Tuesday, April 28, 2009

M is for Making Mistakes

Isn’t that the essence of editing – to catch mistakes, to fix them and to prevent them? Yet that is just one part of editing, when I started this course I thought that that was pretty much an editors job. Though I have had several fabulous editors during my internships and jobs at several publications, I knew they had to make tough decisions, but I guess I never thought about all of the different aspects of this career pathway. I certainly have a newfound respect for editors and the amazing work they do. I don’t know if I am cut out for such a position, it takes a special kind of person, but I know that I will never take them for granted.

It’s so funny how I hear all of us in this class joke about how we are so much more attuned to catching grammar errors and such. It’s like we’ve been reprogrammed for accuracy – which is great! Though others can find this annoying, I hope that they secretly appreciate it.

There is such an emotional response to editing. When you catch an error it can feel like a small victory, and when you make a mistake it can tear at you all day. I know I made an error on my last assignment, and it still bothers me because I knew that was improper styling, but it just slipped past me. Good thing we have such a great editor and teacher to catch those things for us.

Thank you Prof. Follis and to all of my fellow classmates, we have become better journalists together. :o)

2 comments:

  1. I feel the same way about catching errors! It's like an "Aha, gotcha!" moment. It's kind of like doing detective work where the criminals are misplaced punctuation marks :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. I totally feel this post. My short month and a half or so of having been editor at buzz has made me appreciate all the editors I worked for before as a writer. It definitely is not an easy job, and sometimes I long for the days I was a "carefree" writer.

    ReplyDelete