Editing for non-native English speaking scientists

Learning by Trial and Error

LEONIE ZANDRA PIPE

The Art of Editing

OverviewThe challenges of being an ESL editor in a small, isolated countryThe major errors I made as a beginning editor and how I learned from themThe diversity of terms that authors expect you to know in their specialist fields, even though you can’t be an expert in everythingThe challenges faced by ESL scientists trying to publish in competitive academic journalsTurning editing into an art – innate language ability + experience

Being an ESL editor in a small isolated country

4 major mistakes I (and likely many others) made when embarking on the editing process

Making the writing so perfect and formal that the writer’s original voice was lost, even though the meaning was preserved.

Trying too hard (can lead to disaster!)Not appreciating the specialist terminologies.Changing words – or even their order.

Error 1: Sterilising the life out of a manuscript

A few examples:

Replacing “carry out” with “conducted” or “performed”

Replacing “have” with “possessed”

Replacing “There are many examples of X in the literature” with “Many examples of X can be found in the literature”

If you apply the above to each of your edited manuscripts, your edits will end up looking all the same – as if they have been passed through a filter

Error 2: Trying too hard

Apparently, “cause” was supposed to be the correct term here

The V-packed rod was arc-discharge evaporated, resulting in the deposition

Original construct was better

Error 3: Not appreciating specialist terminologies

Such as the @ symbol, which designates layer-substrate configurations in composite nanomaterials

Terms such as heteroscedasticity (also spelled heteroskadisticity)

Knowing when to capitalise the first letter (late Jurassic or Late Jurassic?)

When Google is your best friend

Many specialist terminologies appear to be incorrect word usages, or words used in the incorrect context. Some examples…

Non-stationary - wouldn’t you love to edit this to “dynamic”?

NP-hard – a term in computational complexity that is rather “hard” to explain

Vicarious calibration (I nearly edited this to “remote calibration”)

Coupon

Phantom

Non-stationary process – A process in which the statistical properties remain unchanged over time and exhibit no trends. A close relative of “dynamic” but not the same thing!

Example of an NP-hard problem – the Travelling Salesman Problem

Vicarious Calibration

What it does not mean: Calibrating through another’s thoughts and actionsWhat it does mean: Independent checking of the quality of remotely sensed data, typicallyfrom the Earth’s surface.

Again, the casual and technical uses of the word “vicarious” are related but not the same

True colour high spatial resolution image of York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Coupon

In chemical engineering, not a strip of paper offering a discount or a free promotional gift!

It’s a polished strip of specified size and weight that detects the corrosive action of a gas or liquid

PhantomIn dosimetry, not a ghost or a spectre!

It’s a proxy of human tissues used to estimate the dose administered to patients receiving CT scans.

Error 4: Changing words – or their order

First sentence: Should not have altered “investigated”. Second sentence: Should not have altered “with 0.21 nm fringe spacing”.

A couple of other examples…Original :A fossil polychaete annelid, Guanshanchaeta felicia gen. et sp. nov.,from the Lower Cambrian Guanshan Biota (Cambrian Series 2, stage 4) is described.

Incorrectly edited to;We newly report a fossilized polychaete annelid, Guanshanchaeta felicia from the Lower Cambrian Guanshan Biota

Original: The J-aggregates based on the water soluble porphyrin (H4TPPSn) is one of the most researched J aggregates because of the very unique properties as described above in spite of the simple structure.

Incorrectly edited to: J-aggregates are commonly studied in water soluble porphyrin (H4TPPSn), which exhibits the abovementioned unique properties despite its simple structure.

Coping with negative feedback

Consider your negative feedback as an important part of the learning curve. You will remember those errors and not repeat them

Not working directly with authors increases the chance of negative feedback because misunderstandings cannot be sorted on a one-to-one basis

Remember that not everyone will like your style. Some will love it; others will be irked by it or find it wanting

Remember that you are a human, not a robot

Challenges faced by ESL scientists trying to publish in academic journals

Expectations and standards of academic journals vs. elegant writing style.

ESL authors refer to already published articles and try to emulate their style.

BUT… Good scientists are not necessarily good writers.

Consider the following portion of an Abstract written by native-English scientists.

We extend the multiple hypothesis framework to allow for both association uncertainty and a switched dynamic model depending on the currently moving leg. Furthermore, an occlusion model and non-stationary dynamic state transition probabilities are used in the evaluation of hypotheses to further improve tracking robustness. Experimental results demonstrate the robustness and efficiency of the proposed framework.The yellow sentence could be edited to “To further improve tracking robustness, we evaluated hypotheses using an occlusion model and non-stationary dynamic state transition probabilities”.

The competent editor

A competent editor of ESL academic papers will

Have a good grasp of grammar, syntax and sentence structure Be able to transform the paper into a readable document while preserving

the author’s intended meaning Be able to format the document according to the relevant style guide (if

requested) Will give the edited paper a once-over to check for introduced errors, typos

and clumsy changes

The “art” of editing

An editor who has mastered the “art” of editing will

Give the author’s voice space to breathe, within the constraints of academic journal expectations

Look for repeated use of a word or phrase that looks incorrect, and recognise that it probably represents a specialised terminology

Seek economy and elegance, not just formal language, throughout the editing process

Likely have been a competent editor before mastering the art of editing

Questions are as welcome as sister cities

Auckland, New Zealand Toronto, Canada