Copy editing
Encyclopedia
Copy editing is the work that an editor
does to improve the format
ting, style, and accuracy of text. Unlike general editing, copy editing might not involve changing the substance of the text. Copy
refers to written or typewritten text for typesetting
, printing
, or publication
. Copy editing is done before both typesetting and proofreading
, the latter of which is the last step in the editorial cycle.
In the United States and Canada, an editor who does this work is called a copy editor, and an organization's highest-ranking copy editor, or the supervising editor of a group of copy editors, may be known as the copy chief, copy desk chief, or news editor. In book
publishing
in the United Kingdom and other parts of the world that follow UK nomenclature
, the term copy editor is used, but in newspaper
and magazine
publishing, the term is sub-editor (or the unhyphenated subeditor), commonly shortened to sub. The senior sub-editor on a title is frequently called the chief sub-editor. As the "sub" prefix suggests, U.K. copy editors typically have less authority than regular editors.
The term copy editor may also be spelled as one word or in hyphenated form (copyedit and copy-edit). The hyphenated form is especially common in the UK; in the U.S. newspaper field, using the two word form is more common.
Typically, copy editing involves correcting spelling, punctuation
, grammar
, terminology
, jargon
, and semantics
, and ensuring that the text adheres to the publisher's style or an external style guide, such as the Chicago Manual of Style or the Associated Press Stylebook. Copy editors may shorten the text, to improve it or to fit length limits. This is particularly so in periodical publishing, where copy must be cut to fit a particular layout, and the text changed to ensure there are no 'short lines.'
Often, copy editors are also responsible for adding any "display copy", such as headline
s, standardized headers
and footers, and photo caption
s. And, although proofreading is a distinct task from copy editing, frequently it is one of the tasks performed by copy editors.
Copy editors are expected to ensure that the text flows, that it is sensible, fair, and accurate, and that any legal problems have been addressed. If a passage is unclear or an assertion seems questionable, the copy editor may ask the writer to clarify it. Sometimes, the copy editor is the only person, other than the writer, to read entire text before publication, and for this reason, newspaper copy editors are considered the publication's last line of defense.
The role of the copy editor varies considerably from one publication to another. Some newspaper
copy editors select stories from wire service
copy; others use desktop publishing
software to do design
and layout
work that once was the province of design and production specialists.
or written manuscript
, manually marking it with editor's correction marks. Today, the manuscript is more often read on a computer display
and text corrections are entered directly.
The nearly universal adoption of computerised systems for editing and layout in newspapers and magazines has also led copy editors to become more involved in design and the technicalities of production. Technical knowledge is therefore sometimes considered as important as writing ability, though this is more true in journalism
than it is in book publishing. Hank Glamann, co-founder of the American Copy Editors Society
, made the following observation about ads for copy editor positions at American newspapers:
skills in order to recognize inconsistencies or vagueness; interpersonal skills for dealing with writers, other editors and designers; attention to detail; and a sense of style. Also, they must establish priorities and balance a desire for perfection with the necessity to follow deadlines.
Many copy editors have a college degree, often in journalism
, the language the text is written in, or communications
. In the United States, copy editing is often taught as a college journalism course, though its name varies. The courses often include news design
and pagination
.
In the United States, The Dow Jones Newspaper Fund sponsors internships that include two weeks of training. Also, the American Press Institute, the Poynter Institute
, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
, UC San Diego Extension and conferences of the American Copy Editors Society
offer mid-career training for newspaper copy editors and news editors (news copy desk supervisors).
Most U.S. newspapers and publishers give copy-editing job candidates an editing test or a tryout. These vary widely and can include general items such as acronyms, current events, math, punctuation, and skills such as the use of Associated Press style
, headline writing, infographics editing, and journalism ethics.
In both the U.S. and the U.K., there are no official bodies offering a single recognized qualification.
In the U.K., several companies provide a range of courses unofficially recognised within the industry. Training may be on the job or through publishing courses, privately run seminars, or correspondence courses of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders
. The National Council for the Training of Journalists
also has a qualification for subeditors.
