Whenever there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an error in the Optic, some readers likely think we messed up. And they holler, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hire a proofreader!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
But isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t it possible that we merely plant a typo here and there? Why? To give readers something to talk about and us something to write about. Like now.<\/p>\n
Alex Montoya of Las Vegas, now living in Flint, Texas, caught one of the plants, this time in an advertisement for Mora County manager. Montoya, my former student, writes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I thought of applying for the position. I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think I meet the computer qualifications. The ad calls for one who is \u00e2\u20ac\u02dccomputer illiterate.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u0153<\/p>\n
No, Alex, if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re lacking the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153illiteracy\u00e2\u20ac\u009d qualifications, Mora County simply has no room for you. However, what if, just what if … the alleged error were deliberate? We at the Optic get tired of going days without anyone calling to say, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153You know that article you wrote about city government? Well, I want you to know that almost every word was spelled right.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s rare, Alex. So if we sprinkle in a typo or a wrong word choice, what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the harm? And besides, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m the product of parents who lost all interest in technology some time around the and their 70s. If their car started, that was good enough for them. If Mom\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s electric typewriter worked, fine.<\/p>\n
My dad, whose interest in anything mechanical waned around the time the then-high-tech IBM Selectric typewriter appeared, was worse than merely indifferent to computers, which he prefaced with \u00e2\u20ac\u0153stupid.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He reasoned that since humans invented computers, by definition, computers couldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be as smart as the inventors.<\/p>\n
Alex Montoya may have suspected the coincidental timing of the advertisement, which appeared on April Fool\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Day. I checked the original version of the ad and \u00e2\u20ac\u201d sure enough \u00e2\u20ac\u201d it used \u00e2\u20ac\u0153illiterate,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d which we fixed in some, but not all, issues of the paper. All that reminds me of the time recently when I got chided by several people who told me the one word in the English language I ought never misspell is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153proofreader,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d which I did by omitting the first \u00e2\u20ac\u0153r.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d With one word, my training went \u00e2\u20ac\u0153poof.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2<\/p>\n
A few columns back, we speculated on mascots and wondered why schools would rather have a girls team called the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Lady Rams\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Lady Stallions\u00e2\u20ac\u009d than to use \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Ewes\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Mares.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
An example we used was of our own West Las Vegas Dons, whose female counterparts are the Lady Dons, not the Donettes or the Do\u00c3\u00b1as. Since a Don is a Spanish gentleman, that makes the Lady Dons the Spanish Lady Gentlemen.<\/p>\n
Then what about Doncellas? Local attorney Art Vargas mentioned a 2007 National Geographic article about an \u00e2\u20ac\u0153extremely well preserved mummy \u00e2\u20ac\u201d a 15-year-old girl known as \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcLa Doncella.\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The magazine says the maiden \u00e2\u20ac\u0153appears to have been selected for sacrifice.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d She and two others were discovered in 1999 during an Inca expedition. The mummies may have been on the mountain 500 years.<\/p>\n
A Doncella (the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153ll\u00e2\u20ac\u009d sounds like a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153y\u00e2\u20ac\u009d) would give a more precise identity to girl hoopsters and softball players than does Lady Dons.<\/p>\n
Just wondering: If girls\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 sports had ante-dated boys\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 athletics and if girls\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 nicknames had come first and included names like \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Ewes,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hens\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Cows,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d would the corresponding boys\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 teams be \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Boy Ewes,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Boy Hens\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Boy Cows\u00e2\u20ac\u009d?<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Doncella\u00e2\u20ac\u009d has a pretty sound to it. And it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a one-word name, unlike so many other girls\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 mascots whose nicknames need to be forever modified and qualified.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2 \u00e2\u20ac\u00a2<\/p>\n
A reader called about the use of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in newspapers and magazines. He phoned just to ask what the term means. Before answering this question, I said, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll bet you didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t find \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the Optic.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d He hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is a Latin word meaning \u00e2\u20ac\u0153thus,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d \u00e2\u20ac\u0153so\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or \u00e2\u20ac\u0153as such.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Some publications use it to show readers that the odd word or phrase belongs to the original writer and not to the publication. For example, if someone writes \u00e2\u20ac\u0153who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s\u00e2\u20ac\u009d when it should be \u00e2\u20ac\u0153whose,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d editors often will follow the word with \u00e2\u20ac\u0153[sic.]\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
But what else is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d used for? It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s used to assign fault. A paper I once worked for, the Aurora (Ill.) Beacon-News, used \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to discredit the writing of those critical of the newspaper. Once, an angry reader took in to the Aurora Be-Confused, and in doing so, committed a number of spelling errors. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s when our editors chose to pepper the copy with \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
But what does that prove? Only one thing: The writer\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s spelling and proofreading need work. On another level, the intent was to convince our readers that the letter-writer didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have much credibility. If he can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t even spell, how can anyone believe what he writes?<\/p>\n
Other letters to the editor, some of which praised the Illinois newspaper, contained errors in the original submission, but those typos magically got corrected in print.<\/p>\n
At the Optic, we receive batches of letters \u00e2\u20ac\u201d many critical of the newspaper, and with errors that indicate haste, lack of proofreading or simply weakness in spelling. We try to correct all the errors, thus avoiding \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
I believe that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the right thing to do. And besides, on the basis of the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153computer illiterate\u00e2\u20ac\u009d typo we let get past us, we wonder, do we need to \u00e2\u20ac\u0153sic\u00e2\u20ac\u009d ourselves on ourselves?<\/p>\n
That would be sic-ening.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Whenever there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an error in the Optic, some readers likely think we messed up. And they holler, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Hire a proofreader!\u00e2\u20ac\u009d But isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t it possible that we merely plant a typo here and there? Why? To give readers something to talk about and us something to write about. Like now. Alex Montoya of Las Vegas, now […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=356"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":359,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/356\/revisions\/359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rezio.net\/woa\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}