Style guide

race at a racecourse or racetrack and are listed in a racecard

Do not use "ethnic" to mean black or Asian people. In a British sense, they are an ethnic minority; in a world sense, of course, white people are an ethnic minority.

Just as in the Balkans or anywhere else, internal African peoples should be called ethnic groups or communities rather than "tribes".

Avoid the word "immigrant", which is very offensive to many black and Asian people, not only because it is often incorrectly used to describe people who were born in Britain, but also because it has been used negatively for so many years that it carries imagery of "flooding", "swamping", "bogus", "scroungers" etc.

The words black and Asian should not be used as nouns, but adjectives: black people rather than "blacks", an Asian woman rather than "an Asian", etc.

Say African-Caribbean rather than Afro-Caribbean

one's brains for something

by guilt, with pain, not wracked

not racquets, except in club titles

Royal Academy of Dramatic Art

takes x-rays

reads them

Irish public broadcasting corporation

plural radii

something Huck Finn and Jim were on when they floated down the river; do not say "a raft of measures", which has very rapidly become a cliche (particularly in political reporting)

redundant array of independent disks (data storage)

train station is now acceptable

for girls from five (four in Northern Ireland) to seven, at which point they may become Brownies

month of fasting for Muslims

ex-footballing chef but note that England's World Cup-winning manager in 1966 was Alf Ramsey

where Neighbours become good friends

no hyphen

for police, army and navy, spell out in full first time, then just use the surname

not Glasgow Rangers

TM

TM; it's OK to call them Ray-Bans

Use re- (with hyphen) when followed by the vowels e or u (not pronounced as "yu"): eg re-entry, re-examine, re-urge.

Use re (no hyphen) when followed by the vowels a, i, o or u (pronounced as "yu"), or any consonant: eg rearm, rearrange, reassemble, reiterate, reorder, reread, reuse, rebuild, reconsider.

Exceptions (where confusion with another word would arise): re-cover/recover, re-form/reform, re-creation/recreation, re-sign/resign

lc, no accent

Rear Admiral Horatio Hornblower at first mention, thereafter Adm Hornblower in leading articles, otherwise just Hornblower

a traditionally prestigious accent, associated with public schools and used by an estimated 3% of the population of England, also known as BBC English, Oxford English or the Queen's English; nothing to do with Standard English, which includes written as well as spoken language and can be (indeed, normally is) spoken with a regional accent

avoid: if the date is relevant, use it

university; the original six were Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield

plural referendums

not reafforestation

to form again

to change for the better; we should not take the initiators' use of the word at its face value, particularly in cases where we believe no improvement is likely. Thus, while the Great Reform Act is, at a push, correct, a new set of education reforms is not – or not necessarily so

use this much abused word only when an argument is disproved; otherwise contest, deny, rebut

plural, of royalty; "royal regalia" is tautologous

with regard to not with regards to (but of course you give your regards to Broadway)

no accent

lc, eg East of England regional assembly; there are eight of them, representing English regions outside London, represented collectively by the English Regions Network

not registry office

noun, repellent adjective: you fight repellent insects with an insect repellant

an individual's range of skills or roles

a selection of works that a theatre or dance company might perform

the Lawrence report, etc; use report on or inquiry into but not report into, ie not "a report into health problems"

When a comment in the present tense is reported, use past tense: "She said: 'I like chocolate'" (present tense) becomes in reported speech "she said she liked chocolate").

When a comment in the past tense is reported, use "had" (past perfect tense): "She said: 'I ate too much chocolate'" (past tense) becomes in reported speech "she said she had eaten too much chocolate" (not "she said she ate too much chocolate").

Once it has been established who is speaking, there is no need to keep attributing, so long as you stick to the past tense: "Alex said he would vote Labour. There was no alternative. It was the only truly progressive party," etc

lc (except for US and other political parties)

has a rather old-fashioned feel to it, especially in the deadly form "local residents"; on the whole, better to call them people

see terrorism, terrorists

not restauranteur

prices not price, but normally no need to spell it out

formerly the National Schizophrenia Fellowship

at first mention, thereafter use courtesy title: eg the Rev Joan Smith, subsequently Ms Smith if honorific is needed; never say "Reverend Smith", "the Reverend Smith" or "Rev Smith"

last book in the New Testament: not Revelations, a very common error; its full name is The Revelation of St John the Divine

acceptable shorthand for HM Revenue and Customs, formed in 2005 from a merger of the Inland Revenue and HM Customs and Excise

do not call it rheumatism or arthritis, but it can be abbreviated to RA after first mention

(not Riba) Royal Institute of British Architects

tautologous, as padi is the Malay word for rice; so it should be paddy fields or simply paddies

expresses the magnitude of an earthquake, but now largely superseded by the moment magnitude scale

to flick through a book, newspaper or magazine; often confused with rifle, to search or ransack and steal from, eg rifle goods from a shop

nouns

adjective

lc, eg river Thames, Amazon river

is what Bo Diddley played: R&B is the stuff of Beyoncé

Royal National Institute of Blind People (no longer "the Blind")

you rob a person or a bank, using force or the threat of violence; but you steal a car or a bag of money

cap if referring to Gibraltar

one word

no accent

TM; say inline skates

one word

(lottery)

The archbishop of Birmingham, Cardiff, Glasgow, Liverpool, St Andrew's, Southwark and Westminster: insert Roman Catholic only to avoid confusion, the Roman Catholic bishop of Aberdeen, Argyll, Lancaster, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Shrewsbury (for all of which there are Anglican bishops). Unless obviously Roman Catholic from the text, the Roman Catholic bishop of Brentwood, Clifton, Dunkeld, Galloway, Hexham and Newcastle, Leeds, Menevia, Middlesbrough, Motherwell, Northampton, Nottingham, Paisley and Salford.

In British setting use Roman Catholic in describing Roman Catholic organisations and individuals and wherever an Anglican could argue ambiguity (eg "the Catholic Church"). But Catholic is enough in most overseas contexts (eg. Ireland, France, Italy, Latin America)

noun, adjective; Roma plural

plural of roof (not rooves, which has appeared in the paper)

roll-on, roll-off ferry

psychological test based on the interpretation of inkblots

They are routeing buses through the city centre after the routing of the protesters

(no apostrophe) Coronation Street's pub

usually known as the Royal Academy

or RAF

(Edinburgh)

(London), also known as Kew Gardens or simply Kew

the college or the royal college is preferable to the RCS on subsequent mention

marines after first mention

or the navy

RSA after first mention; its full name is Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce

do not normally need to be spelt out

(1577-1640) Flemish painter

Indian currency

Indonesian currency