Organizations
Newspaper copy editing
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
does to improve the format
Format
Format may refer to:* File format, layout for electronic files* Text formatting, typesetting of text elements* Format , a command-line utility in many computer operating systems* Format , a computer command to prepare hard disks...
ting, style, and accuracy of text. Unlike general editing, copy editing might not involve changing the substance of the text. Copy
Copy (written)
Copy refers to written material, in contrast to photographs or other elements of layout, in a large number of contexts, including magazines, advertising, and book publishing....
refers to written or typewritten text for typesetting
Typesetting
Typesetting is the composition of text by means of types.Typesetting requires the prior process of designing a font and storing it in some manner...
, printing
Printing
Printing is a process for reproducing text and image, typically with ink on paper using a printing press. It is often carried out as a large-scale industrial process, and is an essential part of publishing and transaction printing....
, or publication
Publication
To publish is to make content available to the public. While specific use of the term may vary among countries, it is usually applied to text, images, or other audio-visual content on any medium, including paper or electronic publishing forms such as websites, e-books, Compact Discs and MP3s...
. Copy editing is done before both typesetting and proofreading
Proofreading
Proofreading is the reading of a galley proof or computer monitor to detect and correct production-errors of text or art. Proofreaders are expected to be consistently accurate by default because they occupy the last stage of typographic production before publication.-Traditional method:A proof is...
, the latter of which is the last step in the editorial cycle.
In the United States and Canada, an editor who does this work is called a copy editor, and an organization's highest-ranking copy editor, or the supervising editor of a group of copy editors, may be known as the copy chief, copy desk chief, or news editor. In book
Book
A book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...
publishing
Publishing
Publishing is the process of production and dissemination of literature or information—the activity of making information available to the general public...
in the United Kingdom and other parts of the world that follow UK nomenclature
Nomenclature
Nomenclature is a term that applies to either a list of names or terms, or to the system of principles, procedures and terms related to naming - which is the assigning of a word or phrase to a particular object or property...
, the term copy editor is used, but in newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
and magazine
Magazine
Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
publishing, the term is sub-editor (or the unhyphenated subeditor), commonly shortened to sub. The senior sub-editor on a title is frequently called the chief sub-editor. As the "sub" prefix suggests, U.K. copy editors typically have less authority than regular editors.
The term copy editor may also be spelled as one word or in hyphenated form (copyedit and copy-edit). The hyphenated form is especially common in the UK; in the U.S. newspaper field, using the two word form is more common.
Overview
The "five Cs" summarize the copy editor's job: Make the copy clear, correct, concise, complete, and consistent. Copy editors should make it say what it means, and mean what it says.Typically, copy editing involves correcting spelling, punctuation
Punctuation
Punctuation marks are symbols that indicate the structure and organization of written language, as well as intonation and pauses to be observed when reading aloud.In written English, punctuation is vital to disambiguate the meaning of sentences...
, grammar
Grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of structural rules that govern the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology, syntax, and phonology, often complemented by phonetics, semantics,...
, terminology
Terminology
Terminology is the study of terms and their use. Terms are words and compound words that in specific contexts are given specific meanings, meanings that may deviate from the meaning the same words have in other contexts and in everyday language. The discipline Terminology studies among other...
, jargon
Jargon
Jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, group, or event. The philosophe Condillac observed in 1782 that "Every science requires a special language because every science has its own ideas." As a rationalist member of the Enlightenment he...
, and semantics
Semantics
Semantics is the study of meaning. It focuses on the relation between signifiers, such as words, phrases, signs and symbols, and what they stand for, their denotata....
, and ensuring that the text adheres to the publisher's style or an external style guide, such as the Chicago Manual of Style or the Associated Press Stylebook. Copy editors may shorten the text, to improve it or to fit length limits. This is particularly so in periodical publishing, where copy must be cut to fit a particular layout, and the text changed to ensure there are no 'short lines.'
