National Service / national service , "No"/ no

[Tan Elaine]

There was a straw poll that asked whether women appreciated men who had National Service, and of the 14 who answered, 36 per cent said no / "No".

1. Would it be wrong if "National Service" is in lower case?

2. Should I use no or "No"?

Thanks.

 

[Jenniferhu]

What's this national service? A government agency or a special kind of service? Is it a proper noun? If yes to all those questions, no, it cannot be written in the lower case.

As to no/No, I'd use "No" if it was a one-word sentence as in a poll.

Jenny
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NOT A TEACHER OR NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKER
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[emsr2d2]

There was a straw poll that asked whether women appreciated men who had done National Service, and of the 14 who answered, 36 per cent said no / "No".

1. Would it be wrong if "National Service" is in lower case?

2. Should I use no or "No"?

Thanks.

It depends whether you are talking about national service as a general term, meaning the conscription which still exists for young people in many countries or if you are referring to the scheme of one particular country which actually uses that as its name. In the UK, during the Second World War, for example, conscription was officially named War Service or Military Service. Those would require capitalisation, but if you simply referred to the national service that they had to do, then you don't need capitals.

With the second part, I would leave "36 per cent said no". A straw poll can be done verbally, by email, by text, via a paper questionnaire (although it's usually verbal) so it's possible that those people didn't physically "say" anything. Their answer to the question was no so I would leave it as it is.

 

[5jj]

If the National Service referred to is the compulsory military service that young British men had to undergo until the mid-1950s, then the initial letters are normally capitalised.

You can write either ... 36 per cent answered no or ... 36 per cent answered, "No".

ps. ems beat me to it.

 

[emsr2d2]

If the National Service referred to is the compulsory military service that young British men had to undergo until the mid-1950s, then the initial letters are normally capitalised.

You can write either ... 36 per cent answered no or ... 36 per cent answered, "No".

ps. ems beat me to it.

Ah, I thought that "National Service" wasn't actually the given name for the compulsory military service in the UK. I would bow to your more, ahem, personal knowledge though. ;-)

 

[5jj]

Ah, I thought that "National Service" wasn't actually the given name for the compulsory military service in the UK. I would bow to your more, ahem, personal knowledge though. ;-)

Yes, it was "National Service." I escaped it by eight years - those born after 1938 didn't have to serve. Britain was one of the first countries to abandon peace-time conscription so I wasn't 'called up' (though I did did sign up, as it happened).

ps. You were right about 'War Service/Military Service' - at least until 1948. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conscription_in_the_United_Kingdom