and "paragraph coherence" in chb index

T-dev - essay is underdeveloped; needs more disc and illus

T-dev/OCE - see NNRRE or pep2-VII.B on the minimum length of out-of-class essays, and why

T-u - problem in overall essay unity (irrelevant material; wandering away from the subject; a need to tie all material to the particular assigned topic)

T-u/disc - problem in essay unity from not telling how and why this/each illus supports your main point(s) or relates exactly to your thesis or your ts

T-u/sub - subordinate background or narrative details to main topic; put these in appositives, participial or prepositional phrases, subordinate clauses--minor parts of individual sentences; see sub-lit; see "Keeping to Your Point" in Ch. 1 of RJ

tex - vague or inexact essay title; title needed; a student from another English class should be able to deduce from the title what the assigned topic was, exactly; a literary analysis essay should identify author, genre, and title of the literary work somewhere in the essay title

tex-at - identify author, genre, and title of literary work in the title of your essay as well as your essay's first paragraph

tex-ellip - unclear or elliptical reference in the title to the assigned topic or assigned material (e.g., title: "My Life Compared with the Protagonist's"--what protagonist?); cf. intro-ti

tex-sub - essay title should be a subordinate clause or phrase; avoid newspaper headline titles (not "English Teachers Shouldn't Wear Tennis Shoes" but rather "Against English Teachers Wearing Tennis Shoes" or "Why English Teachers Shouldn't Wear Tennis Shoes")

tex-subt - add a clarifying subtitle (usually followed by a colon) to the title

tex-wrtg - in the writing about writing (books, essays, stories, poems, plays) just the original title of the work or the author's name plus the work's title aren't satisfactory; no student yet has written William Shakespeare's Hamlet--or, more wordily, Hamlet by William Shakespeare--though many have unwittingly claimed credit for it by such misleading titles (the minimally acceptable title--probably still faulted by tex--would be (without the quotation marks) "On Shakespeare's Hamlet"

tht - thinking is muddled, illogical, or contradictory (not enough careful thought about the subject in the inv or revision stage of composition)

tht-g - a good observation or good observations; some good conclusions, perceptions, or perspicacity here

tht-log - more attention needed to the formal principles of good logic and the avoidance of logical fallacies

time - faulty time management on ICE; see pep2-X.C on this problem

tl - omission or careless addition of terminal letter to a word (e.g., -s, -ed; or -y in the word "they"), usually an element of the transcription process; heed especially "prejudiced," "supposed to," "used to," "biased," "iced tea")

tm - more precision needed in use of the terminology of literary criticism or style (as terms are explained in RJ and collegiate dictionary); see NNRRE or pep2-V.J

tm-cat - don't just catalogue literary terms; make use of them for thematic analysis

tm-n - more use of relevant literary terminology needed

tmt - avoid the awkward sentence structure and paragraph-fragmenting of the following sentence pattern: " ' [quotation from the literary work]' means [such and such]'; especially do not repeat the mere "this-means-that" pattern--cf. org-lit

topic - this passage or the overall essay doesn't deal squarely enough with the assigned topic; relevance to the assigned topic unclear

topic-inc - radically incomplete coverage of the main components of the assigned topic (usually a byproduct of inv)

TP - top paragraph on new page, continued from the preceding page (not the first new paragraph on the new page, but a continuation of the paragraph from the preceding page)

trans - transitional words or phrases or expressions needed to clarify the connection between sentences; see table of contents and index in the chb for this, along with the term and concept of coherence

trans-m - transitional material (phrases, clauses, sentences) needed to clarify the connection between sentences

trans-w - incorrect transition words used ("however" used when "moreover" or "furthermore" should have been; "for example" used when no particular example given--"in addition" would have been better)

triv - trivial as stated; omit or revise to make inf

ts - no overall essay thesis sentence; weak overall thesis sentence; overall ts should indicate what the assigned topic is, plus main idea(s) about it; a student from a different class should be able to deduce from the topic sentence what the assigned topic was, exactly

ts#body - thesis sentence of the essay and the body of essay are not in accord; material in the rest of the essay not in accord with or covered by the ts

ts-coh - points in ts (and essay) not apparently arranged in the best or most logical order

ts-comp - faulty ts for comparison and contrast writing; see section in pep1 or pep2 (especially VI.B) that deals with comparison and contrast writing

ts-lap - serious (illogical) overlap in the main points of the ts (and essay); faulty fleas-ticks-lice ts because components are out of alignment (e.g., fleas-ticks-atoms, fleas-ticks-elephants, fleas-ticks-oranges, fleas-ticks-insects)

ts-lit - problem with content, punctuation, or grammar of the thesis sentence in the literary analysis essay or essay about a piece of writing; see NNRRE or pep2-V.C

ts-lit/r - literary analysis thesis sentence is too restricted to particular components, including an incomplete list of such components; use more general phrasing: e.g., "several literary components help convey . . . "

ts-ord - order of points in the ts violated in the rest of the essay

ts-rn - first general sentence in the paragraph or essay needs a second, restricting sentence to better show where the paragraph is specifically heading; or, faulty restricting sentence follows the first general sentence

ts-rre - problem with the ts for the reading-response essay in Engl. 1101; see NNRRE

ts-rx - overall ts in par. 1 of essay is unnecessarily restrictive (to first of several points raised in essay)

tsb - weak or lacking topic sentences in essay's body paragraphs after the first paragraph; tsb should cover all material that follows in its paragraph

tsb#body - topic sentence of essay body paragraph not in accord with or doesn't cover all material in the rest of the paragraph

