Devika Panikar

A letter is a written message that can be handwritten or printed on paper. It is usually sent to the recipient via mail or post in an envelope, although this is not a requirement as such. Any such message that is transferred via post is a letter, a written conversation between two parties.

Meeting minutes, or MOM (for minutes of the meeting) can be defined as  the written record of everything that’s happened during a meeting.  They’re used to inform people who didn’t attend the meeting about what  happened or to keep track of what was decided during the meeting so that  you can revisit it and use it to inform future decisions.

Reports generally involve presenting your investigation and analysis of information or an issue, recommending actions and making proposals.

Reports are well researched, planned and organized documents that are written for a purpose. A report is written for a specific audience; it must always be accurate and objective. It is a concise document based on research that typically analyses a situation and sometimes makes recommendations.

Report writing is an essential skill in many disciplines. A report aims to inform and sometimes to persuade. They should be written as clearly and succinctly as possible, with evidence about a topic, problem or situation. Requirements for the precise form and content of a report will vary between organisation and departments and in the study between courses, from tutor to tutor, as well as between subjects, so it’s worth finding out if there are any specific guidelines before you start.

There is an old saying that America and Britain are “two nations divided by a common language.” While they are essentially the same, British and American English also differ a great deal, with some words holding completely different meanings depending on which side of the Atlantic you’re on.

Every email you write has the same basic structure: Subject line, greeting, email body, and closing. But as with every written form of professional communication, there’s a right way to do it and standards that should be followed.

Developing an effective paragraph -a combination of sentences joined cohesively together to further a focused topic -requires seven steps. Emily Layfield outlines these easy steps which will help one write an impeccable piece of writing: plan, gather, order, compose, elaborate, conclude and review. These seven steps apply to each of the four types -descriptive, expository, narrative and persuasive -of paragraphs.

A paragraph is a collection of sentences that all relate to one main idea or topic. Good writing in any form has the following characteristics, which is true of well-written paragraphs as well. The four main characteristics: a topic sentence, unity, coherence, and expansion and emphasis.

The beginning of the 20th century was marked by a new approach to grammar suggested by linguists like Ferdinand de Saussure and American linguists such as Franz Boas, Edward Sapir and Leonard Bloomfield. This school of linguistics is called Structuralism. It arose as a reaction against the approach of the traditional grammarians of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.