Word Wise

Gender Bender

Work to make your writing as gender neutral as possible. In addition to just plain ol’ being the right thing to do, it also minimizes the possibility that gender becomes your subject matter, allowing your reader to focus on what people do rather than on which sex they happen to be.                   Do: Recast singular references into plural ones. Instead of “a consumer gets his or her choice of extras” or, worse, “a consumer gets his/her choice of extras,” make it “consumers get their choice of extras.” (Worse still, “s/he gets a choice of extras.”) Eliminate personal pronouns. Not “each contestant should submit her photo” but “each contestant should submit a photo.” Use “you.” Replace “every reporter must apply for his backstage pass” with “you must apply for a backstage pass.” Substitute gender-neutral synonyms.“All NGOs have a president. He is often on a second career” becomes “All NGOs have a president. This official is often on a second career.” Refer to people by gender-neutral job titles like “firefighter,” “server” and “housekeeper” instead of “fireman,” “waitress,” and “cleaning lady.” Watch out for phrases like “no man is an island” and “every man for himself.” Not only are they double whammies – cliché and gender specific – but to make them gender neutral you have to say that no person is an island or every man and woman for himself and herself. Ugh. Avoid what are known as “false generics” – nouns and pronouns intended to apply to both men and women but that actually may be ambiguous and exclude women, like the word “chairman” (“chairperson” may sound contrived to you – it doesn’t to me – so in cases like this search for an acceptable alternative; in other words, don’t give up). For the love of God, please don’t: Alternate between genders: Using “he” three times and “she” three times in a paragraph just makes it worse. Aside from the confusion it may cause, it’s an attempt at political correctness that’s more laughable than laudable. That writers would do this sounds ridiculous, I know, but I’ve seen it. (Remember the scene in "Friends" when Phoebe looks across the courtyard and sees Chandler and Monica “doing it” and screams, "My eyes! My eyes!" That’s what it feels like to read sentence constructions like that. My eyes! My eyes!)

Hope Springs Eternal

Hopefully, the use and misuse of “hopefully” hasn’t kept you up nights. That said, I know there are some of you who see its alleged misuse and think the world has gone all wiggy, that it’s only by your own unyielding allegiance to the most stringent, narrow definition that stands in the way of the English language’s demise. You are our savior.   I have only four words to say: Girl, get over yourself.   Yes, in some edenic garden of language purity we would all only use “hopefully” to mean “in a hopeful way” and not “I hope.” But – in case you haven’t noticed – the world today as a pure place, grammatically speaking? Not so much.   Using “hopefully” to mean “I hope” has been around a long time – since at least the early 18thcentury, according the folks at Merriam-Webster. There are all sorts of online discussions about whether starting sentences with adverbs is a good idea, and  whether “hopefully” really is leading to the ruination of the language. But the fact is, we all use "hopefully" to mean “I hope” and no amount of hoping that the English-speaking peoples of the world will rise up in a collective maw of grammatical correctness will change that.   The world is full of problems, and there are things worth fighting for (even things having to do with grammar). The traditional and correct use of “hopefully” is not among them.

its gr8 2b able 2 txt in 160 ltrs but b carefl ur not letting it mpact how u rite or ul b sorry Ive red more of this l8ly creeps me out mayb im 2 old 4 this

Last year I wrote about the angst – both existential and real – I feel when I walk around the office and see my colleagues in the middle of several IM conversations at once, presumably with a combination of friends and clients. The possibility for sitcom-worthy mix-ups is high. Now, as if I don’t have enough on my plate o' angst, I’ve noticed text message-isms slowly but surely creeping into everyday work  e-mail: Numbers and letters standing in for complete words and syllables. Seemingly unimportant letters omitted from words   And punctuation? Fahgetaboutit So talented have we become at texting huge amounts of information in 160 characters or less that we forget writing complete sentences, using entire words and punctuation, and including upper and lowercase letters is actually a good idea and not merely an expression of retro charm, like hot pants or double-layer cakes.  In our profession, it’s crucial that we take advantage of new means of communications. (Ask anyone over 35 who knows me – I keep urging them to join Facebook for no other reason than it’ll provide instant insight into social media, which many people in PR – at their peril – still lack.) But it’s equally important we remember that there’s a time and a place for everything (talk about a retro sentiment). The very nature of text messaging demands a new way of smooshing words and ideas together, but don’t fall into the trap  of thinking it’s cute or hip to use text-like style in e-mail or other documents. It’s not. Keep in mind you never know where your e-mails will actually land, to whom they’ll be forwarded, who will read them. Err on being professional at all times. That’s what our employers pay us for.

