ATTN: Copyeditors and Grammar Fiends

Is "dominatrix" the only "-trix" that's survived (while "aviatrix," "editrix," etc., have disappeared)?

And "massage therapist" ascends because nobody can figure out that a "masseuse" is a gal and a "masseur" is a guy.

whoa hold up, they're not the same thing! my sister is a (qualified) massage therapist, but i can tell you in no uncertain terms she is not a "masseuse" and she will kick the puny ass of anyone who calls her one! (trust me on this)

Oh, sorry. I don't want to get all those massage therapists mad at me, because the sad truth is, my ass IS puny.
I love the verb "burgle."
The good thing about moving toward gender-neutral job titles is that you can trot out the gender-specific ones when you want to be catty.

burglarise/ize is american isn't it? i don't remember ever having seen it in a uk publication.

When did people start saying 'in agreeance' instead of 'in agreement'? It just doesn't seem cromulent.

yep. Burglarize and burgle were both coined around the same time, late 19th century. xp.

xpost Since 1540?

I have a question on the usage of “says x”. E.g.:

Says Joe Scatterbrain, “We must fight them over there so that we don’t have to fight them over here.”

I think it looks ugly as sin, but I have encountered quite a few good writers employing it. Is it acceptable in formal writing?

Beth: "server" is in many places being usurped in turn by "waitron"!!

(or is it the other way around?)

and pronunciation freaks: is it "way tron" or "way truhn"?

http://bartelby.com/61/8/W0010850.html

do ppl actually say waitron, Godfrey Daniel!

I have a question on the usage of “says x”. E.g.:

Says Joe Scatterbrain, “We must fight them over there so that we don’t have to fight them over here.”

I think it looks ugly as sin, but I have encountered quite a few good writers employing it. Is it acceptable in formal writing?

-- Jeb, Wednesday, September 12, 2007 4:43 PM

It's an affectation, surely, to put the "Says" before both the quote and the speaker? I don't mind it, and it's certainly not incorrect per se, but it's arguably archaic.

That would be changed in any US publication, says I

Morbs a friend of mine in the restaurant business says it as a matter of course

Ok, thanks.

That would be changed in any US publication, says I

I saw it being used in a Slate article a couple of days ago, actually.

I think it's sort of colloquial-sounding but not wholly incorrect.

hahaha Slate doesn't count!

The plural form of BBS. BBSes? BBSs? What say you?

BBSs

Definitely “BBSs.” Same thing as with the DVD discussion earlier in this thread; some style guides (most notably NY Times’) go for DVD’s (BBS’s), but most recommend just adding an “s,” DVDs (BBSs).

I am SHOCKED that ANY style guide calls for an apostrophe for the plural of an abbreviation! That is crazy talk!

I dunno, even the hyper-sensitive Lynn Truss chalks that one up to 'usage'.

even the apostrophe-averse AP uses it for plurals of single characters: mind your P's and Q's. because Ps and Qs looks odd. (but yes, DVDs, SUVs, STDs...)

I don't think Ps looks that odd. Is and Os and the other vowels look very odd though. I suppose you could do "I"s and "O"s.

while this thread is active, i'm curious to what degree anyone is aware of copyediting being outsourced or back-officed. i wrote a book for a small publisher earlier this year, and they shipped it to india for proofing and copyediting (not for substance -- the editors here did that -- but for basic typos and style issues). the indian editors did a fine job, caught a lot of small mistakes. but is this a widespread practice? are there copyediting shops popping up like there are call centers and coding shops? since it's what i actually get paid to do, it makes me a little nervous.

I used to work for a textbook development firm, and we basically did proofreading, fact-checking, and design for large textbook publishers, as well as other publishing outfits. (Part of how I got hired at my current company was that we were briefly a client of my old company and so I already had experience with one of the projects.) I don't know how much straight-up copyediting took place, but it doesn't seem outside the realm of possibility.

In this case, I think the advantage was that the work was done quickly and reliably, when the publishers didn't have the time or the staff to do it themselves. Outsourcing the work to India makes me think that there's a financial motivation, though, as well.

oh yeah i'm sure the indian copyeditors make a lot less than american copyeditors do.

I wrote into AP and asked my BBS plural question, and they said:

Probably BBSes. If you are abbreviating bulletin board systems for computers, suggest use the more understandable, if longer, bulletin boards.

My favourite part: "Probably." Thanks, AP's ask the editor. Thanks for your decisiveness.

