What Issues Editors Address: Part 1: The Trees and Leaves
What kinds of issues do editors address? This is a question I often hear. I liken editing and writing to looking at the forest, trees, and leaves; there are different levels of considerations.
Following are some issues in the tree and leaves categories; in other words, these are issues of details and the mechanics of writing. These are not bigger issues of structure and content (the forest, which I’ll address in another blog). And, no, I don’t get into the issues below and how to address them. This is simply a list of some issues on two levels.
- The writer’s use of…
- contractions
- possessives
- ellipsis
- commas
- prepositions
- sentence fragments, comma splices, etc.
- unclear pronoun references
- modifiers and clarity
- subject-verb agreement
- active vs. passive voice
- examples drawn primarily from narrow groups
- gross generalizations – e.g., about cultural norms or assumed knowledge
- issues in what, when, and how to quote
- sources, what/when to cite them, and how
- sloppy copy and paste of text pulled from other documents – e.g., “back burner” materials not updated, repurposed documents not revised to suit new needs, examples pulled from one source but not updated
- The writer’s use of specific words and phrases:
- affect, effect, impact, result
- border, boarder
- breath, breathe
- device, devise
- discreet, discrete
- farther, further
- fewer, less
- knew, know
- lose, loose
- meter, metre
- not only… but also…
- that, which
- that, who, whom
- threw, throw
- throw, through, though
- where, were, we’re, wear, ware
© Laura Edlund 2010