Publishing

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I agree with Bruce.  I have done a lot of work on professional society  
technical standards, and while they have style requirements of their own, for  
issues of grammar, syntax, etc. they defer to the Chicago Manual of  Style  
exactly as Bruce recommends.  I also agree about the  Microsoft Word grammar 
checker.  It is horrible.  I ended up disabling  it on my copy because it 
was wrong 2/3 of the time.
 
I'll add my name to the pool of volunteers willing to assist in  
proofreading similar to Bruce.  It's heartening to see Mr. Schust's  willingness to 
use the talent in the Society membership to improve things.   Errors of 
grammar and syntax have been a weakness in some (a small minority, to  be sure) of 
the books, especially in the earlier ones.
 
I can be contacted off-line at drperiepa at aol.com.
 
Dave Phelps
Moneta, VA
 
 
In a message dated 1/4/2013 11:27:55 A.M. Eastern Standard Time,  
nw-mailing-list at nwhs.org writes:

On Thu,  Jan 3, 2013 at 10:55 AM, Alex wrote:  


 
First,  with both spelling and grammar, copy editors have different 
approaches as to  what is correct and I have had one professional copy editor 
making changes  to another professional copy editors work with respect to 
grammar. Typos are  generally easier to deal with but sometimes it depends on the 
style guide  being used. Word/publishing programs will highlight questionable 
words or  phrases, but you then have to decide how to proceed. As an 
example I spell  coalfield as one word where many publications will spell it as 
two words.  Another example is state names. I used to use post offices 
abbreviations  such as WV for West Virginia and the copy editor agreed with it. 
However the  Associated Press Style Book says not to use them, but it is ok to 
use W.Va.,  but in some circumstances you should use the full state  name. 



It appears that one of the first orders of business is for the Society to  
declare what style it is going to follow (if it already hasn't) and stick 
with  it. I'm curious about the reference to the AP Style Book -- it is a  
good reference, but it really applies to newspapers, magazines, press releases  
(the Virginia Tech University Relations style guide uses it as a starting  
point), and like publications. It isn't quite geared for journal articles 
and  books. One of the mainstays in that area is the Chicago Manual of  Style, 
which is much broader in its scope and coverage. I've used both,  the AP 
book a long time ago when I was a newspaper reporter in Radford and the  
Chicago manual when I was marking up papers for an education journal, before  
each issue was sent to the printer. I also know that Microsoft Word is far  
from perfect when it comes to pointing out grammar and other construction  
"errors" and shouldn't be followed blindly just because it threw some green  
lines on the screen.


That said, I would be wiling on a volunteer basis to read, review, and  
copy edit any Society publication at any point in the process. I know I won't  
be able to catch factual errors, but can help weed out grammar problems,  
typos, and misspelled words (depending on when, where, and how something is  
sent on to a printer).


Bruce in Blacksburg






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