Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Mon, 05 Jun 2000 20:35:45 -0600
From:      Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>
To:        Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com>
Cc:        tlambert@primenet.com (Terry Lambert), roberto@keltia.freenix.fr (Ollivier Robert), freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: Punctuation conventions (was: cvs commit:
Message-ID:  <4.3.2.7.2.20000605202431.04a0f100@localhost>
In-Reply-To: <200006060026.RAA01410@usr05.primenet.com>
References:  <4.3.2.7.2.20000602165302.04939e50@localhost>

next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
At 06:26 PM 6/5/2000, Terry Lambert wrote:

>"WiReD" magazine is not very authoritative.

Their style guide is quite good and covers areas that references
written before the start of the "Digital Age" do not address. I
think that if you read it (check any bookstore there in the Bay
Area) you'll gain respect for it.

>> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0201339854/ref=sim_books/002-9186126-2223249
>
>I would be more likely to accept this as a source, if it in fact
>has anything to say on the subject.  Realize, however, that AP
>is likely to treat text as source code for typesetting, as opposed
>to an end in itself.  Going to http://wire.ap.org/ confirms that
>their wire format uses single spaces following periods.

It's perfectly legitimate to treat text as source code for typesetting.
At one time, that was all it was for!

>> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0226103897/wedwordcom/002-9186126-2223249
>
>My copy of the Chicago Manual of Style shows two spaces following
>periods.

How old is your copy?

>My problem with taking an MBA book to be authoritative is that
>such a book is unlikely to be authoritative on written English.
>I'd be more willing to accept the authority of an English
>professor on English.  MBA professors will undoubtedly know
>more about business that English professors, but we are not
>disucssing business, we are discussing English.

I was under the impression that we were discussing business English.

>> Also, here are some links to style guides around the Web, all
>> of which say that it is desirable to use one space after a period 
>> that ends a sentence. (These are only the results of a brief search;
>> I'm sure there are many more.)
>> 
>> http://webster.commnet.edu/apa/apa_spacing.htm
>
>Psychologists, not English professors.

The APA Style Guide is widely respected as a guide for scholarly
papers in EVERY field of study -- including English. It is the
gold standard for academics everywhere. It mandates a single
space after all punctuation with the exception of a colon used in 
a ratio.

>> http://www.the-efa.org/news/gramglean.html#onespace
>
>This one actually supports two spaces.  It calls the use
>of one space "a case of collective cultural amnesia".  8-).

Reread this piece carefully. You'll see that she attributes a 
lack of knowledge of WHY the change in conventions has occurred 
to "a case of collective cultural amnesia." She approves of the 
shift to one space.

--Brett



To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org
with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message




Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?4.3.2.7.2.20000605202431.04a0f100>