In September 2012, I wrote to Tami Reed, author of the online
blog "Talking with Tami" about a poorly written article [about the Soul Train Awards] she had published. Here is an excerpt of my e-mail to her: "Hi Tami, kudos on your reporting and
gorgeous photos. There’s no way to
soften the reality of this truth so I'll jump right in: This article is riddled with spelling/grammatical
errors. Here are some examples: Scarfs should be scarves; eskimo is a noun
(and should be capitalized), "anymore" should be two words, designers should be
designer’s (possessive) [in the context used], etc."
To her credit, Ms. Reed's response was receptive, not
defensive, to the errors I pointed out:
"Thank you for your email and yes I went to an urban school where the teachers probably didnt give a damn about
us and it was soo hard for me to break that habit when I went off to college. A lot of it, is me rushing because of
deadlines and I have so much to cover and do.
I have an editor for the other sites I write for but not my own. I'm not offended and get emails here and there
telling me of errors. I like to write in
my own voice on my own blog. Thanks for emailing me! I'm trying to do better! I fixed the typos! How much do you charge?"
After my e-mail to Ms. Reed, some of the errors were
corrected (for example, Eskimo is now capitalized), but others (including "anymore"
[which should be two words]) were not. As of the date of this blog post (7/24/13), the word
Ms. Reed's response brought up a couple of interesting
issues. First, it contained even more
errors (see underlined words above), which I believe is due to the general feeling that
one’s personal writing need not be "perfect," as opposed to when writing in more
formal or professional settings. Second,
it alluded to Ms. Reed's belief that the [high school] teachers in her "urban
school" didn't care about [Ms. Reed] and other students enough to teach them
correct English. This latter is harder
to [personally] quantify because I [graduated from a British high school
outside the U.S. at age 15 and therefore] did not attend public schools in the
U.S. I happen to believe one’s writing
should be, if not "perfect," then certainly correct, in any/all settings. I also now wonder if perhaps the problem
could be, their possible truancy or inattention during English class
notwithstanding, that students are not learning proper English because some/many
teachers are themselves not well versed in the rules of English?
Another example of the widespread nature of the
problem [of poor writing] is illustrated in this screen capture from the
excellent, free, recently released iTunes
Festival iPad app. For such a short
caption, it is filled with a surprising number of errors: In the song title (Wonderful), the comma should be inside the quotation mark (not
outside); the 'n has an extraneous quotation mark after it (it should only have
one before the n, not after); and there’s a comma missing after the word "echoes." The most glaring error is, of course, that
the word “here” in the second sentence should be “hear.” Needless to say, it was quite startling to
see that many errors in an Apple product—evidence that not even one of the wealthiest
companies in the world is immune from not only writing/grammatical errors, but
from said errors making it to "print" in a published app without someone in the
editorial process raising a hue and cry.
P.S. I reported the errors to
Apple (in a review of the app) on September 1, 2012. I have reported similar [grammatical] errors
to at least one other app developer, who responded within a matter of hours
and, to my surprise, released an app update [correcting the error I had written
to them about]. Not surprisingly, Apple
has not, to date, followed suit.
In this screenshot from the DailyHoroscope iPhone app,
it states in its Scorpio/Leo overview: "A
typical Scorpio and Leo combination can become the ultimate power couple." It continues... "But only if you are both
loyal and determent" [emphasis added].
Obviously, the word "determined" should have been used in place of "determent,"
which is not merely a misspelled word… it's not a word at all!
In this screenshot from the DailyHoroscope iPhone app,
it states in its Scorpio/Leo overview: "A
typical Scorpio and Leo combination can become the ultimate power couple." It continues... "But only if you are both
loyal and determent" [emphasis added].
Obviously, the word "determined" should have been used in place of "determent,"
which is not merely a misspelled word… it's not a word at all!
In the NDJ World screen shot below, the word "particularly" (instead of "particular") is [incorrectly] used in the
first sentence of the article.
In a 1984 memorandum responding to a letter from David
T. Willard, an elementary school superintendent in Illinois who opposed the
administration’s education policies, Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts
concluded that no legal issues needed to be addressed by the White House
counsel’s office [where he worked at the time], but he took the opportunity to
note, "The letter is very sarcastic, although Willard inadvertently proves
our point about the quality of public education by incorrectly using 'affect'
for 'effect.' "
As George Orwell said in his 1946 "Politics and the English Language" essay
that explained [his views on] the connections between bad writing and bad
thinking as well as the political consequences: "Modern English, especially written English,
is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one
is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think
more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political
regeneration: so that the fight against
bad English is not frivolous and is not the exclusive concern of professional
[or scholarly] writers," and "A scrupulous writer, in every sentence that he
writes, will ask himself at least four questions, thus: What am I trying to say? What words will express it? What image or idiom will make it clearer? Is this image fresh enough to have an
effect? And he will probably ask himself
two more: Could I put it more shortly? Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?"
Apart from the need for one’s writing to be
technically correct, with words correctly capitalized, hyphenated and commas
and punctuation marks, etc. correctly placed, there is also the issue of words
being misspelled and usage of the wrong words (e.g., its/it’s, your/you are/you’re,
their/there/they're, etc.). As another
example, I recently wrote (in a Facebook comment) to Essence magazine about
their [incorrect] use of the word premier (it should have been premiere in the
context used).
Yet another
example: In this screen grab from the 2009
movie Precious,
“You are a wonderful young women” should be “You
are a wonderful young woman.”
The National Commission on Writing, in its 2004
report, said that good writing skills are at least as important in the public
sector as in private industry, and that poor writing not only befuddles
citizens but also slows down the government as bureaucrats struggle with
unclear instructions or have to redo poorly written work [emphasis added].
According to former U.S. senator and 2004 chair of the
National Commission on Writing, Bob Kerrey, "You have to be able to write,
convert an idea and turn it into words."
Also, Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, vice chairman of
the National Governors Association, which conducted the survey for the
Commission's 2004 report, said "It’s impossible to calculate the ultimate cost
of lost productivity because people have to read things two and three times."
Another hidden cost [of poor writing] is that good ideas may never see the light of day. "I see that all the time in writing and political speaking," Gov. Huckabee said. “There are some really bright people who can't communicate and as a result their ideas probably aren't given the attention they deserve."
Judge Roberts agrees.
In his interview for an August 29, 2005 NY Times article [by Anne Kornblutt] (original article has been archived), he stated "your brief writing conveys not only your argument to the court, but
it also conveys a sense of your credibility and the care with which you put
together your case."
Another threat to good writing is the proliferation of
abbreviations and acronyms that saw their origins in online chatting and
instant messaging but which now occur with alarming regularity in almost all
other forms of writing. Terms like "ur"
(in lieu of your, you are or you're), "OMG" (oh my God), "2" (to, too and two)
and "4" (in lieu of for and four) are now, unfortunately, far too common.
In closing, this Orwell quote seems apt: "One cannot change this all in a moment, but
one can at least change one’s own habits, and from time to time one can even,
if one jeers loudly enough, send some worn-out and useless phrase—some
'jackboot,' 'Achilles' heel,' 'hotbed,' 'melting pot,' 'acid test,' 'veritable
inferno,' or other lump of verbal refuse—into the dustbin, where it belongs."
The question remains, however, that, typographical errors notwithstanding, if
one doesn't know that one's grammar/writing is poor, how then would they know
it should be changed/improved [and therefore that they are part of the (general)
problem]? They will not, and therefore
the problem, sadly, seems destined to continue... unchecked■
Copyright © Luceele Smith -- September 3, 2012
