capitalization - When should the word "English" be capitalized?


I am often confused how the word "English" should be written in phrases such as "English language", because I have seen both variants: capitalized and starting with lowercase letter.


What is the most accepted usage: "English language" or "english language"? And what about other possible usage of the adjective "english"?



Answer



If it is a proper noun, it must be capitalized.


If it is an adjective derived from a proper noun, it should retain its capitalization, according to this Wikipedia entry:



In English, adjectives derived from proper nouns (except the names of characters in fictional works) usually retain their capitalization
– e.g. a Christian church, Canadian whisky, a Shakespearean sonnet, but not a quixotic mission, malapropism, holmesian nor pecksniffian.


Where the original capital is no longer at the beginning of the word, usage varies: anti-Christian, but Presocratic or Pre-Socratic or presocratic (not preSocratic).



The "usually" might explain why you sometimes see "english" without any capitalization. The only case of "english" as a common noun would be in the context of pool, billiards or bowling games, as described by Wiktionary:



english (uncountable)



  1. (US) Spinning or rotary motion given to a ball around the vertical axis, as in billiards or bowling.


You can't hit it directly, but maybe if you give it some english.



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