Pearson Reference Guide

This is the eBook of the printed book and may not include any media, website access codes, or print supplements that may come packaged with the bound book.

For first year composition courses.

Tried-and-true advice at every stage in the writing process

The Prentice Hall Reference Guide, 10th Edition is a tabbed, spiral-bound handbook written to help all writers quickly find the information they need, without necessarily knowing the proper terminology. A series of “portals” guide learners to the answers to writing, research, and grammar-related questions. The compact, four-color design makes this book easy to use. The result of many years of field testing, this handbook offers guidance at every stage of the writing process from instructors who have over 30 years of combined experience, all while using language students will understand.

The 10th Edition has been extensively revised to provide the most updated and easiest-to-use writing instruction. It now features more coverage of critical thinking and reading, and examples of interactions with texts, student writing, and explanatory graphics.

Prentice Hall Reference Guide, 10th Edition is also available via Revel™, an interactive learning environment that enables students to read, practice, and study in one continuous experience. Learn more.

Muriel Harris, Emerita Professor of English, Purdue University, started the Purdue University Writing Lab in 1975, with the help of several graduate students. Later, with graduate student assistance, she developed the extensive OWL website of instructional pages on writing skills and grammar. Drawing on this experience, she authored The Prentice Hall Reference Guide and The Writer’s FAQs, both later co-authored with Jennifer Kunka. These books originated after explaining to a Prentice Hall editor that composition handbooks are unhelpful because too many students found them difficult to use. When the editor challenged her to write textbooks that would be student friendly and easy to use, these reference handbooks were her answer and have since gone through multiple editions. Harris also initiated and continues to edit the Writing Lab Newsletter, now renamed as WLN: A Journal of Writing Center Scholarship. She continually champions writing center collaboration as a highly effective instructional context for working with writers. Because of her fervent interest in helping writers develop into effective communicators, she is firmly committed to one-to-one collaboration between tutors and writers as a particularly successful partnership with classroom teachers of writing. Her CV list of books, book chapters, articles, and conference presentations, all of which focus on the theory, pedagogy, and administrative work of writing center professionals, is available on the Purdue University Department of English’s website section for retired faculty.  She is most proud–and awed by–her husband, their children, children’s spouses, and grandchildren.

Jennifer Liethen Kunka is an Associate Professor of English and Director of the Writing Center at Francis Marion University. She earned her Ph.D. in English from Purdue University, along with a secondary specialization in feminist theory and women's studies. She teaches Business Writing and British Literature. Her research involves writing center theory and practice, tech-enhanced writing, and research writing. She also is a specialist in 19th and 20th-century British literature, focusing on issues of gender and class in the novel.  Dr. Kunka served on the original Gender Studies Steering Committee, and on the Gender Studies Advisory Committee.

TAB 1. FAQs & How To’s Question & Correct Compare & Correct

FAQs & How To’s FAQ

Question & Correct

Compare & Correct

TAB 2. Reading and Writing Processes

1. Thinking About Reading and Writing

2. Reading and Writing Processes and Strategies

3. Paragraphs

4. Designing Papers and Projects

TAB 3. Reading and Writing for College and Career

5. Reading and Writing in the Disciplines

6. Reading and Writing About Literature

7. Critical Reading, Thinking, and Arguing

8. Visual Argument

9. Professional Writing

10. Writing for Assessment

TAB 4. Revising Sentences for Accuracy, Clarity, and Variety

11. Comma Splices and Fused Sentences

12. Subject—Verb Agreement

13. Sentence Fragments

14. Dangling and Misplaced Modifiers

15. Parallel Constructions

16. Consistency (Avoiding Shifts)

17. Faulty Predication

18. Coordination and Subordination

19. Sentence Clarity

20. Transitions

21. Sentence Variety

TAB 5. Parts of Sentences

22. Verbs

23. Nouns and Pronouns

24. PRonoun Case and Reference

25. Adjectives and Adverbs

26. Prepositions

27 Subjects

28. Phrases

29. Clauses

30. Essential and Nonessential Clauses and Phrases

31. Sentences

TAB 6. Style and Word Choice

32. Style Versus Grammar

33. General and Specific Language

34. Glossary of Usage

35. Conciseness and Wordiness

36. Passive Versus Active Voice

37. Unnecessary and Inappropriate Language

38. Appropriate Language

39. Gender-Inclusive Language

TAB 7. Punctuation

40. Commas

41. Apostrophes

42. Semicolons

43. Colons

44. Quotation Marks

45. Hyphens

46. End Punctuation

47. Other Punctuation

TAB 8. Mechanics and Spelling

48. Capitals

49. Abbreviations

50. Numbers

51. Italics

52. Spelling

TAB 9. For Multilingual Writers

53. American Style in Writing

54. Verbs

55. Omitted and Repeated Words

56. Pronouns and Adverbs

57. Count and Noncount Nouns

58. Adjectives and Adverbs

59. Prepositions

60. Idioms

TAB 10. Research

61. Finding a Topic

62. Choosing Primary and Secondary Sources

63. Searching Libraries and Library Databases

64. Using Web Resources

65. Conducting First-hand Research

66. Evaluating Sources

67. Collecting Information

68. Using Sources and Avoiding Plagiarism

69. Writing the Research Paper

TAB 11. MLA Documentation

70. Documenting in MLA Style

TAB 12. APA, CMOS, and CSE Documentation  

71. Documenting in APA Style

72. Chicago Manual of Style (CMOS)

73. Council of Science Editors (CSE) Style

74. Resources for Other Styles

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