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本帖最后由 Reader86 于 2024-3-13 01:26 PM 编辑
That Slangy Tone
By Philip B. Corbett November 24, 2009 8:00 am November 24, 2009 8:00 am
Notes from the newsroom on grammar, usage and style.
AfterDeadline
We’re dissing, punting and grousing. We’re sussing things out and gussying them up.
In other words, we are routinely falling short of the serious, literate, polished tone that we strive for. Instead, we’re peppering our prose with slang and colloquialisms, often of the most trite and tired variety.
We should normally avoid such expressions completely in news articles. Even in features, reviews or other lighter contexts, the offhand slang and colloquialisms of casual conversation should not be routine. Used judiciously, a particularly apt expression may enliven or add color. But more often, such usage simply makes our writing seem like everyone else’s.
Just a few of many recent examples:
•••
On the hunt for new customers, Bloomberg is testing a Web-based product aimed at law firms. Executives are also looking at the sports arena, sussing out interest among team owners or even fantasy leagues for a system to analyze sports statistics.
……
And it was still possible to suss out a gem from the rough. Xaphoon Jones, who produces for the Philadelphia rap group Chiddy Bang, was only poking at his laptop on Wednesday night during his group’s performance at Fat Baby, but his beats were sprightly and alluringly melodic …
Certainly there was no call for the slang in the straight business story. And it’s hard to see what special effect was achieved in the music review, either.
•••
SINGAPORE — President Obama and other world leaders have decided to put off the difficult task of reaching a climate change agreement at a global climate conference scheduled for next month, agreeing instead to make it the mission of the Copenhagen conference to reach a less specific “politically binding’’ agreement that would punt the most difficult issues into the future.
It’s a straight news story on a serious topic — no place for slang.
•••
The McCain campaign dissed Sarah Palin, muffled her, and then stuck her with a $50,000 legal bill: that, at least, is how she tells it in her new book, due to be released next week.
This was originally a blog item online, then ran in print. Even within the somewhat more conversational tone of some blogs, it’s hard to see what the slang “diss” adds in style or flavor.
•••
This tale begins with Ms. Williams, alone in a nearly finished loft with 200 cardboard boxes. For it fell to her to finish the apartment by herself, gussying it up for sale so it could be someone else’s dream home. …
First, the apartment sold for not too much less than the asking price of $2.6 million, even in the lousy market over the summer, going into contract after a few weeks. (By contrast, Ms. Cohen told of gruesome scenarios ramped up by the tanking economy …)
This was an interesting feature, and a conversational or even colloquial tone might have been justified. But this pileup of tired slang diminishes the effect.
•••
China, groused one negotiator, has enough money to send rockets into space, yet pleads poverty when it comes to supporting the United Nations.
……
In interviews, representatives from both political operations stood by their ads, and groused about the inaccuracies in the campaign materials of their opponent.
“Grouse,” too, is considered colloquial, or “informal,” as our preferred dictionary (Webster’s New World College) says. No need for it in either of these examples.
In a Word
This week’s grab bag of grammar, style and other editing missteps, with contributions from colleagues and several careful readers.
•••
A raft of conservative groups, commentators and politicians are supporting a primary challenge to Mr. Crist by Marco Rubio, a telegenic former speaker of the Florida House christened a Reaganite’s answer to Mr. Obama by The National Review.
It even has its own entry in The Times’s stylebook entry, yet we still get it wrong. The magazine is National Review — no “the.”
[same story]
“He’ll never be able to get over that photo,” Mr. Pennington said, declining the opportunity to shake hands with Mr. Crist and his new wife, Carole, as they campaigned at the barbeque.
It’s “barbecue,” and it’s in the stylebook.
•••
There are lots of reasons to loath the New York City subway, but one very good reason to love it — Helvetica, the typeface that’s used on its signage.
A reader wrote: “The word needed here is loathe, not loath. Usually the mistake is in the other direction. Perhaps there are lots of reasons to loathe the New York City subway, making people loath to use it (I am not one of them).”
•••
A canny self-promoter, a competent filmmaker and one of the few genuine populists in American pop culture, Perry is, with Oprah Winfrey and Barack Obama, one face of a new black-power structure that has become part of the American establishment.
The hyphen is unnecessary and seems misleading. The adjective “black” modifies the phrase “power structure.” With the hyphen, it reads as though we’re referring to the old “black-power” movement.
•••
The use of the word, “bitch,” for example, tripled in the last decade alone, growing to 1,277 uses on 685 shows in 2007 from 431 uses on 103 prime-time episodes in 1998
Maybe no one was focused on the punctuation in this story, but there shouldn’t be a comma after “word.”
•••
Steve Bodow, head writer for “The Daily Show,” conceded that the preponderance of male writers had not changed much in recent years, although his show hired two women writers in September.
As noted here recently, we should avoid “woman” or “women” as modifiers. Here, it’s easily done: “hired two women as writers.”
•••
The British economy, in particular, is lagging its neighbors. British growth contracted by 0.4 percent in July to September from the previous three months, and it shrank by 5.2 percent compared with a year earlier.
“Growth contracted” is incomprehensible. Presumably we meant that the British economy, or British G.D.P., contracted by 0.4 percent.
•••
The satellite, known as Lcross (pronounced L-cross), slammed into a crater near the Moon’s south pole a month ago. The impact carved out a hole 60- to 100-feet wide and kicked up at least 24 gallons of water.
No need for the hyphens.
•••
On Wednesday, the city of Copenhagen said that Mr. Eliasson will create a bridge there, called Cirkelbroen.
Sequence of tenses: make it “would.”
•••
At the White House, President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama start a full day of activities with a breakfast for veterans in the East Room.
We don’t use first lady as a formal title before a name.
•••
What Mr. Bernanke insisted on, and what Mr. Frank vowed to prevent, was Congressional interference in Fed deliberations over monetary policy.
The sentence goes off track; Bernanke didn’t insist on Congressional interference.
•••
After Deadline examines questions of grammar, usage and style encountered by writers and editors of The Times. It is adapted from a weekly newsroom critique overseen by Philip B. Corbett, the associate managing editor for standards, who is also in charge of The Times’s style manual.
https://archive.nytimes.com/afte ... 4/that-slangy-tone/ |
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发表于 2024-3-13 12:20:36
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