THE EDITORS' WEEKLY

This image is a head shot of designer Naomi MacDougall, taken outside against a background of leafy trees. She wears shoulder-length brunette hair and is smiling slightly at the camera.

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What does your markup say about you?

March 19, 2013 by Iva Cheung | 5 Comments on What does your markup say about you?

A friend of mine was venting to me about his old boss, who used to look over his reports. Whenever his boss found an error, he’d not only circle it but also emphasize his discovery with an exclamation point—a practice that drove my buddy nuts. Encoded within this tiny mark of punctuation was his micromanaging […]

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designer editing editor editor's role proofreader proofreading working relationship

Torso of a nude man, from neck to waist, holding a nude baby.

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GETTABLE GRAMMAR: Things that dangle

March 12, 2013 by Karen Virag | 1 Comment on GETTABLE GRAMMAR: Things that dangle

Things that dangle in the night. And in the day. Hours before giving birth, a woman’s boyfriend leaves her for her best friend and quits the talent agency they run together to start his own competing business. Now that is one amazing—and appalling!—boyfriend. First he gives birth, then he betrays his girlfriend. Typical man. In […]

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dangling modifier editing Gettable Grammar grammar Grammar Gals misplaced modifier usage

A woman is carrying a huge stack of hardcover books. She is standing in front of an institutional green brick wall on which there is a clock that says 3 o’clock.

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DISPATCHES from an Editorial Intern

March 5, 2013 by Kate Icely | 10 Comments on DISPATCHES from an Editorial Intern

Outside Looking In I decided I wanted to go into publishing in early 2011. It was a good solution to my problems at the time. Problems like why I didn’t want to fill out arduous grad school applications and why I wouldn’t apply to law school (as members of my family fervently hoped I would). […]

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editing editor editor's role editorial intern intern publishing

A striking black and white image of an older man with glasses perched on his nose, side lit and wearing a plaid jacket or housecoat, who is holding what looks like an old book and reading.

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Freedom to read, at all

February 28, 2013 by Debra Huron | Leave a Comment

Although larger social issues are on the periphery of what we do as editors and writers, they sometimes grab my attention by speaking to questions of equity and human rights regarding the written word. Here’s how this is resonating with me this week. During the week of February 24 as Canada celebrates Freedom to Read Week, […]

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Freedom to Read Week literacy

A text-only image, which is a definition by Ambrose Bierce, from his acerbic book, The Devil’s Dictonary. The definition reads: “Defame, verb transitive. To lie about another. To tell the truth about another.” In the red and black background, a dictionary excerpt of the word “justice” fades in at bottom.

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R. Franklin Carter

Know Your Legal Limits

February 26, 2013 by R. Franklin Carter | 3 Comments on Know Your Legal Limits

Let’s begin by sketching a fictional but plausible scenario. Dan Ascot is a librarian who works at the University of Western Nebraska. One day, in 2009, he posts a few remarks about a publisher on his blog. He says that Knightsbridge Press, a publisher of scholarly books in Massachusetts, produces “over-priced works of dubious scholarship.” […]

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censorship defamation freedom of expression Freedom to Read Week legal

An attractive, long-haired blond woman looks straight at the camera, holding up a magnifying glass in front of her right eye, making that eye appear extremely large within the frame of the magnifying glass.

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What’s an editor to do?

February 19, 2013 by Anita Jenkins | 4 Comments on What’s an editor to do?

Virginia Durksen recently stated in her blog post The Inner Editor: Reflections on Editing as Mindful Practice that an editor must “respect the writer’s voice and suggest only those changes that serve the writer first, and then the writer’s reader.” Certainly I agree; it’s a big mistake to indiscriminately apply a standardized style so firmly […]

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copy editing copy editor editing editor editor's role editors editors at work

Head portrait of Irish satirist and author Jonathan Swift, best known as the author of Gulliver’s Travels.

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Gettable Grammar: I are confused

February 12, 2013 by Karen Virag | 1 Comment on Gettable Grammar: I are confused

Gettable Grammar is a monthly series of conjectures, opinions and postulates by Karen Virag. I ARE CONFUSED, AREN’T I? Have you ever wondered why we say, “He is, isn’t he?” and “She is, isn’t she?” but we don’t say “I am, amn’t I?” (though you might say this if you lived in certain parts of […]

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editing grammar humour usage

A two-story house is burning, filled with flames that are coming out through the front porch, upstairs windows, and through the roof. Four firemen in gear, with their backs to us, are standing in the foreground, watching the fire.

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Wasted Words: My Hit List

February 5, 2013 by Wilf Popoff | 2 Comments on Wasted Words: My Hit List

Wasted Words is a series of musings on language and usage by editor emeritus Wilf Popoff. I have a dream: English users create their equivalent to the Académie Française to mind the language. I’m at the first hearing of this august body presenting a list of words I want banned. The English Academy must acquiesce if […]

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editing redundancies usage

Close up of a section of bookshelf lined with books, spines facing in. The “exposed” pages are facing out and an old letterpress ampersand sits on top of the books, facing the viewer, as if to ask the question, “And….?”

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Are Book Editors an Endangered Species?

January 29, 2013 by Nancy Flight | 4 Comments on Are Book Editors an Endangered Species?

In December 2012, the world was supposed to end, the U.S. was expected to fall off the so-called fiscal cliff, and some commentators had already pronounced Canadian publishing dead or nearly so. As we know, the world did not end, and the U.S. has avoided plunging over the fiscal cliff, at least for the time […]

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book editors editing editors publishing

Close-up shot of a woman's hand, holding a pen, resting on an open book, suggesting that she is studying.

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Kristina Lundberg

Rising Above the Plateau: Mid-Career PD for Editors

January 22, 2013 by Kristina Lundberg | 4 Comments on Rising Above the Plateau: Mid-Career PD for Editors

Every fall I struggle with the professional development plan I’m required to submit to my employer. My first decade in editing was brimming with formal and informal professional development, and my professional growth was steep. Fourteen years into my career, how can I rise above the PD plateau and continue to grow? Of course, in editing there’s […]

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career editing editor mentorship