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Global Writting Styles

Global Writting Styles

Global Writting Styles

(OP)
I'm curious to know if people that are writing reports and other technical documents do so with the consideration of the target audience in mind?

I understand that a work instruction one writes for the assembly line will have a different style and grammar usage than a product proposal going to excecutive review.  I suppose my question is for those that work in global companies where their [English] writting could be read by people in several countries.  Do you use the "Queen's" English, or write in "American" English?

As an example, from Reuters:

Quote:

Patriots Hope Defense Can Take Them Back to Super Bowl

Philadelphia have lost three consecutive NFC title games, while Atlanta are hoping mobile quarterback Michael Vick can lead them to their first Super Bowl appearance since 1999.

Reader comment: Don't you employ proof readers any more? " Philadelphia have lost… while Atlanta are hoping…. It should be Philadelphia HAS lot. Atlanta IS hoping. I swear my six year old has better english.

Editor comment: This is acceptable in British English, but is extremely jarring to American eyes. It should not have been used in a U.S. story about an American event.

Being American/British, should a person go out of their way to change writing habbits for the global audience?  If so, in what direction?

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Global Writting Styles

Language will resist all attempts at universalization.  That is part of its nature.  Oh, you can try...

RE: Global Writting Styles

... and if you ever did get to the point where everyone is speaking the same language, some supernatural omnipotent being(s) will come along and say "Hey, we can't have this ... they are becoming too much like us" ... zzzappp!!

Deja vous all over again

& all the best.

RE: Global Writting Styles

writting?

jimbo

Buy a dictionary, keep it nearby and USE it. Webster's New World Dictionary of American English is recommended, and Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.

RE: Global Writting Styles

(OP)
Grant me at least one typo a week...

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Global Writting Styles

At least it's a global typo, rather than some arbitrary, regional one like color and colour.

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

RE: Global Writting Styles

(OP)
Maybe "writting" could be the act of writing a writ?

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943.
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

RE: Global Writting Styles

Ah, from spelling error to a verbing neologism.  It's all a matter of perspective.  

Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein

RE: Global Writting Styles

Apparently, moving fingers have been observed writting:

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it

    -- Omar Khayyam

RE: Global Writting Styles

MadMango
You asked for only one mulligan. Ya cannot have two.
I'm calling you on the spelling of habit "habbit" maybe you meant hobbit?

Regards

RE: Global Writting Styles

also "should a person go out of their way" is a bad mix of singular person with plural adjective.

Jimbo should allow at  least a bag of errors per handle per weak.

Ciao.

RE: Global Writting Styles

Readers who comment on others' bad writing should be educated well enough to be aware of British vs. US English.

That said, it should be up to the editorial staff to correct such things.  If it really is a piece about US events aimed at a US audience, it isn't necessarily the writer's job to be bidialectal but the editors should take care of it.

I did a mess of editing lately for a US conference & proceedings thereof.  If something was odd to me but okay in BritEng, I left it alone.  And I know I'd have no way to get it right if I were to try to deliberately write British (though I spelled a lot of things the British way until my teens, since most of what I read as a kid was British).

Hg

RE: Global Writting Styles

Most people in the world who use english will use british english spelling and grammar and not the corrupt american form.
The story of american football merely demonstrates the differences in deciding whether or not a team should be treated as a singular group or as a collection of players, and is therefore plural. This has nothing to do with american or british forms of english. The reader who commented that he'd swear his 6 year old knows better english is obviously american as the british would never use profanities in front of their children.   

corus

RE: Global Writting Styles

For a discussion on singular/plural see Thread1010-104593 . (Started by HgTX no less!).

There are many differences between "British" English and American English (Note: "Queen's English" has a different meaning in the UK).  I agree with HgTX's sentiment.  If you write in your own (local) language and style, it's not wrong, just different.  If you try to write in a different style, you will undoubtedly get it just plain wrong.  I can't begin to tell you, as a "Brit" how badly structured the sentence in the quotation appears to me.  "Philadelphia have" etc. seems fine to me, it's just the rest of the sentence.
In addition, the statement that a six year old "has" English appears ridiculous to me.  You can speak English, you can write English, you can understand English, but you can't have English.
As Winston Churchill said of the US and Britain - "They are two nations divided by a common language".

Vive la difference!

RE: Global Writting Styles

I've long been curious as to why the British go to hospital, while Americans go to the hospital for medical care.

RE: Global Writting Styles

We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language.

Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900), The Canterville Ghost, 1882

RE: Global Writting Styles

To respond to MadMango's original question, it appears fairly normal in a multi-national Company to address listeners in whatever version of English they are conversant with. When it comes down to writing reports however, many have adopted 'simplified English' This was developed in Europe, originally to draft aircraft maintenance manuals in English. In simplified English, there is only one word which can legally be used to convey an idea e.g. start will be used but not 'commence' ,nor 'begin'

RE: Global Writting Styles

I find it interesting that Europeans and other non-Americans "go to University" while we "go to College".

Just another example I suppose.

RE: Global Writting Styles

We Indians go to college upto Bachelor's Degree and to university for Master's Degree.

Secondly, we call persons with a Bachelor's Degree as Graduates.

RE: Global Writting Styles

Ahh the discussions we have had here deciding whether "the company" should be plural or singular!

Sometimes it just doesn't "sound right" when treated as the singular, even though, I believe, that that is correct.
For really complicated grammatical issues read the five books in Douglas Adams' Hitchhikers' trilogy (I know, I know) where they discuss tense and time travel....

PS.
Apologies for any of my posts which currently are littered with typos. I'm trying to get used to a new laptop keyboard and the keys are really stiff!

"I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go past." Douglas Adams

RE: Global Writting Styles

flamby,

mixing singular and plural is acceptable when it allows you to avoid the dreadfully cumbersome "his or her" or "he or she" while not just using a single gender pronoun - or so my profs always said

(sorry for the late reply but i had to add my 2 cents)

cheers,
rad
"Remember, if you leave it to the last minute, it'll only take a minute"

RE: Global Writting Styles

radAES--I'm with ya there.  Generic masculine is an error in gender as much as generic plural is an error in number; people writing grammar books in the 18th century made an arbitrary choice (along with banning split infitinives or sentence-final prepositions, all based on some neoclassical worship of Latin) that didn't particularly reflect the natural patterns of the language.

Hg

RE: Global Writting Styles

Follow a command like "a person should bring their umbrella when it rains". Taken literally, this results in four problems, when you try unsuccessfully to avoid a language problem.

1. Logistic - Lot of umbrellas!
2. Moral - Have you got their permissions or are you steeling?
3. Accidental - Implication of damaging their umbrella is more troublesome than breaking your own.
4. Empathy - What they do without umbrellas and it's still raining?

And there is no reason why a Sentence should not be obeyed literally!

Have fun.

Ciao.

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