Or, "Why The Elements of Style is kind of a piece of crap."

Pretty interesting article in the Chronicle of Higher Education. I'm a subscriber, so I hope you're all able to use this link. Let me know if you can't.

http://chronicle.com/free/v55/i32/32b01501.htm

Where's Frank Sisko when you need him most?

That's what I'm saying.

Sorry, Lorie.

Oh, no need to apologize! I was just thinking that I'd love to have his take on that article. Strunk and White has been my writing handbook for years, but the points the author makes in that article are actually pretty sound ones. So now I'm at a crossroads.

WWFSD?

Lorie, I laughed at the last thing you wrote. That sounds like a thread that someone would have started a while back: What Would Frank Sisko Do? Can you imagine the responses it would have gotten.

I will have to check out that article. I bought a copy of Strunk & White years ago and am curious to see what this guy debunks.

My comment on the article is simply this: my GF teaches Advanced Placement English; she does not use Strunk and White.

I'm a fan of Diana Hacker:
http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/newcata ... 0312450257

Hmmm. Grammar is one of my weaknesses, since I am an intuitive writer, and I really loved how FAL made it understandable.

Now I have to read that article and see if it makes sense to me.

I would discard most of Strunk and White -- I had a Technical Writing teacher that was smoking that "passive voice" crack pipe. Passive voice is usually an avoidable crutch, but he was spotting in ever sentence that used "has" and "is" and everything like that.

The one thing I think Strunk and White is good for is diction -- word choice. Words are misused often, and it helps to remind us of perfectly good distinctions between words.

I'm talking about those pairs of words explained like "imply, infer" and "reluctant, reticent."

Lawyers need to use the passive voice. It helps to hide their client's wrong doings.

Mistakes were made.

And politicians!

Taxes were raised.

I have both Strunk and White's The Elements of Style (because I got it for cheap at a used book sale) and Diana Hacker's A Writer's Reference (because it was recommended to me by an English teacher with Sisko-level powers). If I find contradictions between the two, I pick whichever way I like, just like people who consult religious writings.

I liked that column and mostly agreed with it.

All I've ever read of The Elements of Style was E.B. White's famous introduction to it. I've never paid much attention to style guides.

Even the AP stylebook was out of date when I was in the papers. They still had "Teen-Ager," "Free-Lancer" and a personal pet peeve of mine, "Web site."

The wrong doings made by the clients.

It helps was deliberately chosen to show the passive voice being active.
But, in hindsight, the pronoun it could be interpreted as meaning the lawyers need to use it,
especially with the pronoun their being used.

I should have written The passive voice helps to hide a lawyer's client's wrong doing.
That's getting ugly, though.

Which helps signify the point! I think I like your last version, John.