Often, copy editors are also responsible for adding any "display copy", such as headline
Headline
The headline is the text at the top of a newspaper article, indicating the nature of the article below it.It is sometimes termed a news hed, a deliberate misspelling that dates from production flow during hot type days, to notify the composing room that a written note from an editor concerned a...
s, standardized headers
Page header
A page header or simply header in typography is text which is separated from the main body of text and appears at the top of a printed page...
and footers, and photo caption
Photo caption
Photo captions, also known as cutlines, are a few lines of text used to explain or elaborate on published photographs.Captions more than a few sentences long are often referred to as a "copy block". They are a type of display copy...
s. And, although proofreading is a distinct task from copy editing, frequently it is one of the tasks performed by copy editors.
Copy editors are expected to ensure that the text flows, that it is sensible, fair, and accurate, and that any legal problems have been addressed. If a passage is unclear or an assertion seems questionable, the copy editor may ask the writer to clarify it. Sometimes, the copy editor is the only person, other than the writer, to read entire text before publication, and for this reason, newspaper copy editors are considered the publication's last line of defense.
The role of the copy editor varies considerably from one publication to another. Some newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
copy editors select stories from wire service
News agency
A news agency is an organization of journalists established to supply news reports to news organizations: newspapers, magazines, and radio and television broadcasters. Such an agency may also be referred to as a wire service, newswire or news service.-History:The oldest news agency is Agence...
copy; others use desktop publishing
Desktop publishing
Desktop publishing is the creation of documents using page layout software on a personal computer.The term has been used for publishing at all levels, from small-circulation documents such as local newsletters to books, magazines and newspapers...
software to do design
News design
News design is the process of arranging material on a newspaper page, according to editorial and graphical guidelines and goals. Main editorial goals include the ordering of news stories by order of importance, while graphical considerations include readability and balanced, unobtrusive...
and layout
Page layout
Page layout is the part of graphic design that deals in the arrangement and style treatment of elements on a page.- History and development :...
work that once was the province of design and production specialists.
Changes in the field
Traditionally, the copy editor would read a printedPrinting
Printing is a process for reproducing text and image, typically with ink on paper using a printing press. It is often carried out as a large-scale industrial process, and is an essential part of publishing and transaction printing....
or written manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
, manually marking it with editor's correction marks. Today, the manuscript is more often read on a computer display
Computer display
A monitor or display is an electronic visual display for computers. The monitor comprises the display device, circuitry, and an enclosure...
and text corrections are entered directly.
The nearly universal adoption of computerised systems for editing and layout in newspapers and magazines has also led copy editors to become more involved in design and the technicalities of production. Technical knowledge is therefore sometimes considered as important as writing ability, though this is more true in journalism
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...
than it is in book publishing. Hank Glamann, co-founder of the American Copy Editors Society
American Copy Editors Society
The American Copy Editors Society, commonly known as ACES, is a professional not-for-profit association for copy editors at U.S. newspapers, magazines, Web sites and corporations., the group offers:*a headline contest*member directories*a newsletter...
, made the following observation about ads for copy editor positions at American newspapers:
We want them to be skilled grammarians and wordsmiths and write bright and engaging headlines and must know QuarkQuarkXPressQuarkXPress is a computer application for creating and editing complex page layouts in a WYSIWYG environment. It runs on Mac OS X and Windows. It was first released by Quark, Inc...
. But, often, when push comes to shove, we will let every single one of those requirements slide except the last one, because you have to know that in order to push the button at the appointed time.
Traits, skills, and training
Besides an excellent command of language, copy editors need broad general knowledge for spotting factual errors; good critical thinkingCritical thinking
Critical thinking is the process or method of thinking that questions assumptions. It is a way of deciding whether a claim is true, false, or sometimes true and sometimes false, or partly true and partly false. The origins of critical thinking can be traced in Western thought to the Socratic...
skills in order to recognize inconsistencies or vagueness; interpersonal skills for dealing with writers, other editors and designers; attention to detail; and a sense of style. Also, they must establish priorities and balance a desire for perfection with the necessity to follow deadlines.
Many copy editors have a college degree, often in journalism
Journalism
Journalism is the practice of investigation and reporting of events, issues and trends to a broad audience in a timely fashion. Though there are many variations of journalism, the ideal is to inform the intended audience. Along with covering organizations and institutions such as government and...
