EPL; Esoteric Principles of Light

EPL- INFORMATION FOR YOUR BUILDING SOUL

by Richard Nordquist

Updated April 04, 2017

The basic guidelines for using capital letters in English appear simple enough:

• Capitalize the first word in a sentence.
• Capitalize the pronoun I.
• Capitalize proper nouns and most adjectives formed from proper nouns.

But things become tricky once we get down to the details. That's when even the most exhaustive style guides (such as the AP Stylebook and The Chicago Manual of Style) occasionally disagree.

In addition, there may be regional disagreements. As Pam Peters has observed, "British writers and editors are more inclined to use capital letters where Americans would dispense with them" (The Cambridge Guide to English Usage).

So don't regard these "rules" as the final word. If your organization has a house-styleguide, stay in house. And if you run across a word or phrase not covered by these guidelines, consult a dictionary.

One final note: in these guidelines capitalize means to use upper case for the first letter of a word.