What Time Is It?

I’m sitting in my den at home as I write this. I look at the watch on my wrist (a cheap Timex from Target). I glance at the bottom right of my computer, where it says the time. I look up at the digital cable box, it flashes the time. My BlackBerry, at my side, also tells me the time. Elsewhere, my oven, microwave, and bedside alarm clock all provide the time, too. Then there’s the clock in the bathroom. And the one on the wall in the kitchen. And the two other watches I own but hardly ever wear. Oh, and my camera, for some reason, also tells me the time.     So what time is it? 10 a.m. CST? 10 a.m. EST? 10 a.m. MST? 10 a.m. HST? (HST? Yes, HST – Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time). Most of us in the U.S. think about time in three time zones – Eastern, Central, and Pacific. Except there are nine, from east to west: Atlantic Standard Time (AST) Eastern Standard Time (EST) Central Standard Time (CST) Mountain Standard Time (MST) Pacific Standard Time (PST) Alaskan Standard Time (AKST) Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time (HST) Samoa Standard Time (UTC-11) Chamorro Standard Time (UTC+10) (AKA Guam Standard Time, GST) Easy enough (assuming you’re not too worried about nos. 6 – 9). But dang it all, things get complicated because of Daylight Saving Time (DST). All of a sudden you’re sitting in your cubicle or your fancy-shmancy corner office writing about a series of events taking place in a variety of cities across the country over a period of several months and you have no freakin’ idea what time it is.   Sadly, time doesn’t stand still: DST traditionally starts at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday in March and screws things up until 2 a.m. on the first Sunday in November Worse, each of the nine time zones in the U.S. changes names during this period – replace “Standard” with “Daylight" Worse still, Puerto Rico, Arizona, Hawaii, U.S. Virgin Islands and American Samoa pretend none of the DST rigamarole is happening  Worse still, in 2007 the U.S. government, in all its wisdom (yes, that’s a joke), extended DST by four weeks (worse still, instead of just extending it by four weeks on one end or the other, it chose to have it start earlier by three weeks and end a week later)  Feel like giving up? Yeah, me, too. Your best bet is to cruise the Web looking for a time zone converter that suits you (there are a million of them, as well as widgets, some more complicated and detailed than others). The point is to get it right every time.

Note, part I: Wanna sound really smart? It's Daylight Saving Time, not Daylight Savings Time. 

Note, part II: Soon after I posted this, on Saturday, a comment was posted (see below) recommending a way around this mess (well, a Web site that will help you easily navigate it). Visit it here.

The Wednesday Word Wise Round Up

• I work in Chicago, but a few years ago I flew to one of my company’s other offices to teach a series of writing workshops, including one on how to write effective press releases. The office’s then-managing director welcomed me and announced to the staff that “the press release is dead. No point. What are you all doing here?” Oy vey – not a great way to start the morning. And here we are, about five years later, and The New York Times runs this article – “Need Press? Repeat: ‘Green,’ ‘Sex,’ ‘Cancer,’ ‘Secret,’ ‘Fat’” – that not only dispels the notion of my now-employed-somewhere-else colleague, but implies that press releases can still be highly effective. It’s just a really good read. 

• “British bureaucrats have been warned: no more synergies, stakeholders or sustainable communities,” noted this article on CNN.com/Europe. Seems that the Local Government Association has told its members to stop using management buzzwords, saying they confuse people and prevent residents from understanding what local governments do. "Why do we have to have 'coterminous, stakeholder engagement' when we could just 'talk to people' instead?” asked the association's chairman, Simon Milton. Good question.

• David Broder’s not normally my cup of tea (I happen to not like tea), but a recent column headlined “Dumbing Down the Presidency” caught my attention. He reports on the work of a professor at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn., whose research shows that messages from the president “were pitched at a college level through most of the 18th and 19th centuries. They have now come down to an eighth-grade reading level." I’m actually surprised it’s that high. Maybe eighth graders have gotten dumber also?