tsb-comp - faulty topic sentence for body paragraph in a comparison and contrast essay; see pep2-VI (on comparison and contrast essays)

tsb-lit - S1 of every P after P1p.1 should indicate main or minor theme(s) or idea(s) of the literary work, not straying into mere plot summary or narrow focus on some particular literary component or small part of the literary work

tsb-rep - topic sentence(s) in paragraph(s) following the first paragraph merely repeat in identical words the sentences or long phrases from the first paragraph--unacceptable repetitiousness in a short paper; cf. intro-b

tsb-rx - unnecessarily restrictive ts in essay body paragraph; ts doesn't cover all material of the paragraph

tsb-tu - tsb not clearly or explicitly enough connected to assigned or announced topic of the essay

ttl - problem of whether to use quotation marks or italics (underlining) for such titles -- never both together; see pep2-V.C3 and the material in the composition handbook and Roberts-Jacobs on when to use quotation marks and when to use underlining for titles

ttl-rdg - wrong or incorrect version of title of printed work

usg - violation of good usage or questionable usage (gl; LTUFW); problem in d-ov or ss-ov (see these abbreviations)

userdg - faulty use (including underuse) of the required reading in the reading-response essay, as per NNRRE

vf - weak or erroneous verb form (the latter often a result of tl)

vf2 - problem with similar verbs such as "lie-lay," "sit-set"

vf-aux - incorrect doubling of auxiliary verbs (e.g., "you might could even tell a person's favorite color")

vf-inf - incorrect inclusion of infinitive sign or marker (not "I had the dealer to repair my car" but "I had the dealer repair my car")

vf-seq - problem with sequence of tenses (be careful to use and keep consistent auxiliary or helping verbs, such as "could," "has," "have," "had," or "might")

vocab - a need is indicated to work on building vocabulary by way of doing more reading and doing the reading carefully, looking up words

vw - avoid vogue words (words or phrases from advertising, government, or popular culture that sound fancy and flare up in popularity, being overused until they fade--e.g., "no way") (cf. cw, gob, wdy)

5w's and h - see the f section of this handout

WII - Webster's II: New Riverside University Dictionary

WC - Works Cited

wc-ex - errors of fact in WC entry: e.g., wrong publisher, wrong editor(s), wrong author(s), or wrong place of publication

wc-m - Works Cited page missing

wc-om - necessary items of information omitted from Works Cited entry

wc-opt - faulty handling of order, punctuation, or typographical marks (e.g., qt vs. itl) in Works Cited entry

wc-p - faulty handling of parenthetical note (e.g., where parenthesis placed relative to punctuation marks of sentence, or material within the parenthesis, including faulty capitalization)

wc-pm - parenthetical note missing where it should be used

wc-pg - erroneous page number(s) cited for the literary work on the WC page

wc-pl - erroneous citation of place in WC entry: always city, or city and state, never just the state

wcvswcp - confusion between Works Cited entry and parenthetical documentation: the two should not be placed together; the works cited entry belongs only on the Works Cited page, and parenthetical documentation belongs only in the body of the essay itself; some composition handbooks for purposes of comparison-contrast show the two together, but with the understanding that they belong different places in the essay

wc-x - faulty handling of documentation (parenthetical footnoting, Works Cited page, amount of bibliographic information to be supplied, the manner or order in which the bibliographic information is to be supplied--e.g., whether first or last name placed first, correct punctuation of items, itl or qt)

wdy - wordy or verbose (cf. cw, gob, vw)

wdy-an - avoid announcing, circumambulatorily and circumlocutorily, what you're going to do; just do it); see the material on introductions in sections V, VII, VIII, X-XII of pep2, especially XII.A

wdy-I - in literary-analysis papers avoid such repetitive sentences as "After reading the text, I have formed several opinions about it. It showed me that man is an outsider from nature and a dreamer"; rather: "Wordsworth's poem 'I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud' shows/suggests/portrays ________________________" Likewise, avoid using "we" and "the reader" in sentences, which causes the same kind of wordiness

wdy-int - unnecessary use of an intensive or intensifier (e.g., not "he turned quite scarlet" but "he turned scarlet")

wdy-lit - special forms of wordiness in literary analysis writing (or writing about printed sources) that need to be avoided; see pep2-V.F and V.C2

wdy-pr - excessive predication (too many clauses); reduce clauses to phrases or even single adjectives

W[8][9][10]NCD - Webster's [Eighth][Ninth][Tenth] New Collegiate Dictionary

WNW[2][3][4]C - Webster's New World Dictionary, [Second] [Third] [Fourth] College Edition

ww - wrong word, word incorrectly used, or no such word

X - error; either obvious, or an error noted earlier in the essay or paper (often, just above)

X2,X3 - more than one of these errors on the line (e.g., vfX2 = two occurrences of vf on the line where vf placed)
 
 

^ - caret symbol used to indicate the position in the sentence or passage of the problem, or where something needs to be added

<--------> - these two problems or items are interrelated, causally; e.g., prim <----> P-coh = short choppy sentences cause paragraph to lack coherence or smooth flow

-----> - one problem causes or contributes to another (e.g., comb-sub ----> wdy; failure to combine and subordinate in sentences produces shorter sentences that are wordier than one or more longer sentences)

<----- - the first problem has been caused by the second; e.g., P-coh <--- prim means that paragraph coherence (the paragraph is too choppy and disconnected) has been caused in large part by prim (too many short, choppy sentences)
 

+ - plus of something; something done well: e.g., "+ ap" would mean good control of ap

+/- - pluses and minuses of something; e.g. "+/- ap" would mean some good uses of apostrophe but some mistakes as well

(!) - very important

* - repeated