that’s the first thing that we’re told when we are learning to write: make sure names, months, and beginning of sentences are all capitalized. why? we all can read this post just fine. as long as there are not spelling or grammar errors we’re fine right? so why the emphasis on capitalization? 

today was a fairly slow day. just as any other tuesday, i found myself waiting for 5:10, so that i could trek over to douglass room 201 and listen to my professor read straight from the book. (word-for-word) every time he scratched something on the board the class went, “ahhh…. that’s what he’s talkin’ about!” needless to say he wrote in all capitals. what did i think of it at the time? … to be honest, nothing. i just figured i would find that same word in the book, used in the same manor, and in the same sentence word-for-word. 

having trouble reading this yet?… didn’t think so. 

let me tell you something: i write all my notes in lower case. i write my drafts in lower case. i write all my poems, short stories, long stories, medium stories … yea … lower case. so what’s the big deal? why are we told to capitalize? 

here’s the bottom line: it’s because we as people have a flicker or arrogance in each one of us. how would you feel if you got an official document and your name was lower cased and everyone else’s was “normally” written? that would bother you right? it would bother me. my first thought would be: what? is jon-michael washington not important enough to get his name in caps? not that serious to you huh? well, it matters to me. 

we also capitalize to create emphasis. just as i said before, my professor scratched those words in capitals, not lower case. and just as you know someone is mad at you (you know, when they write in all caps: FUCK YOU!) it’s because they don’t want you to miss anything. didn’t miss that did you? you probably saw it before you read the paragraph right? figured you did! 

well, that’s about it. we only do it for two reasons: arrogance and emphasis. . .