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Copy editing is a most important and time-consuming task for those involved
in the field. It requires the sensitive editorial handling of print material
of every kind. And it requires the editor's close attention to a document's
every detail, its format, and all of its elements; a thorough knowledge of
what to look for and of the style to be followed as desired by the author
or client; and the ability to make quick, logical, objective, justifiable,
and defensible decisions in the correction of spelling, grammar, punctuation,
terminology, sentence structure, clarity, conciseness, tone and voice, inconsistencies,
and typographical errors. Valued editors are those who know editorial and
factual things that others don't know and who offer keen understanding of
an author's need to advance communication.
To begin with, copy editors are
thoroughly familiar with and comfortable applying the universally accepted
editorial and typographic marks and symbols-as described in the Chicago
Manual of Style and summarized under proofreader's marks in Merriam-Webster's
Collegiate Dictionary, 11th edition-that are commonly understood by compositors
working in English.
The editorial function comprises two processes: mechanical editing and substantive
editing. Mechanical editing involves a close reading, with an eye on consistency
of capitalization, spelling, and hyphenation and other end-of-line word breaks;
agreement between verbs and subjects; scores of other matters of syntax; punctuation;
beginning and ending quotation marks and parentheses; number of ellipsis points;
numbers given either as figures or as words; and hundreds of other, similar
details of grammatical, editorial, and typographic style.
In addition to regularizing those details of style, the copy editor is expected
to catch infelicities of expression that mar an author's prose and impede
communication. Such matters include but are by no means limited to dangling
participles, misplaced modifiers, mixed metaphors, unclear antecedents, unintentional
redundancies, faulty attempts at parallel construction, mistaken junction,
overuse of an author's pet word or phrase, unintentional repetition of words,
race or gender or geographic bias, and hyphenating in the predicate,
unless, of course, the hyphenated term is an entry in the dictionary and therefore
permanently hyphenated in every grammatical case. Job seekers, especially,
need to attend to such details in their executive résumé.
The second, nonmechanical, process-called substantive editing-involves rewriting,
reorganizing, or suggesting more-effective ways to present material.
o Editors identify by instinct and learn from their experience how much of
this kind
of editing to do on a particular document.
o Experienced editors recognize and do not tamper with an author's unusual
figures of speech or idiomatic usage that is pertinent to a work.
o They preserve the author's voice with a view toward the faithful reproduction
of the author's manuscript.
o They silently correct inconsistencies, misusages, and misspellings solely
for the purpose of clarifying the unclear.
o They know when to go ahead and make an editorial change or simply suggest
it to the author.
o They know when to delete a repetition, when to change it for variation,
and when to merely point it out to the author or to job seeker on an executive
résumé.
o They respect an author's right to expect conscientious, intelligent editorial
help.
o They never make queries that sound stupid, naive, or pedantic or that seem
to reflect upon an author's scholarly ability or powers of interpretation.
o And they handle untold and unsung other matters of style and usage.
Adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style
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