I frequently write in margins "probably..." or "I'd suggest..." which should be understood as "there is no right or wrong here unless you pay me far more to rewrite the whole piece cos even when I fix the obvious errors it will still be gibberish".

In most questions like the BBS one, sadly, the answer does not matter.

I'd have said BBSs, out of the two choices. But BBSes gets used often enough that I wouldn't care much. "Bulletin boards" is better, though, if that's what you mean.

Probably BBSes.

Kisss
Boxs
Gass

That's your where/why.

are there copyediting shops popping up like there are call centers and coding shops?

i feel like there was an article about this on the bbc or somewhere, with the answer being "yes," although i recall hearing about it more in the context of major multinationals (i.e. Citigroup or Dow Jones, say, moving these parts of their operations there, or parts of these parts, i guess) rather than indepedent "shops."

Probably BBSes

absolutely BBSes. i mean ... do none of you remember the fucking pertuises?

but really, that isn't an argument i want to go through again. ever.

(hmm: not sure how i've managed to anchor that link halfway down the thread. meant to start at the top, obviously.)

Some questions about a teacher's edits to a s1ght and sound piece:

1. She circled the phrase 'by that t0ken' and called it a cliche. Do you agree or disagree?
2. "Cust0dians work dilig3ntly during the night sh1ft, mopping the d1rty halls before the m0rning teenagers arriv3." She circled "work dilig3ntly" and put 'show.' Really?
3. "3ducation continues to burr0w its way into the m1nds of students" She wrote: "Why are you using personification?" Thoughts?
4. "She makes her way to a wat3r fountain, pushes th3 tab and gorg3s" She circled 'makes her way' and wrote "What is blocking her?" ^^

I have more, but I'll leave it at this.

Without the context of the whole piece it's hard to say... #1 seems nitpicky, #2 has some merit, 'diligently' seems a little lazy, #3 is way OTM, wtf is that bro, #4 seems dubious as you have to kind of make your way to most water fountains.

Mostly agree with W and with teacher, though it depends on context:

1. "by that token" is an acceptable stock phrase in, say, a magazine article, but doesn't work in anything where the prose itself is supposed to be valuable

2. I get the sense she wants you to SHOW "work diligently" because that's somehow the point of the piece? (I don't know what "a s1ght and sound piece" refers to, but the "s1ght and s0und" bit sure makes it seem like showing would be good)

3. yes, way OTM, cause it's a weird personification to have education (which is usually, like, acquired) attacking these kids -- if your point is that education gets in despite the students' passive disinterest, you'd need more on that

4. I don't know how much I agree with teacher, but her point is that "makes her way" can sound a bit like she's fording streams and carrying a pack

Thanks for the help...I'm keeping #1 (while, as a whole, the prose is supposed to be nice, flowery and descriptive, this sentence appears in the very beginning, when I explain what the piece is a bout).

I know how to show #2, and I'll probably just have a conversation with her about #4...

Re: #3, I wasn't attempting to make some statement about the students' interest level. Rather, through imagery, I was trying to show how, when you're in a learning environment, information tends to seep into your brain without you ever realizing it...

And a sight and s0und = when you go to a place, observe and then write a piece about it. It's f0r a high school newspaper.

i'm just glad there are still high school newspapers, much less ones with good teacher/editors. listen to her, she knows what she's talking about.

(generally, yes...but I think you need to know a little more background before you can say listen to her)

I am intrigued.

I thought the expression was "by the same token". In any case it doesn't mean much. Why not drop it?

You could say that custodians mop the dirty halls. (Or just "halls" -- presumably if they were clean, no mopping would be required!) Do you really know that they were "diligent"? They might have been smoking and cracking jokes half the time. If you DO know that they were diligent, write how you know this, rather than that they were diligent.

Things burrowing into minds recalls a particularly uncomfortable scene in Star Trek II - The Wrath of Khan.

Re: #3, I wasn't attempting to make some statement about the students' interest level. Rather, through imagery, I was trying to show how, when you're in a learning environment, information tends to seep into your brain without you ever realizing it...

Well, use "information" rather than "education" (if you must use personification, at least use the thing you actually mean).

"Inf0rmation continues to burr0w its way into the m1nds of students, bearing light artillery, wool blankets and supplies for several months."

Education burrowing it's way... -> I was trying to show how information tends to seep into your brain...

Say that then - "Information continues to seep/drip into/be absorbed by the minds of students..."

What is a custodian?

A janitor

AHhhhhhhh I was just in a work meeting that was really well run and informative, but unfortunately the presenter has the habit of saying "just simply" this and "just simply" that. Arrrrlghghg redundancy.