[Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

Fri Oct 25 08:22:39 EDT 2013

(This is such a fun thread, by the way!)

>From Wednesday’s NY Times on the new Emily Dickinson website: “Dickinson scholars have long hotly argued over questions like her sexuality [like?] and her reasons for not publishing, along with issues that might strike ordinary readers as bafflingly arcane, from the precise angle and length of her dashes to …”

I prefer the company of extraordinary readers.

From: vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu [mailto:vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu] On Behalf Of Sarah M. Hall
Sent: Friday, October 25, 2013 5:44 AM
To: Stuart N. Clarke; list', 'woolf
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

My standard works for UK-style editing were Hart's Rules, Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors (a slimmer volume than it sounds), and Judith Butcher's Copy-editing. For US-style editing, I'd use MLA or The Chicago Manual of Style and an American dictionary such as Merriam-Webster.

I also have a nice little book called A Concise Dictionary of Foreign Expressions by B. A. Phythian, who was the headmaster at the boys' school that was twin to my all-girls' school next door. In fact, he must have been Stephen Barkway's headmaster. 

But most publishers would also have their own style guide, and you'd stick to that primarily. If they didn't have one, I'd make my own so that their proof-reader could check for consistency.

  _____  

From: Stuart N. Clarke <stuart.n.clarke at btinternet.com>
To: "list', 'woolf" <VWOOLF at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu> 
Sent: Friday, 25 October 2013, 9:30
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

It’s understandable that it’s hard to be consistent, but why not just use “New Hart’s Rules” (OUP)?  As authors (as Anne Fernald implies/infers), we may not know them, but professional editors should know and apply their own house styles.  After all, writers for US academic publications are always being told to use the MLA style – something that is beyond me coz I don’t have the book(let?).

Stuart

From: Martin, James <mailto:j.martin at klett.de>  

Sent: Friday, October 25, 2013 9:20 AM

To: Diana Swanson <mailto:dswanson at niu.edu>  ; list', 'woolf <mailto:VWOOLF at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>  

Cc: mailto:paul at skandera.com 

Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

Diana, I’ll give you the inside scoop on publishing companies and their editors. When I arrived at my current position, I cared about every comma, apostrophe and dash, be it an n-dash, an m-dash or a hyphen. There were differences in the usage and I wanted to adhere to the rules - not that I was a prescriptivist, mind you - but I simply wanted to do things correctly and in a unified manner. It turns out that when I asked the experienced, highly respected author of the company’s style sheet which dash should be used where, he said, “Relax, it’s just a horizontal line. Nobody cares.” 

The readers, it turns out, “didn’t care” because they never complained to us formally about any abuses of punctuation. So if no one complains, you can’t be doing anything wrong, right? 

However, when I was in school, I paid attention to these things from an early age and thought other pupils using our textbooks might notice the difference between random punctuation marks and those that seem to be used systematically. I am fully aware that standards change over the years (the interest in placing a comma before the final “and” in a series seems to wax and wane along with skirt length, for example) and am able to accept such changes. When you are working in a multilingual setting, and editors with backgrounds in British and American English who have been living in Germany for 20 years sit down at a table and try to set these rules in stone, it is difficult. The difficulty lies partly in the fact that we have read so many different publications during our studies and professional lives - encyclopedias and dictionaries from various centuries, magazines, newspapers, books, websites and textbooks (all with their own country of origin and printing, their own style sheets and editors or obvious lack of them) - that we begin to question what is indeed correct. We all had English teachers throughout our schooling who categorized gross errors according to their own educational backgrounds. And so they - and we - perpetuate stylistic myths and there is no one authority to answer all our questions. William Safire did it for years (and I loved his columns!), but I know of no one in the digital age who has offered his or her services as he did. Any takers?

Jim

Von: vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu [mailto:vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu] Im Auftrag von Diana Swanson
Gesendet: Donnerstag, 24. Oktober 2013 15:38
An: list', 'woolf
Betreff: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

I have noticed more and more such mistakes in scholarly books and text books over the last few years; I think that publishers have laid off too many editors and copy-editors. The causes? Probably in large part the consolidation of publishing companies, the pressure for quarterly profits, and the cutting of university budgets (especially state universities) so that university presses are being starved of funds.

>>> Mark Hussey <mhussey at verizon.net> 10/24/2013 8:25 AM >>>

"Too fussy" might be a euphemism for "able to use words correctly." 

From: vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu [mailto:vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu] On Behalf Of Sarah M. Hall
Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2013 6:40 AM
To: Stuart N. Clarke; woolf list
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

There was an interview on Radio 4 yesterday with a Scotsman who thinks that we are all too fussy about English grammar, and that phrases such as 'most beautifullest' are quite acceptable because Shakespeare used these constructions. The opposing view was that Shakespeare was writing poetry. Downward spiral?

  _____  

From: Stuart N. Clarke <stuart.n.clarke at btinternet.com>
To: woolf list <VWOOLF at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu> 
Sent: Thursday, 24 October 2013, 11:33
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

Of course, we all make mistakes, but there's just no end to failures in copy-editing.

There's something just not quite right about:

"This great church ... is crowned by the second largest Roman dome after St Peter's."

In his TV show, Dave Gorman pointed out the faux spectrum, as in something like "She has taken all the great tragic roles, from Ophelia to the Duchess of Malfi".

Stuart

From: Jeremy Hawthorn <mailto:jeremy.hawthorn at ntnu.no>  

Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2013 11:17 AM

To: Stuart N. Clarke <mailto:stuart.n.clarke at btinternet.com>  ; woolf list <mailto:VWOOLF at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>  

Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

And another one. In the last week I have seen "interred" used where "interned" was correct, and vice-versa. Thus people of Japanese descent were interred during WW2, and the body was interned after the funeral.

Jeremy H

  _____  

From: vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu [vwoolf-bounces at lists.service.ohio-state.edu] on behalf of Stuart N. Clarke [stuart.n.clarke at btinternet.com]
Sent: 24 October 2013 11:51
To: woolf list
Subject: Re: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

The 2 words are quite different, but I admit that I have to concentrate when typing them to make sure I've chosen the right one!  I don't think they have (yet?) become interchangeable.

Unlike "imply" and "infer": in the Antipodes, even in scientific papers, the words are used interchangeably, although I was surprised to find the use as early as 1931, e.g.:

M. H. C., 'The Scheme of Things', NZ Evening Post, Vol. CXII, No. 112 (7 November 1931), 9: '"Oxbridge" . plainly infers [sic] Oxford'; http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d <http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&cl=search&d=EP19311107.2.40.1> &cl=search&d=EP19311107.2.40.1

Stuart

From: Sunjoo Lee <mailto:abgrund at naver.com>  

Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2013 10:38 AM

To: woolf list <mailto:VWOOLF at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu>  

Subject: [Vwoolf] "principle" in place of "principal"

Hi, everyone,  

I have been a bit bugged by seeing "principle" when the word has to be "principal." 

I saw that happening in doctoral dissertations and (in a few cases) articles from well-known journals, or even books from good publishers. 

And this afternoon, from Heidegger's Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics (Indiana UP, 1997), I found: 

"Thus the knowledge of beings in general (Metaphysica Generalis) and the knowledge of its principle divisions (Metaphysica Specialis) become a "science established on the basis of mere reason."" (6). 

And now I wonder, has "principle" been accepted as an alternate spelling of "principal"? Only I haven't been aware of it? 

Dictionaries I use don't have such information. Has anyone else wondered about this? 

Sunjoo 

  _____  

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