Dictionary.com recently published an interesting article titled “Does Grammar Matter in the Workplace?” The article was referring to Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit and founder of Dozuki, who wrote an article titled “I will not hire people who use poor grammar” in the “Harvard Business Review”. Wiens says, “I’ve found that people who make fewer mistakes on a grammar test also make fewer mistakes when they do something completely unrelated to storage shelves or label parts.” In response, John McWhorter argued in a “New York Times” essay that grammar is not indicative of intelligence or attention to detail, and in many professions, it is not an essential skill.
While, of course, grammar is more important in writing-related jobs than other jobs, such as a factory assembly line, I beg to differ that grammar has nothing to do with attention to detail. As a book critic, I have seen countless poorly written books where the grammar is appalling. I’ve also seen that many of these books completely lack any attention to detail.
The world now has countless aspiring authors, and over a million books are published each year. If an author is going to compete against all the other authors to make his book stand out, having a well-written book with proper grammar and meticulous proofreading will make a big difference.
Believe it or not, even among authors, there is a bad grammar. Traditionally published books tend to be better than many self-published books because publishers have publishers to correct grammar, spelling, and other errors. But not all publishers, publishers or authors are of the same caliber, regardless of whether the book is published traditionally or independently. And many smart, self-published authors know enough to have their book edited and revised to avoid mistakes.
I see certain grammatical mistakes made in all areas in the books; I often find infinitives divided into books produced even by major publishers. The best-known example of a divided infinitive comes from the television show “Star Trek” in its famous opening “boldly go”. Here, “go” is the infinitive of the verb, so it should not be divided, although people frequently insert adverbs into the infinitive, dividing it like this.) I also often see subject-pronoun agreement problems. For example, “Everyone should decide what they want for lunch before they get to the counter.” In this case, “all” is singular, so the pronouns must also be singular. Instead of “they”, “he”, “she” or “he or she” should be used. Or “all” must be replaced by a plural word like “people” which will then coincide with the plural pronoun “they”.
As I said, such mistakes are prevalent even in traditionally published books, and well-educated people still make these mistakes constantly. Many people who complain about bad grammar don’t even acknowledge that these examples are bad grammar. I had fun reading the article on Dictionary.com that among the comments readers made, both from those who felt grammar mattered in the workplace and from those who did agree, many were full of bad grammar, and at least one person noted this fact in his comment.
Nor do I agree with John McWhorter that grammar has nothing to do with being detail-oriented. I will expand a bit here from grammar itself to include spelling, pronunciation, and other writing and communication related matters. I shudder when I see commercials where people use bad grammar; commercials have writers who should know better. Bad pronunciation also makes me shudder; In a commercial I’ve seen, the business owner tells customers that his product is “guaranteed,” only that he can’t pronounce “guaranteed.” He thinks that the beginning of the word rhymes with “auto” instead of “care.” Then a jingle appears in which the word is pronounced correctly. This business has done numerous commercials and each time is the same “guaranteed” line and the same pronunciation problem. I am surprised that the television station producing the ad has never told the business owner that he is mispronouncing the word, and I am also surprised that the business owner has never understood how the word is pronounced differently in the jingle. Obviously, attention to detail is lacking here. I know there is a small margin for the difference in pronunciations, so I went online and listened to the word pronounced in four different dictionaries and none pronounce it the way it does. And even if there are two ways to pronounce it, shouldn’t the pronunciation be consistent in the commercial? I want to buy a product from a man who for years has not known how to correctly pronounce a word that he uses over and over to promote his business and who has heard from other people’s lips dozens of times, and but he can & # 39 ; t pick up your mistake? How guaranteed is your product really?
Such a lack of attention to detail is even worse when it’s in a book. Here is an example from one of the countless books that I have been given to review where poor grammar and poor writing also reflect a lack of attention to detail. First, this particular book was riddled with typos and misspellings. One that really irritated me was the author who continually referred to what an “alternate boy” used to be like. As a good Catholic, you should have known how to spell “altar”. Worse still, throughout the book, he couldn’t decide how to do next to nothing. Every time he referred to a book or movie, he had it italicized on one page, then bold on another page, then underlined on another, then italicized and underlined on a third page. In one case, I saw it in italics, bold, and underlined, all in the same sentence, not understanding that the three mentions in the book did not match. I wonder if I would paint a fence like that, black pole, green pole, some pink stripes, then some blue polka dots, and I don’t realize it looked terrible when it was done. His book surely looked terrible, and it read horribly. A good author pays attention to detail and makes sure everything is as consistent as possible.
I also know authors who, incredibly, do not think that good grammar is important. They say “That’s why I have an editor”. And I know that publishers who tell me that writers without good grammar are terrible writers, and no matter how hard they, as publishers, work, and no matter how great the idea of the book, a book can only be improved by someone else. from the author, and it will never be completely on par if it was not well written to begin with.
If you are an author, seller, or factory worker, people judge you by your use of grammar. If you haven’t seen the movie “My Fair Lady”, it’s worth seeing as an example of how grammar can get you ahead or hold you back in life. Perhaps transforming from a flower girl on the street to part of English high society, as Eliza Doolittle does in the film, is quite extreme for her situation, but shows how people see it based on what comes out of her mouth. And they also judge you by what comes from your pen.
Poor grammar, poor writing, and lack of attention to detail are the main reasons desktop publishing has had a bad reputation. Maybe you can get away with bad grammar in the workplace, but you can’t get away with it when you write a book. Trust me; There are readers who delight in finding mistakes and pointing them out to feel superior to the authors.
If you are an aspiring writer, I recommend that you review your grammar. It wouldn’t hurt to take a class or read a grammar book. And of course, find a good editor. But don’t let your editor fix your grammar; Pay attention to what the publisher changes and learn from him or her (not theirs). Good and serious writers pay attention to detail. They realize what their editors change, they learn why, and they don’t repeat the same mistakes in the future.
Regardless of what the rest of the world may say about the need for good grammar, an author must be an aspiring grammar and punctuation expert and be detail-oriented. You may not need to know the name of each part of the speech, but you should write and rewrite with a dictionary and a grammar book nearby for quick reference. Do your best to produce a consistent, well-written quality product and you’ll be ahead of the crowd to make your book stand out.
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