Tag: grammar

GUMmyStuff: What is it?

I use the hashtag #GUMmyStuff on Twitter at least once a day. I’ve explained it there several times, but I’ve never done a post here. Time to fix that.

Grammar. Usage. Mechanics (which includes spelling and punctuation). Take the first letters of each, and you get “GUM.” Things about or containing gum are gummy, so: Posts or tweets about grammar, usage, or mechanics are gummy. Gummy stuff. #GUMmyStuff.

It makes more sense to me to use this than to have separate tags for grammar and usage and mechanics (splitting that into spelling and punctuation), because, let’s be frank—#GUMmyStuff is eye-catching. It makes people stop. It’s oddball (like me). It’s also accurate, because those tweets and posts are about those things, often in combination.

I’ve initiated hashtags before. The one that’s taken off is #SpellcheckCannotSaveYou, which some folks insist on writing with “WillNot” instead. Will has nothing to do with the situation. Spellcheck is incapable, unable to save your sorry butt from using the wrong word spelled correctly. It’s not that it won’t. It can’t.

That’s separate from GUMmyStuff, because it’s specific to one situation. GUMmyStuff is a catchall category into which I toss many things: grammatical voice, verb tense, subject/verb agreement, syntax issues, and more.

It’s stuff. GUMmyStuff.

There are editors, and then …

… there are editors.

My initial idea for this post was quite different from what it is actually about. You see, I was surfing the internet (what else is there to do when self-isolating, aside from bingeing* shows on Netflix or some other streaming platform?) when I saw an editor say something that stopped me dead in my tracks. I won’t quote it here; I not only do not have permission, but I would not ask for it. It’s not a very flattering reason to be quoted. It was a gaffe I almost immediately attributed to the difference between a copy editor and a developmental one. The copy editor needs a grounding in grammar. The developmental one does not. In fact, it can be a hindrance; it’s much easier to do the deep reading for developmental work without the distractions of misplaced modifiers and errant commas.

I had thought I’d write about the problem in the statement, which meant a lot of deep grammar stuff that even some long-time copy editors don’t necessarily know. It’s one thing to know that something is wrong; it’s another to know precisely why, and to be able to explain why in clear, concise, and above all correct terms.

This was … not correct.

And unless the writer knows grammar, they won’t know it’s not correct.

And for me, that’s a problem.

But backing up a step: The gist of the comment was right. The wrong thing was being emphasized. The details were wrong, though. And that bothered me. It still bothers me, hours later. But I realized, as I sat being bothered, that the bigger issue is that “editing” is a very large tent, encompassing several styles, and while there is often some overlap in skills, there isn’t necessarily any. It’s a happy coincidence when there is, in my experience.

And it’s far from my place to call someone out on having spoken erroneously when they’re essentially talking to a specific person, as it was in this case, rather than to a group at large. Not my business, honestly.

I know some of you must be wondering what the error was that got under my skin. Pretty basic stuff, really, about the grammatical subject of a sentence. Except there was a predicate complement involving a subordinating preposition followed by a rather intricate clause, and that got mixed up with the grammatical subject, and it was a right mess.

The developmental editor had a good point, but they made it with utterly incorrect information. That’s what bothered me. The sentence in question needed rewriting to tighten the focus, yes. But the prepositional object was not the grammatical subject of the sentence. Nope, sorry. (And it didn’t help that the prepositions were understood/implied rather than present, but if you diagrammed the sentence you’d know they were there. English grammar, man, it’ll get you in the ass every time.)

Can the recipient of the suggestion use the information they got and improve their writing? Probably. Especially if they go to the editor and ask for clarification. Even one who doesn’t know all the grammatical terms can still explain a problem like this one in ways that a writer can take to heart and use in a later draft. Know that I’m saying that as both a copy editor who knows her grammar and as a developmental editor who learned that DEs don’t need to focus on the technical issues, but rather on the Big Picture or “30,000 feet” problems. “Put the focus on [this word] instead of [that word].” That was the heart of the statement. And it was appropriate for the situation.

But the subject wasn’t the object of the preposition.

 

*”Bingeing” is the preferred spelling given by Merriam-Webster. The E differentiates it from “binging,” as in “The computer was binging for at least 15 minutes while her cousin tried to get her attention.”

Yep, it breaks the “rule” for dropping the terminal E when adding -ing to a verb. Too fucking bad.

Work with your editor, part 3: You are part of a team

I’ve written about one method of finding an editor, and about what I expect from my clients (new and old alike), but what about after the editing? What happens then?

It’s not that difficult, really.

I’ve given your work at least two complete read-throughs and one pass with PerfectIt4 for proofreading/consistency. I’ve made changes for which there is no debate (actual misspellings, errors in grammar and mechanics) and for which I welcome discussion (usage and style issues). I’ve left copious comments for you, at least some of which are positive (“I LOVE THIS!” “Great phrasing here”) while the rest are neutral or warnings (“Watch out for this phrase, you’ve used it at least twice in every chapter so far” or “I’m not marking every instance of this, but if I were you I’d go through and reconsider every usage of it for deletion”). Some of them are miniature essays in usage or diction (word choice). Deletions are marked in red, additions are marked in blue, and all of my comments are in the margins, never in-line.

I was a teacher, once. I cannot not teach on some level.

I may well have emailed you with requests for clarification of things I can’t figure out on my own. Sometimes it’s a problem on my end, sometimes there’s information missing in the work. I’ll only email if the issue will keep me from continuing the edit. If I think I’ve sussed it out, I’ll mark and comment and keep going.

I will not have fiddled with your formatting unless there was a major issue of some kind, such as no spaces between paragraphs or no paragraph indentations. (I don’t care which format you use. Block paragraphs are lovely, as long as there’s a space between them. First-line indents are great, as long as they’re in place. I follow your lead. As I have said repeatedly, I am an editor, not a designer/formatter.)

All of my edits are visible. Some editors do “silent edits” for things like extra spaces, obvious misspellings, missing mechanics, and such. These things aren’t negotiable; they’re wrong, and editors correct them. That’s the rationale for doing them silently. I don’t. Back when I began freelance editing, I took an informal poll and overwhelmingly the respondents said they wanted to see everything. So, you see everything. Every space, period, apostrophe, and hyphen, whether it’s been added or deleted.

Eventually, then, on or before the deadline we agreed on (unless life blew up and I had to renegotiate with you), you get your file back with all of my markups. You could, if you wanted, just say “ACCEPT ALL” and be done.

But you wouldn’t learn anything then, would you.

I suggest going through it and reading the comments, to get a feel for what’s generally happening. Make a list of questions for me. Seriously. I love discussing edits with clients. Perhaps there’s something I missed that led me to suggest a certain change. That might point to a problem on my end, or it might mean there’s something missing from the text that you need to address. Once you’ve gone from end to end, maybe then is the time to send me your questions. Or perhaps you want to wait until you’ve accepted those you agree with, and send the questions afterward. I can’t tell you what the right time is.

I don’t expect to see the work again after I return it. However, sometimes a client wants me to see a rewrite, to ensure they haven’t messed something else up in the process. That’s totally fine. I won’t say no to another chance to look at your work.

At some point, then, you’ll let me know we’re done, and I’ll thank you for the chance to work with you, and I’ll invoice the final payment. You’ll pay it, and we’ll go on.

And if I’m lucky, I’ll get to work with you again someday.

A sentence must have at least two words.

(And other things English teachers get wrong)

I’m hoping the pitchforks haven’t come out already, just because of that title (or perhaps that subtitle). I’m also hoping that most of you know why that statement is incorrect.

It’s true that a sentence needs a subject and a verb, BUT what most teachers forget (or never knew in the first place) is that the subject might not be overt. It could be understood, as with “HALT!” The implication is that you or someone else is to halt.

That doesn’t make “HALT!” any less of a sentence than “HALT, YOU!” or “HALT, THIEF!” Those last two are just inverted syntax, with the subject of the verb coming after it instead of up front.

Utterances like “Ugh!” and “Oh my God!” aren’t sentences, grammatically speaking; they’re, well, utterances. They’re spoken. They have meaning, but it’s based on context, on the words and circumstances surrounding them.

So once more, with feeling: Every sentence needs a subject and a verb. (Not necessarily “two words.”)

 

Lost in the words: a tale of two commas

Earlier this morning I was scrolling through my Twitter feed, and I came across a retweet concerning crop-circle art of Beto O’Rourke. About halfway through the text, I’d lost sight of the sentence structure. Why?

Here’s the tweet.

And here’s the text, copied exactly (links removed):

“Dying to know how this 2-acre “BETO 2020” crop circle made of sand, mulch, clay, rocks & pecan shells a little over a mile north of an Austin Texas airport less than a week after @BetoORourke announced his run for president shows up in @FEC campaign finance disclosures”

I can’t speak for everyone, of course, but by the time I got to “Austin Texas” I was asking myself what the crop circle did. I had yet to come to the relevant verb.

