oxford_guide_to_english_grammar

7 SPOKEN ENGLISH AND WRITTEN ENGLISH PAGE 74
6 Capital letters
We use a capital letter in these places,
a
At the beginning of a sentence,
b For the pronoun I.
c
With the names of people: Jason Donovan, Agatha Christie. Titles also have a
capital: Doctor Owen, Mrs Whitehouse, Uncle William.
NOTE
Words like doctor and father have a capital when they are a title, or when we use them to
address someone.
Talking to someone Talking about someone
Mrs Whitehouse Mrs Whitehouse
Doctor Owen/Doctor Doctor Owen/the doctor
Professor Jones Professor Jones/the professor/the Professor
Father/Dad
my father/my dad/my Dad
Grandma
my grandma/my Grandma/Grandma
Uncle William
my uncle/Uncle William/my Uncle William
d
e
With the names of places: Australia, New York, Oxford. When a noun is part of a
name, it has a capital letter too: the River Aire, the Humber Bridge, Fifth Avenue,
Paddington Station.
With some expressions of time such as the names of days and months: Tuesday,
April; special days: New Year's Day, Easter Sunday; historical periods and
important events: the Modern Age, the First World War.
f With nationality words: a French singer, I'm learning Greek.
g
h
With the titles of books, newspapers, films and so on: Animal Farm, The Daily
Telegraph.
NOTE In titles, grammatical words often have a small letter: Strangers oka Train.
In most abbreviations which are formed from the first letters of each word in a
phrase: the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation).