ABC Radio National

federal cabinet, shadow cabinet

golf caddie

tea caddy

unfeeling

hard skin

the dance

body of work (cannon is the weapon)

artists' material

solicit votes, opinion etc

one of the host cities of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, and the legislative capital of South Africa

We limit initial caps (apart from those marking the beginning of a sentence) to proper nouns—that is, nouns naming a particular person or thing. So we'd write 'Mark Scott, the ABC's managing director…' or 'John Smith, adjunct professor at ANU…'

No caps for 'premier', 'prime minister', 'president', 'executive producer', 'artistic director', 'curator', and so on, because these are all common nouns. When used as a form of address, a common noun is capped and becomes a title: President Obama, Queen Elizabeth, Pope Benedict, Governor Bartlett; but 'Australia's prime minister, Julia Gillard, is visiting New York…' or collectively, 'Previous popes have held similar views…' are all lower case.

when used as a verb means to rush headlong (careen is to keel over)

the boat cast off from the quay

we accept cast-off clothing

not catapault

Roman Catholic (but small c for catholic tastes)

no apostrophe

not cemetary

you voice your censure when you're censoring something

capitalised, but northern Australia not, as 'northern' is descriptive, not an official name

A listener has recommended that we avoid using epicentre to describe anything other than the point on the earth's surface directly above the central disturbance of an earthquake.

twentieth century, 21st century, the nineteen hundreds, the 80s

not chaffing

no need to capitalise. Same for general manager, chief executive, etc

no need to capitalise

when cited appear in single quotes

as chips

Chechen Republic, Chechen people, Chechen prime minister, Chechen war, Republic of Chechnya.

the birdsong

The Macquarie dictionary lists child care for 'the professional superintendence of children', followed by child-care centre and childcare worker. We prefer the one-word version for all uses.

musical chord, but spinal or vocal cord

but unchristian, and a child's christening

not civilization

George Orwell said, 'Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.' So in that spirit, please avoid phrases like these:

battle with cancer
raft of awards
at the end of the day
emotional rollercoaster
to name but a few (usually seen at the end of an exhaustive list)
anytime soon

(but cooperation, cooperative)

trademark so capitalise

no hyphen

large stadium or theatre (but Colosseum is the amphitheatre in Rome)

committee, jury, choir, audience: the audience were (plural) drifting in to the auditorium in ones and twos; the entire audience was (singular) on its feet. Use of singular or plural verb depends on how you want the collective noun to be understood.

is the South American country. Columbia is a city in the US state of South Carolina.

please use in headings and titles instead of dashes

the Roman amphitheatre. Coliseum for buildings in other countries.

On the RN website all punctuation should make sense grammatically, not just rhetorically. Marks you use to show pauses and intonation in your studio scripts won't necessarily work in online copy. For some comma rules follow the 'how to use commas' link below

compare like with like: yesterday's weather with today's. But compare two different things with the aim of finding similarities: compare her outfit to an unmade bed.

the full complement

a scarf would really complement that outfit

might describe angles, colours, medicine; and means completing a whole

you pay someone a compliment

I compliment you on your great dress sense

I was being complimentary when I said you had great dress sense. Free drinks or tickets are also complimentary.

understandable

inclusive

means consist of. So comprise of is wrong

means general agreement or concord, or majority of opinion (Macquarie) so 'opinion' is redundant in 'consensus of opinion'

we usually say something may have serious consequences for an existing situation. So the following doesn't sound right: '...the increasing numbers of jellyfish around the world are having serious consequences on the marine life status quo...' The writer may have been thinking of 'effect on'.

continual means continuing on with stops and starts; continuous means going on without stopping.

not convenor

(no hyphen)

Please use this wording on the RN website: For copyright reasons this [program, story, interview, etc] is not available as [streaming, downloadable audio etc] ... Please avoid platform-announcement style disclaimers beginning with 'Due to copyright restrictions...'

thin rope, vocal or spinal cord, but musical chord

writer or reporter, but co-respondent in a divorce case

the verb is to court-martial

a 40-year cover-up means the full story has only now come to light

intimidated (but to kowtow, from the Chinese, means to prostrate yourself before someone)

In a nation-wide crackdown, the government will crack down on welfare fraud.

and it's phenomena (plural) but phenomenon (singular)

not cross benchers

kitchen-cum-dining room

to restrain (kerb is the edge of the footpath)

Microsoft Word has a feature that changes straight quotes and apostrophes into curly quotes. Sometimes these display as something like this: ’ when published online. Here's how to turn them off in Word:

dried fruit

electricity or water

use 'now'

means where two points meet. It doesn't mean on the verge of. Your birthday can be on the cusp of two star signs, but you can't be on the cusp of adulthood.

useful keyboard shortcuts in MS Word: Ctrl+A highlights all text, Ctrl+C copies it, and Ctrl+V pastes it to a new place or a new document. On a Mac 'Ctrl' is the Apple key.

cyclone Tracy, tropical cyclone Aivu, hurricane Andrew