Grammar will help sort this out. The sentence subject isn’t present; it’s “I,” which is understood. “I’m dying to know.” That’s the basic sentence, here. However, that’s not the really important bit.

What is the writer dying to know? “How this crop circle” did something, presumably. You’ll notice I’m leaving out the modifiers. They’re not germane to the basic sentence. They add information, sure, but they’re not vital to a subject/verb structure.

A quick and dirty fix is to insert commas after “circle” and “president.” Then we have this:

Dying to know how this 2-acre “Beto 2020” crop circle, made of sand, mulch, clay, rocks & pecan shells a little over a mile north of an Austin Texas airport less than a week after @BetoORourke announced his run for president, shows up in @FEC campaign finance  disclosures

There’s no period because Twitter. That’s also why the subject, I, is understood and absent; it saves characters. Sure, we have 280 to play with now, but people are still stingy with them. This version uses 272.

Those commas I added indicate to the reader that what’s set off by them can be ignored safely to get to the meat of the sentence, which is this: Dying to know how this crop circle shows up in FEC campaign finance disclosures. (I’ve left out other modifiers, too, for clarity in making the point.) I’d prefer to see more commas, but as I said, this is quick and dirty. (Twitter register is oh, so forgiving.)

However, we could help readers more by making bigger changes. Those two commas are the minimum work. What if we rearrange the phrases and clauses a little?

Dying to know how this 2-acre “BETO 2020” crop circle shows up in @FEC campaign finance disclosures. Just over a mile north of an Austin, TX, airport, appearing less than a week after @BetoORourke announced his run for president. Made of sand, mulch, rocks, clay & pecan shells.

Two hundred seventy-eight characters. The gist of the tweet, which is the crop circle showing up in FEC documents, is together now rather than separated by a string of modifiers (“made of this and such,” “just over a mile north of an airport,” “less than a week after (he) announced his run for president”).  I also used “TX” instead of “Texas,” with commas where style required them. The least important information, what the circle is made of, comes at the end. We don’t have to use full sentences, again because Twitter.

Do we take time to edit like this before hitting “TWEET”? Of course not. We’re working at speed, on the fly. Some folks are better than others at composing succinct yet descriptive tweets.

This is the kind of work I once did for a national chain’s social media. I edited tweets and social media posts, which were scheduled to go up at specific times. When I see one that’s difficult to parse, my editor brain jumps in to see what can be done: what’s the least amount of editing necessary to help the reader? What more could be done if there’s time?

 

 

When grammar isn’t grammar, but something else

(And a digression at the end)

I’ve been involved in several discussions over the years about this particular issue, and I remain unmoved. I hold to the belief that it does no one any good to continue to conflate “grammar,” “usage,” “mechanics,” “syntax,” and “style” into one big blob called “grammar.”

Because it’s not true, it’s not accurate, and it’s not helpful in the long run—to anyone who wants to truly understand their language. (I won’t say “English,” only because how rude is that? EVERY language has grammar and syntax.) Continue reading “When grammar isn’t grammar, but something else” →

Thought for the day, July 25, 2018

“A great deal of modern-day grammar confusion stems from people not understanding the role of style guides. Their rules are not meant as definitive statements on what’s right or wrong. They simply work as playbooks to be followed by anyone who wants to follow them. But the rest of us are not bound by them–a fact some people fail to understand.”

June Casagrande, The Joy of Syntax: A Simple Guide to All the Grammar You Know You Should Know

(I will add that I don’t call the contents of style guides “rules.” I call them “guidelines.” Furthermore, I usually say that unless one is paid to follow a particular set, one need not follow any at all–unless one wants to make an editor very happy. Run wild, run free!)

Thought for the day, June 27, 2018

“You will often be judged, fairly or unfairly, on your use of language, both written and spoken, so it makes sense to learn the standards that teachers, editors, and potential employers are inclined to respect. Grammar may be magical, but remember this: a magician is an illusionist, someone who learns the strategic uses of physics and engineering.”  (Roy Peter Clark, The Glamour of Grammar)

Yes, there are rules.

Lots of folks seem to have gotten the idea that “there are no rules” about English anymore. I have to guess that they’ve seen and heard the articles and discussions about prescriptivism versus descriptivism, and their takeaway has been “Well, so rules can be broken.” That becomes “rules don’t matter,” and from there it’s a short hop to “there are no rules.”

Yes. There are rules. Continue reading “Yes, there are rules.” →