One would think that a paper on the Importance of Style would be extremely easy to write, with the only problem being how to limit it to the 5 page limit. This was not the case for me. I have never experienced such a case of writer's block with anything that I have written. Perhaps, it is because my examination of the importance of style led me to examine my job, and I know of very few people who would happily conclude that their job was not important. This sort of thing leads to layoffs, loss of income, etc.
It could also be as Williams states, "Whenever we reflect on what we do as we do it, we become self-conscious, sometimes to the point of paralysis." (p v).
I have suffered much paralysis in the production of this paper, but at last, I think that I have something that I can be proud of.
Please be assured that it is at least 5 pages in normal paper formatting. It appears shorter because I recently took document design and could not help attempting to format it for beauty as well as function. Hence, the use of 10 pt type on 12 pt lead with a 5 inch measure. I wrote it formatted more normally and then had to change it because of my rigorous document design training.
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Jessica M. Badger
English 5365
Importance of Style
The importance of style is a wide-open concept with many facets and layers that it would be difficult only to limit it in length. As I explored the importance of style, I found it necessary to attempt to define style in a way that perhaps makes sense only to me. Style is more than a list of rules to be followed; it is a combination of those rules with the voice of the author as the author strives to create a presentation that is both pleasing and appropriate for the audience in question. In addition, that presentation must clearly present the message to the audience. If the message does not make it from the author’s understanding into the understanding of the reader, the paper has failed to exhibit the appropriate style.
But, before I can address the importance of style, I must address a question that no one seems to be able to answer: What is style? I am sure that this question has many answers, some of which were presented in class discussions. There are numerous style guides on the market, each proclaiming its contents to be the correct style. But, the correct style for what context? If one overall style is correct, then some of these guides must be incorrect. However, that is not the case. Each one carries correct information for the field or subject to which it applies; therefore, style itself is something larger than the placement of a comma next to a quotation mark, a preferred spelling or acronym, or a reference format.
Merriam-Webster’s dictionary has several definitions for the word style. I think that definitions 2a and 6 are most applicable to this discussion: “2 a : a distinctive manner of expression (as in writing or speech) ” and “6 : a convention with respect to spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and typographic arrangement and display followed in writing or printing” (Merriam-Webster, 2010). Is style one or the other? Or is it some combination of both?
I look at style as a combination of the “manner of expression” and the “conventions” applied in a specific style guide. I defined it as specific presentation chosen for a particular audience for a specific topic or field of study in my January 25th blog post (Badger, 2010). Style is like the voice of the author, a combination of the intonation and the choice of words and presentation. For some, an extremely formal voice is necessary, while for others a less formal voice is appropriate. It may be that there is no wrong style but that a style may be used in an incorrect context. Using the incorrect style for the situation would be like cursing in church. I would not expect a formal report to read like a blog post, nor would I expect a blog post to read like a formal report. Each carries its own unique voice or style that is appropriate to the situation.
Grammar has definite rules, and good grammar has definite characteristics. The conventions presented in Style Guides are concrete with rules that are easy to follow. But, style itself is ephemeral, something more than grammar and conventions of quotation or acronym usage or even preferred reference format. A writer can observe all the rules of grammar and the rules contained within their chosen Style Guide and still miss style or a voice.
Lanham (2003) writes, “Let’s begin by considering what we usually think prose style is all about. We call this conception, building on its three central values of Clarity, Brevity, and Sincerity, the ‘C-B-S’ theory of prose.” These values form the core of most style guides; yet, they seem to be incomplete and insincere. He also notes that “a rigorous C-B-S would have to revise” literature “out of existence,” yet we admire and study great works of literature (Lanham, 2003). Obviously, C-B-S should serve more as a guideline that an unbreakable rule.
Style, then, is not a collection of rules to be followed rigidly without variation but is a combination of author’s expression and the conventions appropriate to the audience or field. It is a way of writing that allows to reader to understand what is written. Poor style confuses the audience, while good style does not. As stated by Ronnie Lipton (2007), “Follow…grammar rules (but not out the window).” “You can go along with the editorial stylebook or the sticklers unless their rules sacrifice clarity (what’s grammatically correct isn’t always what’s clear)”(Lipton, 2007).
