THE EDITORS' WEEKLY

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Paul Buckingham

A Formula for Mathematical Editing

February 10, 2015 by Paul Buckingham | Leave a Comment

Mathematicians need editors. But why should that be? Aren’t mathematical manuscripts rather short on words? And as for the symbols, don’t they look after themselves? In fact, mathematics has plenty of words, particularly at the research level, and the wordy passages are often where the exposition and explanation occur. A page in a typical mathematics […]

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Susan Glickman

Facts and Fiction: Artful Flight

February 3, 2015 by Susan Glickman | Leave a Comment

I’d like to recommend two of my favourite books for writers, one ostensibly fiction and the other, not. Except that both are so idiosyncratic, so luminously zany, so full of revelatory insights, humour and poignancy, that generic boundaries seem to melt and what you take away from each is reaffirmation of not only why you […]

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Dominique Fortier

Les liaisons dangereuses : « lalaïsation » et « çalatisme »

January 27, 2015 by Dominique Fortier | Leave a Comment

« ÇA L’A l’air fou, et ÇA L’EN dit long sur une personne. » « ÇA L’A l’air d’une faute, et ÇA L’EN est une. » Le ça a qui devient ça l’a prend l’allure d’un gros bouton sur la langue québécoise. Ça enlaidit l’élocution. Ça irrite. Ça écorche les oreilles à tout coup et ça donne […]

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James Harbeck

Whom Do You Believe? | Linguistics, Frankly

January 20, 2015 by James Harbeck | 2 Comments on Whom Do You Believe? | Linguistics, Frankly

First of all: If you can avoid using whom, you should. Any but the most formal texts are better off without it; it’s a foreign word for most users, as evidenced by the general inability of even many language professionals to use it quite correctly all the time. Sometimes, however, you have to use it. […]

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Rosemary Shipton

Editors and Their Clients

January 13, 2015 by Rosemary Shipton | 3 Comments on Editors and Their Clients

Editors are shaped by their clients. Sure, we all share common knowledge, skills and talents, but we’re influenced by what our employers want from us. Over a period of years, that accumulated experience makes us the editors we are today. In recent posts to this site, Lori Burwash has described the challenges of writing and […]

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Victoria Neufeldt

What’s an Editor to Do?

January 6, 2015 by Victoria Neufeldt | 2 Comments on What’s an Editor to Do?

The vagaries of language can cause even the most experienced editors headaches. Editors as a group are more attuned to the whims and ways of language than the average speaker, but many strange and challenging usages regularly fly under the radar and pass into public text, despite our best efforts. When should an editor accept […]

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Administrators General EAC

Letter From the Editors

December 22, 2014 by Administrators | 6 Comments on Letter From the Editors

Dear Readers, Thank you all for your readership over the past year. We value our subscribers and would love to hear your thoughts about the blog. If you’re interested in becoming a contributor or have a topic in mind that you’d like to see addressed, please let us know! There will be no post tomorrow, […]

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Dwain Richardson

English Editing in Quebec: Local Realities — Western Quebec and Eastern Townships

December 16, 2014 by Dwain Richardson | Leave a Comment

If you live in the vicinity of Canada’s capital region and are aspiring to become a language professional, you’re in for a treat. For starters, the cities of Gatineau and Ottawa and their surrounding areas are home to most federal government departments. Localities on either side of the Ottawa River have municipal administrations and provincial […]

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Paul Cipywnyk

How Skype Helped Support a Family Editing Tradition

December 9, 2014 by Paul Cipywnyk | 3 Comments on How Skype Helped Support a Family Editing Tradition

Upon retirement from their teaching careers at the University of Saskatchewan, my late mother, Sonia Morris, and her sister, Roma Franko, embarked on a labour of love: translating Ukrainian literature into English. For many years they shared desk space in one another’s homes in Saskatoon. Roma focused on translating, and Sonia on editing. I provided […]

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Wilf Popoff

Wasted Words: The Elements and Style

December 2, 2014 by Wilf Popoff | 1 Comment on Wasted Words: The Elements and Style

It’s the time of year when heeding weather reports is a good idea: setting out with meagre insulation can be foolhardy. (News flash: “Hypothermia Blamed When Editor Vanishes.”) I glean data from all sources and sally forth properly kitted, but meteorological claptrap can be irritating. A local CBC station announces that temperatures overnight will go […]

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