Erin Brenner's Blog, page 3

The Editor’s Approach to Marketing Copy

In this digital age, businesses of all kinds are vying for audience attention. Effective marketing copy is one way to connect with potential buyers, and editing this copy is an important skill for editors looking to expand their clientele. Here are some of the most important things to keep in mind when editing marketing copy. 

Like any other type of editing, you want to become familiar with the jargon—in this case both marketing jargon and related industry jargon. If I edit marketing copy for med...

One House, A Third Writing Process: A Video Essayist’s Approach

Recently on The Writing Resource, I shared two very different writing processes, mine and my husband’s, in the “One House, Two Writing Processes” series. A third member of the Brenner household, our son Sean, is also a writer and has developed his own writing process. I’ve invited him to write about it here. —EB

In the previous two parts of this series, my parents shared their contrasting approaches to writing—my mother’s methodical editor’s process and my father’s “bull in a writing shop” journa...

The Descriptivism–Prescriptivism War, Part 2: The Copyeditor’s Role

In language and editing, descriptivism and prescriptivism can affect how editors approach their work. But sometimes those terms can become a little muddled. 

In part 1, I shared an example of how we can misunderstand descriptivism and prescriptivism and offered more accurate definitions for each. In part 2, I’ll dive into the practical implications of these concepts, exploring how to balance these approaches in your editing practice. 

What Does This Have to Do with Copyediting? 

Critics of false de...

The Descriptivism–Prescriptivism War, Part 1: Battlelines

On September 6, 2016, Merriam-Webster tweeted the following: 

It’s fine to use mad to mean “angry”—even if doing so makes some people mad.

And boy did it make one person mad—er, angry! 

To this day Merriam-Webster’s Twitter account is full of information about words and how we use them. It posts a word of the day, giving the pronunciation and definition from their files. It identifies words that people are suddenly looking up more, usually because of a prominent use in media. And it discusses usage...

One House, Two Writing Processes, Part 2: From Outline to Final Draft

In part 1 of this series, I explored how two writers with different styles—me as a trained editor and my husband Bill as a trained journalist—approach the initial stages of writing. 

Today, we’ll dive into the second half of the writing process: outlining, drafting, and revising. As before, you’ll see that though our approaches differ, they lead to the same destination: engaging, well-crafted content.

4. Outlining: To Structure or Not to Structure

I’m a firm believer in outlines. Yes, they can be t...

One House, Two Writing Processes, Part 1: Getting Started

One of my favorite hobbies is taking yoga classes at a local studio. While every instructor at the studio is vinyasa-trained (vinyasa is one of many styles of yoga), they all approach their classes differently. Some make detailed plans of their classes in advance, while others prefer to ask their students what they need at the beginning of class and incorporate their requests into a flow. Some instructors choose to do a mix of both. 

These subjective differences in teaching yoga mirror subjective...

Allow Me to Explain

An editor once asked me the following question: 

Is it still correct to use “allow” and “allow for” differently? In material I am editing, I often see “allow for” when I think adding the “for” is wrong (or at least unnecessary) for the meaning.

My dictionary indicates that, as I expected, “allow” means “admit (an event or activity) as legal or acceptable” or permit (in several senses, including to permit someone to have or do something). Definitions of “allow for” include “make provision for,” “ta...

AP Style and the Serial Comma

Fueling one of the more popular English language debates are the two most commonly used style guides: the The Chicago Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook. The guides have opposite rules for using the serial comma (that last comma before the conjunction), with Chicago supporting the inclusion of the serial comma and AP omitting it. 

Specifically, AP uses commas to separate elements in a series but does not include the serial comma in a simple series: I like cake, ice cream and pie.

That’s what mos...

Grammar Bite: To Have and to Had

As a freelance editor, I am often asked by clients, readers, and friends about my personal take on grammar rules or the common usage of words or phrases. Once, I was asked to share my thoughts on the use of the phrase “to have” and its past participle “had”:

Q. I should like to read your take on the following quizzical use of the verb “to have” and its past participle form “had:”

It seems common and proper for American English speakers to say, “I had my carpets cleaned, I had my car tuned, I had m...

Grammar Bite: Bored With or Bored Of?

I once received the following question from a reader: 

I have always taught that the correct preposition to use with “bored” is “bored with…” Recently, I’ve noticed more and more the usage of “bored of” something. Has the “of” become more acceptable in recent years, or have I been misleading students and clients all these years?

According to my research, bored of is becoming more common, but bored with is still the most common by far. With and by are the traditional prepositions, and so far are st...