In his blog, my colleague Dark Sage has dissected the editing errors in the Spring 2011 season with precision, humor, and an appropriate level of outrage.His reviews have made me wonder why editing mistakes are so pervasive in fansubbing, and I`d care to pass out a few hypotheses for discussion.
My first shot is that fansubbing, as a hobby, tends to pull people from technical disciplines rather than the progressive arts.
ost of the mass I fansub with are in software development, IT, engineering, and so on.Engineers are not known for the tone of their writing.After all, if they liked writing and were adept at it, they`d be English majors, wouldn`t they?)I`ve run many engineering teams over my career, and one of my jobs has ever been to compensate the written form of team members.However, this hypothesis isn`t sufficient.In my work, I`ve seen bad writing from communications specialists, technical writers, and other professionals.Something deeper is amiss.
More broadly, I`d guess that the precedence of writing skills in the US educational scheme has declined.Education "reform" has turned our schools into factories for passing standardized tests, which concentrate on version and math.The courses that promote good writing skills have been eliminated in budget cuts.The creative writing portion of the SATs has become optional.Many colleges no longer require essays as component of the admissions process.
Finally, belief that the rules of paper and grammar actually matter has disappeared.The usage essays of the former William Safire, or the indictment of modern compositional practice in a book such as "Eats Shoots and Leaves," are treated as humor, irony, or curmudgeonly rants.One doesn`t want to expect any farther than the advancement of "alright" to acceptable usage to see that editorial laxness is ingrained.In short, no one gives a damn.
I was prosperous in my educational experience.Back in the Dark Ages when I went to high school, educators at least gave lip-service to developing students` talents, as good as drilling them in the basics.As a result, a pupil with a full academic record had admission to electives that were off the beaten track.I used that freedom to learn touch typing (on a manual typewriter - no PCs in those days); I was the only boy in the class.I studied Latin.And I took a year in journalism.
Journalism class was far less about reporting than it was about composition.The center was on writing: how to publish articles that were organized well and comfortable to comprehend.Journalism taught me about parallel construction, use of the active voice, simplicity of vocabulary, clarity of references, and other techniques that are now visible in my editing.Combined with the lessons from Latin - proper grammar, sentence parsing, vocabulary - journalism class gave me the foot I required for decent composition.
Where will aspiring editors learn these lessons today?Journalism classes are vanishing; indeed, journalism as a profession is on the endangered list.Latin is regarded as a luxury and is rarely taught.I fully realize that Mandarin or Spanish will be more useful in actual life than Latin, and that skill is better training for a viable career than journalism.Still, as a species we depend on communication.How will we do if understanding drowns in a sea of Internet memes, texting abbreviations, and written trash?
[For those too new to interpret the title reference, see this article: Why Johnny Can`t Read.]
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