Style guide

(GCSE) not A-star

accident and emergency

are, like cathedrals, capped up: Westminster Abbey, Canterbury Cathedral, etc

Do not use full points in abbreviations, or spaces between initials, including those in proper names: US, mph, eg, 4am, lbw, No 10, AL Rowse, OJ Simpson, WH Smith, etc.

Use all capitals if an abbreviation is pronounced as the individual letters: BBC, VAT etc; if it is an acronym (pronounced as a word) spell out with initial capital, eg Nasa, Nato, unless it can be considered to have entered the language as an everyday word, such as awol, laser and, more recently, asbo, pin number and sim card.

If an abbreviation or acronym is to be used more than once, put it in brackets at first mention, eg Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), seasonal affective disorder (Sad). This saves people having to search back through the article to find the original reference.

Cap up single letters in such expressions as C-list, F-word, "the word assassin contains four Ss", etc
see contractions

uc when referring to native Australians

lc when referring to indigenous populations

but absorption

the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, at first mention; thereafter just Acas

Use on French, German, Spanish and Irish Gaelic words (but not anglicised French words such as cafe, apart from exposé, résumé, roué, lamé).

People's names, in whatever language, should also be given appropriate accents where known. Thus: "Arsène Wenger was on holiday in Bogotá with Gérard Houllier"

formerly Andersen Consulting

has been known as contact since the 1989 Children Act
see custody

not acknowledgement

Use hectares, with acres in brackets, rounded up: eg the field measured 25 hectares (62 acres).

You multiply hectares by 2.47 to convert to acres, or acres by 0.4 to convert to hectares

see abbreviations and acronyms

uc when using full name, eg Criminal Justice Act 1998, Official Secrets Act; but lc on second reference, eg "the act", and when speaking in more general terms, eg "we need a radical freedom of information act"; bills remain lc until passed into law

always lc: acting prime minister, acting committee chair, etc

for both male and female actors; do not use actress except when in name of award, eg Oscar for best actress; one 27-year-old actor contacted the Guardian to say "actress" has acquired a faintly pejorative tinge and she wants people to call her actor (except for her agent, who should call her often).

As always, use common sense: a piece about the late film director Carlo Ponti was edited to say that in his early career he was "already a man with a good eye for pretty actors" ... As the readers' editor pointed out in the subsequent clarification: "This was one of those occasions when the word 'actresses' might have been used"

AD goes before the date (AD64), BC goes after (300BC); both go after the century, eg second century AD, fourth century BC

not adaption

someone who adapts; adaptor plug

plural addendums

Latinate -um neuter endings that are a part of the language - cf stadium- take an (s) plural. Exceptions: media, bacteria, which retain the Latin plural and also take a plural verb

90 York Way, London N1 9GU

initial cap

the Obama administration, etc

not -able

Take care; as the great Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee put it: "No story is fair if reporters hide their biases and emotions behind such subtly pejorative words as refused, despite, admit and massive"

Mention that children are adopted only when relevant to the story: a reader points out that "explicitly calling attention to adoptions in this way suggests that adoption is not as good, and not as real a relationship, as having a child normally".

So say biological father, biological family rather than "real father", "real family", etc

TM; a brand of adrenaline

hormone that increases heart rate and blood pressure, extracted from animals or synthesised for medical uses

Do not use hyphens after adverbs ending in -ly, eg a hotly disputed penalty, a constantly evolving newspaper, genetically modified food, etc; but hyphens are needed with short and common adverbs, eg ever-forgiving family, ill-prepared report, much-loved character, well-founded suspicion

not advisor

member of the Scottish bar (not a barrister)

exhortations in the style guide had no effect (noun) on the number of mistakes; the level of mistakes was not affected (verb) by exhortations in the style guide; we hope to effect (verb) a change in this

a written declaration made on oath, so "sworn affidavit" is tautologous

with or between, not to or for

people

currency of Afghanistan

plural aficionados

not Afro-Caribbean

language

person

cattle breed

Gordon Brown, 56 (not "aged 56"); little Johnny, four; the woman was in her 20s (but twentysomething, thirtysomething, etc)

to make worse, not to annoy

despite the once popular terrace chant "A, G, A-G-R, A-G-R-O: agro!"

avoid, use before or in advance of

plural aides-de-camp (aide is a noun)

plural aide-memoires (aide is a verb)

acquired immune deficiency syndrome, but normally no need to spell out.

