Hello all!
I am a chemist-in-training who is particularly interested in nuclear chemistry and it's real world applications. I do not inject my personal opinions into articles, I have a blog for that and recommend that opinionated persons get one and keep their personal beliefs out of Wikipedia.
I believe in strong sources for articles, and I'm willing to jump right in and remove things that are poorly sourced or completely unsourced.
I also have a secondary interest in the field of anthropology and human cultures. So I may end up doing a lot of editing there, especially regarding the various religions of the world.
I believe in the Strunk & White admonition: "Avoid unnecessary words." So my edits do tend to cull redundancies in articles and sentences. Wikipedia should be easy to read; not just an amalgamation of related, but dissociated, information hurled at the reader.
PLEASE leave non-controversial articles that need improvement in my talk page.
Believe it or not, I don't want to be a Wikipedian who only ever edits controversial articles or articles in a small subset of topics, but I'm drawn to them since they often need the most improvement- especially regarding sources. I'd be more than happy to edit articles about sea urchins or beards if they need stylistic or other editing.
English Grammar Basics (That people regularly ignore)
editApostrophes
editFor reference, the following outlines the basics of the apostrophe:
- It is not for emphasis.
- It is never used to denote plurals
Plural Possessive: After the plural normal plural "s", or if the plural does not end with "s" (e.g. "oxen") after the added "s".
- Examples:
"All the creeks' beds in Overton County are polluted with trash."
"The oxens' yoke was broken, and farmer Grumbert had to go into town to buy another."
Can you tell that oxen is the only irregular plural I can think of right now? Ooh! Geese!
Singular possessive:
Add an "s" to any word, preceded by an apostrophe. Any word whatsoever. People tend to inject an apostrophe before an existing "s" in a singular. E.g. "Starbuck's" "Hama's" or they will treat it like a plural, "Starbucks'" "Hamas'". Both of these uses of the apostrophe are wrong. Even if it already ends in an "s", you still make it possessive by adding an "s" and preceding it with an apostrophe.
- Example:
"Star Jones's mother likes candied apples."
Admittedly this can lead to more awkward seeming successions of "s".
"The young lass's ice-cream fell right out of the cone."
Contractions:
Apostrophes are used in contractions. Generally contractions aren't much use in an encyclopedia, but they'll appear from time to time. The thing to remember is that apostrophes show up where letters ordinarily belong. It's not a hard-and-fast rule. There are words like "cannot" that have been contracted as "ca'n't" ("shall not" as "sha'n't") that are no longer contracted this way. Generally restrict yourself to the final apostrophe and leave it at that (e.g. "can't" "shan't").
- Example:
"Can't touch this! Hammer time!"