This brings me to the importance of style. Style allows me to convey my message to my audience in a way that they will understand it. According to Joseph Williams (2009), “it is good to write clearly.” He also notes that readers “won’t even read what we’ve written unless we motivate them to” (Williams, 2009). So, style also serves a purpose as a motivator of the reader. Why would I choose to wade through some dense, obscure document when I have so many other options? A document exhibiting poor style may fail to express its message in more than one way. It may fail to express its message because the reader is confused or because the reader has given up entirely on reading it, neither of which should be the goal of the author.
In many ways, style goes beyond simply audience understanding. Sometimes, I can understand things that are painful to read. I would qualify them as having poor style, even though I understand the meaning. This probably happens more in my line of work than perhaps in others, though I expect that we all run into these things from time to time. These painful reading experiences remove the incentive for the reader to continue with this author, subject, or company, unless highly motivated by another force.
An elegant, appropriate style inspires confidence and even trust in the reader. When I see misspellings in advertisements or other glaring or disruptive errors, I lose confidence in the creator of the product. I feel, perhaps unfairly, that the amount of care taken in the creation of the advertisement would reflect the care put into creation of the product or quality of the service.
The same would hold for a professional publication of any type. I would not expect to see awkward sentence construction, misspelling, poor grammar, or overall weak style in Journal content or published work; yet, it sometimes happens.
As a technical editor for the Publications Division of the American Chemical Society, I am familiar with the importance of style in a professional publication. As of 2010, we publish 41 peer-reviewed journals and numerous books. I work with the journals; however, I will not list the titles on which I work because we can be called on to edit on any of the titles, and I have worked on a very large number of them.
The American Chemical Society publishes a Style Guide (American Chemical Society, 2006), currently in its third edition, loosely based on the Chicago Manual of Style, with specific instructions for handling those tricky chemical names, preferred spellings, quotation usage, citation style, etc. As discussed above, a Style Guide is only part of style; it provides the conventions for the specific field, audience, or publication.
The conventions in a style guide can also help with the clarity of the work within a field. When authors use expected abbreviations, spellings, or representations of chemical formulae, it makes it easier for the reader to understand the work, within the confines of the field of course. For example, the ACS Style Guide instructs authors to use boldface for compound numbers. This helps the reader to pick out the compound number in a sentence that may have numerous other numbers as shown in Example Sentence 1. The author using the specified styling for compounds and the accepted abbreviation for millimoles (mmol) enhances the clarity of that sentence for readers within the expected audience.
My job as a technical editor is to enforce certain conventions that enhance the author’s style without losing the author’s overall style or voice. The same author did not write every paper published in our journals, and we do not expect them to write the same way nor do we change them to sound as though one person wrote them. We make changes to enhance the author’s style and to make the reader’s experience more pleasant.
Each author reacts differently to the changes that we apply. Some send messages of appreciation when we have managed to extract the meaning from a difficult sentence and clarify it. Some are enraged by any changes to their papers, calling for every statement to be returned to its original form with accusations of mangling the meaning and threats of never publishing with us again. Others don’t seem to acknowledge the changes at all; they simply mark their galley proofs without either recrimination or acknowledgement.
The management tells us that the technical editing is reported to be a valued service by the Editors and the authors at meetings. Sometimes, it is difficult to see what happens beyond our screens, but I know that style plays a vital role in my field.
We try to see the voice behind the grammar errors and sometimes strange word usage, to determine if the author has coined a new phrase or misspelled or misused an old one, to prevent the embarrassing errors in connotation versus denotation that plague many of our non-native English speaking authors and even some of our native English speaking authors, and to bring polish and elegance to disparate pieces without losing the author’s own style.
This task is nearly impossible on the scale at which we do it, and not one of the papers will be absolutely perfect. Yet, we push forward with this task because people value the presence of the correct style for the situation. In many ways, my technical editor position is perhaps easier than that of those who do a broader spectrum of topics. My co-workers and I focus on Chemistry, and we are all Chemists, Biologists, Physicists, or some other flavor of Scientist. None of us claim to be masters of Rhetoric or Style, yet we push forward. We know what Style is for our field, and it is not characterized by avoidance of the first person and passive voice, although that is still the prevailing theme.