Don't use such terms as "Aids victims" or someone "suffering from Aids", language that in the words of one reader is "crass, inaccurate and reinforces stigma", implying helplessness and inviting pity; "people with Aids" (or "living with Aids") is preferable

designations usually take hyphens after initials, e.g. B-52, MiG-23

US president's jet

see cabin attendant

Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted (normally no need to say airport); Liverpool John Lennon airport, Schiphol airport, etc

also known as

see arms akimbo

(note lc and hyphen) before an Arabic name means "the" so try to avoid writing "the al- ..." where possible
see Arabic names

Alastair Campbell
Alastair Cook (Essex and England cricketer)
Alastair Hetherington

Alistair Cooke (former BBC and Guardian journalist)
Alistair Darling
Alistair Maclean
Alistair McGowan

Aleister Crowley

former US secretary of state

(1832-88) American author of Little Women

plural of alga; algal bloom not algae bloom

being somewhere else; not synonymous with excuse

as worn by Alice in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass (1871) and more recently David Beckham

etc, but to refer to "C-list celebrities" and its variations has become tedious. An edition of G2 referred to "D-list celebrities" and, less than hilariously, in a separate piece about the same reality TV show, "Z-list celebrities"

Arabic for "the God". Both words refer to the same concept: there is no major difference between God in the Old Testament and Allah in Islam. Therefore it makes sense to talk about "God" in an Islamic context and to use "Allah" in quotations or for literary effect

"God is greatest"

Chilean author, niece of Salvador

Chilean president, overthrown and killed in 1973

second world war allies, etc

not "all mouth and no trousers"

is right; alright is not all right (but note the Who song, much loved by generations of headline writers, was The Kids are Alright)

Oxford, no apostrophe

(not Nuri) became prime minister of Iraq in 2006

arm's-length management organisation

Spanish film-maker

often redundant

dog

person from Alsace

often redundant

we have been known to spell it "altar ego" (to be used only as a headline on a story about an arrogant bishop)

normally a choice between two courses of action; if there are more than two, option or choice may be preferred; beware the trend to use "alternate" instead of alternative: in a piece about French politics we wrote "in this juddering alternate reality …"

plural alumni

member of the Welsh assembly, eg Rhodri Morgan AM

normally no need for com or co.uk

lc, eg the British ambassador to Washington; "ambassador, you are spoiling us"

not ambiance

although like most people we use to mean the United States and its citizens, we should remember that America includes all of North and South America

In general, use British English spellings: secretary of defence, Labour Day, World Trade Centre, etc; exceptions are placenames such as Ann Arbor, Pearl Harbor

not American Civil Rights Union

Take care: "University of X" is not the same as "X University"; most states have two large public universities, eg University of Kentucky and Kentucky State University, University of Illinois and Illinois State University, etc.

Do not call Johns Hopkins University "John Hopkins" or Stanford University "Stamford"

Irish national anthem

trade union formed by a merger between the AEEU and MSF, now part of Unite after a further merger with the TGWU

not amidst

not amuck

not amongst

Contrary to popular myth, between is not limited to two parties. It is appropriate when the relationship is essentially reciprocal: fighting between the many peoples of Yugoslavia, treaties between European countries. Among belongs to distributive relationships: shared among, etc

use in company names when the company does: Marks & Spencer, P&O

plural analyses

precede descendants; we frequently manage to get them the wrong way round

not Andersen

pronoun "it" unless gender established

verb

noun

see appendix 2: the editor's guidelines on the identification of sources

is not a superlative of thin. Anorexia is an illness. Like schizophrenia, it should not be used as a cheap and lazy metaphor. Anyone who thinks of using a phrase such as "positively anorexic" should think again. Very hard

TM; use answering machine or answerphone

(insect) plural antennae; (radio) plural antennas

take action in expectation of; not synonymous with expect

plural apexes

two words

"an insect that lands at random on the printed page, depositing an apostrophe wherever it lands" according to the Guardian's former readers' editor

plural appendices

not Computers

lc: cox's orange pippin, golden delicious, granny smith, etc

to evaluate

to inform

plural aquariums

Both a noun and an adjective, and the preferred adjective when referring to Arab things in general, eg Arab history, Arab traditions. Arabic usually refers to the language and literature: "the Arabic press" means newspapers written in Arabic, while "the Arab press" would include newspapers produced by Arabs in other languages.

There is no simple definition of an Arab. At an international level, the 22 members of the Arab League can safely be described as Arab countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. At a human level, there are substantial groups within those countries – the Berbers of north Africa and the Kurds, for example – who do not regard themselves as Arabs

Though Arabic has only three vowels – a, i and u – it has several consonants that have no equivalent in the Roman alphabet. For instance, there are two kinds of s, d and t. There are also two glottal sounds. This means there are at least 32 ways of writing the Libyan leader Muammar Gadafy's name in English, and a reasonable argument can be made for adopting almost any of them. With no standard approach to transliteration agreed by the western media, we must try to balance consistency, comprehensibility and familiarity – which often puts a strain on all three.

Typically, Arabs have at least three names. In some cases the first or second name may be the one that is most used, and this does not imply familiarity (Arabs often address foreigners politely as "Mr John" or "Dr David"). Often Arabs also have familiar names that have no connection with the names on their identity cards: a man might become known after the birth of his first son as "Abu Ahmad", and a woman as "Umm Ahmad", the father or mother of Ahmad (eg the Palestinian leader Ahmed Qureia is commonly known as Abu Ala).

Where a particular spelling has become widely accepted through usage we should retain it. Where an individual with links to the west has clearly adopted a particular spelling of his or her own name, we should respect that. For breaking news and stories using names for which we have no established style, we take the lead given by Reuters wire copy.

Note also that names in some parts of the Arab world have become gallicised, while others have become anglicised, eg the leading Egyptian film director Youssef Chahine uses a French spelling instead of the English transliteration, Shaheen.