A Writing Question
 

I have another question that is bugging me :)

When writing an article or just blogging is it correct English to start a sentence with And ?

Or is it in context that And can be used ?

I remember at school ( all those years ago ) that starting a sentence with And was incorrect.
What is everyone's thoughts on this ?

Jason

Re: A Writing Question
 

I personally feel that starting a sentence with And is wrong, as far as grammar is concerned. If you're writing an ad it's not as important, but when it comes to articles I think they should be as grammatically correct as possible. That's just my opinion. I try to avoid it and change the sentence around if I have to.

Hope that helps,

Alan

Re: A Writing Question
 

First of all, on the lighter side, you said the question is bugging you and you are still smiling?

Now seriously, whether in or out of school, using "And" at the beginning of a sentence remains incorrect.

You must however pardon some Internet Marketers when they do this as you must realise that their priority is first of all internet marketing rather than English and except for someone whose background is very thorough in English, some grammatical mistakes will arise.

Don't forget that English is just one medium to convey Internet Marketing information accross to others. Other media can be german, french, latin etc.

A perfect example here is Ewen Chia, whose country's lingua franca is not English and is acknowledged as one of the topmost Affiliate marketers. He would naturally be more coherent conveying his ideas accross in his country's lingua franca than in English, yet this does not detract from the fact that he is a top internet marketer.

On the other hand, you find others whose first language is not English being more thorough than some whose first language is English, apparently because of their background, training and experience.

Secondly, where English is the lingua franca of the country of the person making grammatical errors, you should realise that the internet is faceless so you do not really know the background, training and experience of the person and so you cannot associate him with the level of authority/standing you perharps are associating him with, until you do a thorough research on him.

Re: A Writing Question
 

Jason,
You might be right. I haven't been in school for some time now and sometimes it shows. However, I do use the word "and" sometimes when I am writing. I do use it at the beginning of a sentence. And sometime I just use it the way I just started this sentence. But I never use it as the very opening of an article because using that word is in conjunction with what was previously said.
Now starting a paragraph is another story.

Re: A Writing Question
 

Well Jason - even aussies cant really get away with 'and' at the start of a sentence!.........lol
I say that forum posting, marketing ads and the like can probably cope with a grammatical area but for shear professionalism's sake, when writing an article - it should show your expertise! (with English for a start!)

And, have a nice day!.........lol
Kym

Re: A Writing Question
 

Jason,

starting a sentence with "And" is definitely not correct. When writing on the Internet, it is just as important to use correct grammar as when writing a letter or any other correspondence. On the Internet, an article with incorrect grammar is a really big turn off for people.

Frank

Re: A Writing Question
 

What's right for some may not be right for others. Many people, especially English majors..Ü are sometimes offended when they believe the English language is being butchered..specifically when writers begin a sentence with AND or But. Many English majors do not believe any sentence should begin with a conjunction.

You may get your point across using "and" or "but to begin your sentences, "but", the actual sentence may be improved when and or but become clauses in a compound sentence.

Today we begin our study of the history of California "and" the influence of the Spanish-American war on the cultural environment of Southern California.

My suggestion is to always consider whether your conjunction would read more naturally as shown in the previous sentence or if it would loose it's emphasis if you removed it from the beginning of a sentence.

Personally, I prefer not to begin a sentence or a paragraph with a conjunction and I'm not an English major.

Allen

Re: A Writing Question
 

Good post. And great responses. :)