Style in science is not the same thing as style in literature or even in technical communication. We expect our scientific publications to be read by non-native speakers of the language, and we expect them to be translated into other languages. Tested, confirmed, and retested by laboratories around the world. It does not pay to use a flowery phrase that may be misunderstood by another. The result of a vague or confusing message could be the publication of a paper that states, “In our hands, the procedure published in ref 4 did not yield the described results.” A polite, but unmistakable, “you are wrong.”
Speaking as a scientist, I know that we run the very high risk of actually being wrong so very often that the idea of being perceived to be wrong because of our poor word choice is horrifying. Nor would I want to turn my work into a joke by a slip in punctuation or spelling, as illustrated in the Panda Joke from Eats, Shoots & Leaves (Truss, 2003). I would also prefer to avoid giving the false impression that inanimate objects are doing the action. For example, in Example Sentence 2, it appears as though the sample is happily stirring itself, while the researcher sits idly by allowing the sample to stir at its pleasure. Example Sentence 2 is understandable; very few, if any, people would actually think that the sample stirs itself. However, Example Sentence 3, while still in the passive voice beloved by researchers the world over, is more accurate in that the sample is passive. It is not performing any action or being permitted to perform any action.
This is how I would want my work to be presented. I prefer a clean and elegant presentation that shows an appropriate level of sophistication for my audience. Many short choppy sentences may be clear, but they can seem childish or abrupt. Many long convoluted sentences are mature, but they are too dense and run the risk of the reader getting lost. I need a presentation that lends authority to the work without losing readers in pomposity and flowery prose. I need the words to be presented with care to give the impression that I care not only about those words but also about the work described with those words. Most of all, I need the people who read my work, to understand it, to repeat it, to confirm it, and to cite it.
None of those things can happen with poor stylistic choices. Therefore, good style is essential to the publication of scientific information, just as it is for advertisers, writing teachers, and many other professions. Although people peering into the community may see words like N-(2,4-dinitrophenyl)-2-phenylfulleropyrrolidine, 1-morpholino-2,4-dinitrobenzene, and redox reaction and assume that the writing is dense, complicated, and difficult to understand, I know that that those words are clear to the community and that the writing that carries those words needs to be equally clear.
Good style lends importance to works that may otherwise be weak; although it cannot mask the flaws of poor work to astute readers, it may be able to soften them. Poor or inappropriate style choices can weaken strong work, by making it unintelligible, unapproachable, or unappealing. Poor style choices can rob an advertiser, business, scientist, teacher, politician, journalist, or any other author of credibility. While good style choices provide polish, flare, and elegance that the reader will notice, even if the reader does not know the proper terms for the choices.
As long as readers can sense the presence of good style in a work and as long as authors feel that stylistic choices add value to their presentation by enhancing the clarity, preserving the author’s unique voice, showing care in presentation, and preventing embarrassment, style will continue to play an important role in communication in all discourse communities. We can appreciate good style even if we do not understand the Rhetorical Theory underlying the words or the specific grammar rules required to create that elegant presentation.
References
American Chemical Society. (2006). The ACS style guide: Effective communication of scientific information (3rd ed.). (A. M. Coghill, & L. R. Garson, Eds.) Washington, DC: American Chemical Society.
Badger, J. M. (2010, January 25). Jessica's MATC at TTU blog. Retrieved January 2010, from English 5365 Week Two Post: http://jmbadger.blogspot.com/2010/01/english-5365-week-two-post.html
Lanham, R. A. (2003). Analyzing prose (2nd ed.). New York: Continuum.
Lipton, R. (2007). The practical guide to information design. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Merriam-Webster. (2010). Merriam-Webster's online dictionary. Retrieved February 2010, from http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/style
Truss, L. (2003). Eats, shoots & leaves: The zero tolerance approach to punctuation. New York: Gotham Books.
Williams, J. M. (2009). Style: The basics of clarity and grace (3rd ed.). New York: Pearson Education, Inc.
