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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Thanks, tsuwm, for the enlightening citations...knew you'd come through.  So, then according to the Mencken piece, capitilization didn't steady it's course to what it is today, until perhaps the 1930's, having even swung far into a strong non-capitilization movement first? And, that being so recent, can it then be said that the process of English capitalization is still in gestation today (I never though of *grammar as being so fluid...i.e. descriptive grammar)aside from the established convention of the word at the beginning of a sentence? I always surmised grammar to be something more concrete, with, perhaps, consensual scholalry changes from era to era.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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>So, then according to the Mencken piece, capitilization didn't steady it's course to what it is today, until perhaps the 1930's,
make that the 1830's (HLM wrote his tome in 1921).
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Carpal Tunnel
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never though of *grammar as being so fluid...i.e. descriptive grammar
Even prescriptive grammar has had its fads and fancies. I could dig some up but it'd take me a bit.
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old hand
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old hand
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I've been trying to nail down a revised contract with a major client of ours for the past 18 months.
In one small aspect their latest revision of the draft annoyed me - where I'd written "...the Supplier's Engineer or Technician...", they'd replaced the capital T in Technician for a lower case t.
Petty, and in my politically correct world, arrogant and unnecessary.
stales
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Carpal Tunnel
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From tsuwm's link: these were the ancestors of our smalls. Never really thought of my smalls having ancestors  . Bingley
Bingley
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In reply to:
writers felt free to capitalize any word they felt like capitalizing
Or inserting Apostrophes wherever They wished?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Or hyphens, even?
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addict
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addict
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Or , commas!!!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Almost makes you feel naughty like running around without knickers, doesn't it? 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Depends whether your knickers have ancestors, I suppose.
Bingley
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