Category: Levels of Edit

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Conversation Starter: In Response to the Claim That Technical Editors Need Not Be “Grammarians”

(Editor’s Note: Michelle Corbin’s article, “Technical Editors Do Not Need To Be Grammarians,” started a very interesting conversation about technical editing and grammar.
The following lengthy comment was posted to the original article; to make it easier to continue this fascinating discussion, I’ve turned it into a standalone post.
Please feel free to continue discussing this – send your comments to editor@stc-techedit.org.

By Odile Sullivan-Tarazi

Perhaps it comes down to what you mean by “grammar.”

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Four Questions for Considering the Needs and Circumstances of Our Audience

By Danielle Karr

A company must communicate with its customers; however, whether these communications are valuable to the audience is another question.

A company’s content is often influenced by the individuals who internally surround the document rather than the external target audience, which forces technical communicators to sometimes release content that does not accurately reflect or meet readers’ needs. This type of content creation process can lead companies to measure their content’s success by how it satisfies internal (often managerial) opinions rather than how well the document fulfills the content needs of the intended audience.

Luckily, technical editors have the power to correct this corporate messaging problem by championing readership interests, needs, and sensitivities during document creation and review process—safeguarding the audience from irrelevant, insensitive, or burdensome content.

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The Best of Corrigo: Setting Up an Editorial Review Process

By Sarah Barczyk
(originally published in 2009; updated with permission by Corrigo staff in 2018)

So you want to be a technical editor. You’re well-versed in grammar, style, punctuation, and the mechanics of the English language. You know what it takes to produce a clear, concise, readable paragraph and a coherent technical document.

Subject-matter experts within your company recognize that you’re an asset and routinely seek you out for writing help, and perhaps enlist your aid in editing large documents. But you know that so much more can be done. All you need is a process. It sounds so simple.

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Editing People Who Hate to Be Edited

On 4 October 2018, STC Technical Editing SIG member Marcia Shannon gave a fascinating talk entitled “Editing People Who Hate to Be Edited” as part of the SIG’s quarterly meeting.

Corrigo Correspondents Laura Allen and Denise Collins attended, and summarized it for those who couldn’t make it.

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Of Interest: Editing People Who Hate to Be Edited

One of the trends that emerged from our Quo Corrigo? survey was that technical editing practitioners want to know how to work with writers who are sometimes resistant to feedback or do not follow processes, and how to ensure positive working relationships in cases of conflict.

Why do writers dislike seeing their work changed? And what do we do when we need to edit their work anyway?

On 23 August 2018, at 3 PM EDT, Marcia Shannon will examine some reasons for the writers’ resistance and offer suggestions for handling those objections while keeping the work in line with style guides and company standards.

This presentation is open to STC Technical Editing SIG members for free and non-SIG members for a small fee.

To register, go to https://m.stc-techedit.org/Editing+People+Who+Hate+to+be+Edited.

Note: Before the presentation, Technical Editing SIG leaders will present news items related to the SIG.

7 November 2018 Update

For two summaries of this presentation, go here.