Style Guide

M

mailing

  • See addresses.

 major, minor

  • May be used as a noun or verb: His major is computer science, but he minored in economics. She majored in mechanical engineering and minored in psychology.
  • Lowercase names of majors and minors except proper nouns: political science, art, but Middle East studies.

 man, mankind

  • Either may be used to refer to both men and women. Lowercase.
  • Preferable to use humanity, humans, people or individuals instead.

 mathematics

  • Not math.

 measurements

  • Spell out all measurements in running text: inches, miles, millimeters, centimeters, kilometers, percent: She got a ticket because she was traveling at 140 kilometers per hour. She scored 99 percent on her exam.

 medieval, Medieval

  • Capitalize when referring to the Middle Ages; otherwise, lowercase: the Medieval Knight, their medieval methods.

 medium, media

  • Medium is singular; media is plural: The Internet is rapidly taking over television as a medium of information and entertainment. Media outlets across the country bloated the issue.

 metro

  • Capitalize when referring to the formal name of the transit system: The Greater Cairo Underground Metro solved one of the city’s chronic problems.
  • Lowercase when usage is generic: I ride the metro to school.

 mid-

  • Generally, no hyphen in words with mid- as prefix: midterm; midsemester, midyear.
  • Capitalize only when a pronoun follows: mid-America; mid-Pacific.
  • Use hyphen when it precedes a figure: mid-1970s.

 Middle East

  • Capitalize in all references. Do not abbreviate as ME.
  • Do not be repetitive by using the word region after Middle East.

 midnight

  • Not 12 am or 12 midnight.

 millennium

  • Lowercase.

 million, billion

  • Use figures with the words million, billion: There are more than 2 million people living in the city.
  • Use figures up to two decimal places: 7.55 billion.
  • Do not mix million and billion in the same figure.
    • Incorrect: 2 billion, 700 million.
    Correct: 2.7 billion.
  • Do not drop the word million or billion from the first figure in a range.
    • Incorrect: $2 - $6 million (unless you mean two dollars to six million dollars).
    Correct: $2 million to $6 million.
  • No hyphen is used when million or billion are used as adjectives:
    • Incorrect: The university is launching a $300-million campaign.
    • Correct: The university is launching a $300 million campaign.
     

El Mogama

  • The large government building on Tahrir Square, across from the Main Campus.

money

  • See currency.

 months

  • Spell out and capitalize months in running text.
  • When writing a month and a year, do not separate the year with a comma: February 2005.
  • When writing a month, day and year, set off the year with a comma: January 15, 1997.
  • In tabular format, where space is limited, abbreviate the months in three letter forms without periods: Jan, Feb, Mar, Apr, May, Jun, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Nov, Dec.

 more than, over

  • When referring to something than can be counted, use more than: More than 100 people attended the event.
  • Use over in other contexts, such as: She is over 50; John is over 2.1 meters tall.

 movies

  • See titles.

 Mr., Ms., Miss, Mrs., Dr.

  • See titles, courtesy titles.

 Muslim

  • Always capitalize.
  • Do not spell as Moslem.