Editorial Tip of the Week: Abbreviations

Blacklisted by some traditionalists alongside the dreaded end-of-sentence preposition, using abbreviations--especially in formal texts--is often dismissed as a sign of incompetent writing. On the contrary, the entirety of Chapter 15 in The Chicago Manual of Style is dedicated to the complexity and usefulness of abbreviations. Certainly, excessive use will bury the meaning and distract the reader but purposeful abbreviations (and the rules that govern them) offer an equally succinct and expedient means of communicating without compromising readability.

The nature of an abbreviation will indicate how to space, punctuate, write as plural forms and whether to spell out the first appearance. There are many types: the acronym, "terms based on the initial letters of their various elements and read as a single word" {NATO, AIDS}; the initialism, "terms read as a series of letters {BBC, ATM}; the contraction: "includes the first and last letters of the full word" {Mr., amt.}; symbols {$, &} and lower-case shortened forms,{Latin terminology such as ibid., and others like vol., prof.}.

Use abbreviations wisely; if strong whole words can be used, by all means do so but recognize that abbreviations give the lay-reader a handle on specialized material and provide more concise reading for the specialist.

For much more information, in addition to Chicago, consult The Copyeditor's Handbook. Despite Chicago's seemingly exhaustive list, the editors contend that "the abbreviations listed are unavoidably incomplete" and refer readers to the Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Abbreviations Dictionary, and the Acronyms, Initialisms and Abbreviations Dictionary.

Editorial Tip of the Week: Sentence Fragments

Every author and editor should be aware of several basic compositional challenges. In addition to correct spelling and employing the active voice over the passive when possible, reviewing for sentence fragments is imperative for coherent, powerful text. A sentence fragment occurs when a sentence is missing a subject or verb - in essence, when the sentence does not express a complete thought.

Fragment: Begins June 11. What begins June 11?
By adding a subject to this phrase, the sentence is now a complete thought: Portland Pedalpalooza begins June 11.

There are several additional indicators that a sentence may contain a fragment but the most common is the subordinate conjunction. Subordinate conjunctions are words that join sentences and create dependent, or subordinate, clauses. This last characteristic contributes to the appearance of fragments because a dependent clause on its own is not a complete idea; it requires an independent, or main, clause.

Robin L. Simmons of Grammar Bytes maps out punctuation rules for fixing fragments involving a subordinate clause:

• main clause + nothing + subordinate clause
• subordinate clause + comma + main clause

Fragment: There is a cycling event for every whim. Whether you are into tacos, zombies or Buddhism. Whether is the subordinating conjunction and marks the fragment. The second sentence is a subordinate because it relies on the main clause for clarification.
Solution: In this case, simply deleting the punctuation between the sentences creates a complete thought. There is a cycling event for every whim whether you are into tacos, zombies or Buddhism.

Fragment: When the dance party theme is Bowie vs. Prince. Everybody wins!
Solution: Join these two sentences with a comma to express a complete (and more profound) thought: When the dance party theme is Bowie vs. Prince, everybody wins!

For a complete list of subordinate conjunctions visit chompchomp.com.

Editing Tip of the Week: Structuring Sentences

Structuring your thoughts into concise sentences is a good idea. Using the same sentence structures to do so is not. Sometimes it’s easy to get into a pattern when the main goal is just to get the words onto paper. But once the writing is finished, pay attention to sentence structures. In Sharon Schuman’s Ten Tips for Effective Writing, she points out that repetitive writing will alienate readers as quickly as incoherent writing. Repeating vocabulary can also undermine the quality of your work.

If you constantly start sentences with She, alternate using the character’s name or begin with the action of the sentence instead of the name or pronoun. When writing a research paper that refers to the data gathered, watch out for sentences that begin with The research shows or any variation thereof. A neat trick is to use the Find feature in the Word document to locate oft-repeated words or phrases. Not only will it keep your writing from sounding dry and brittle, it will allow the concise ideas to take center stage.

For more tips, visit www.uoregon.edu/~sschuman/tentips98 or www.chicagomanualofstyle.org

Editing Tip of the Week: Avoiding Misplaced Modifiers

We all want to produce clear, concise writing. We spell check, read out loud to catch poor sentence structure, ask others to proofread, and then go through it all again. But sometimes there are mistakes that go unnoticed. One of the most common mistakes involves misplaced modifiers. The simple rule of placing modifiers with the words they modify is not easily followed, according to Sharon Schuman at the University of Oregon. In her Top Ten Tips for Effective Writing, she refers to an example from Strunk and White that illustrates the problem. In the sentence He only found two mistakes, the meaning is ambiguous. Does the writer mean that there were more than two mistakes? It’s unclear. By moving the sentence around to read He found only two mistakes, the sentence leaves nothing to question.

If a sentence sounds unintentionally ambiguous or just plain awkward, it could be due to a misplaced modifier. It could be an adverb like only, just, merely, nearly, or almost. Or it could be a misplaced phrase or clause that changes the intended meaning of the sentence. I found one of the funniest examples of this on Towson University’s online writing support site. In the sentence The waiter served the dinner roll to the woman that was well-buttered, it appears that the woman is well-buttered, not the dinner roll. Although the roll is the more obvious choice for being the buttered subject, the phrasing is still awkward. Changing it to The waiter served the well-buttered dinner roll to the woman erases any chance of confusion or laughter.

To avoid writing humorous sentences when none are intended, make sure modifiers go with the words they are meant to modify. This may require more than simply moving the modifier. You may need to restructure the whole sentence to make it clear and concise.

For more information, visit www.bartleby.com for Strunk and White’s tips;
www.uoregon.edu/~sschuman/tentips98 ; www.towson.edu/ows/moduleDangling

Editing Tip of the Week: Simple Solutions for Bloated Sentences

Chicago Manual of Style continues to surprise me. I just read that the word till is perfectly acceptable to use in a sentence, as in The cafe is open till midnight. But till is not the conjunction of until and shouldn't be written as 'til. I am guilty of writing it as such, and I'm enjoying this moment of awakening. Sometimes the seemingly more complicated word usage is wrong. That should make any writer feel a bit of relief.

Words and phrases that sometimes complicate and jumble our sentences are broken down by Chicago. The manual refers to the term numerous as a bloated way of saying many. The long-winded due to the fact that is dismissed with the instruction to use because instead. Chicago even dislikes the phrase in excess of, preferring the simple more than or even over.

These are examples of phrases that we tend to use to overcompensate for our uncertainties in writing. You may roll your eyes at the mantra less is more, so try remembering that sometimes when you write more than is necessary, readers may read less and only skim for the true point in your work. And no writer should settle for that.

Visit http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/ for more solutions.

Editorial Tip of the Week: A New Beginning

Take a breath and relax. According to The Chicago Manual of Style, the widespread panic caused by sentences that begin with conjunctions is unnecessary.

There are still some things to keep in mind, such as whether to use and or but. Chicago states that the correct choice is but when a new sentence creates a contrast to the preceding one. Strunk and White's Elements of Style acknowledges that the use of conjunctions to begin sentences is part of standard English, but advises to use it sparingly in order for the writing to be most effective.

So, it is perfectly acceptable to use and, but, or so to begin a sentence. Conjunctions can even lead to your next paragraph. And sometimes that's all the help a writer needs to keep the pen moving.