, the language the text is written in, or communications
Communication studies
Communication Studies is an academic field that deals with processes of communication, commonly defined as the sharing of symbols over distances in space and time. Hence, communication studies encompasses a wide range of topics and contexts ranging from face-to-face conversation to speeches to mass...
. In the United States, copy editing is often taught as a college journalism course, though its name varies. The courses often include news design
News design
News design is the process of arranging material on a newspaper page, according to editorial and graphical guidelines and goals. Main editorial goals include the ordering of news stories by order of importance, while graphical considerations include readability and balanced, unobtrusive...
and pagination
Pagination
Pagination is the process of dividing information into discrete pages, either electronic pages or printed pages. Today the latter are usually simply instances of the former that have been outputted to a printing device, such as a desktop printer or a modern printing press...
.
In the United States, The Dow Jones Newspaper Fund sponsors internships that include two weeks of training. Also, the American Press Institute, the Poynter Institute
Poynter Institute
The Poynter Institute is a non-profit school for journalism located in St. Petersburg, Florida. The school's mission statement says that "The Poynter Institute is a school dedicated to teaching and inspiring journalists and media leaders. It promotes excellence and integrity in the practice of...
, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is a public research university located in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States...
, UC San Diego Extension and conferences of the American Copy Editors Society
American Copy Editors Society
The American Copy Editors Society, commonly known as ACES, is a professional not-for-profit association for copy editors at U.S. newspapers, magazines, Web sites and corporations., the group offers:*a headline contest*member directories*a newsletter...
offer mid-career training for newspaper copy editors and news editors (news copy desk supervisors).
Most U.S. newspapers and publishers give copy-editing job candidates an editing test or a tryout. These vary widely and can include general items such as acronyms, current events, math, punctuation, and skills such as the use of Associated Press style
AP Stylebook
The Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law, usually called the AP Stylebook, is a style and usage guide used by newspapers and in the news industry in the United States...
, headline writing, infographics editing, and journalism ethics.
In both the U.S. and the U.K., there are no official bodies offering a single recognized qualification.
In the U.K., several companies provide a range of courses unofficially recognised within the industry. Training may be on the job or through publishing courses, privately run seminars, or correspondence courses of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders
Society for Editors and Proofreaders
The Society for Editors and Proofreaders was formed in 1988. It has 1,500 members, most of them in the UK, and its headquarters are in London.The SfEP is a professional association for editors and proofreaders...
. The National Council for the Training of Journalists
National Council for the Training of Journalists
The National Council for the Training of Journalists was founded in 1951 as an organisation to oversee the training of journalists for the newspaper industry in the United Kingdom and is now playing a role in the wider media.-Purpose:...
also has a qualification for subeditors.
See also
- American copy editors
- American Copy Editors SocietyAmerican Copy Editors SocietyThe American Copy Editors Society, commonly known as ACES, is a professional not-for-profit association for copy editors at U.S. newspapers, magazines, Web sites and corporations., the group offers:*a headline contest*member directories*a newsletter...
- AP StylebookAP StylebookThe Associated Press Stylebook and Briefing on Media Law, usually called the AP Stylebook, is a style and usage guide used by newspapers and in the news industry in the United States...
- EditingEditingEditing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...
- Fact checkerFact checkerA fact checker is the person who checks factual assertions in non-fictional text, usually intended for publication in a periodical, to determine their veracity and correctness...
- HeadlineHeadlineThe headline is the text at the top of a newspaper article, indicating the nature of the article below it.It is sometimes termed a news hed, a deliberate misspelling that dates from production flow during hot type days, to notify the composing room that a written note from an editor concerned a...
- House style
- News designNews designNews design is the process of arranging material on a newspaper page, according to editorial and graphical guidelines and goals. Main editorial goals include the ordering of news stories by order of importance, while graphical considerations include readability and balanced, unobtrusive...
- Photo captionPhoto captionPhoto captions, also known as cutlines, are a few lines of text used to explain or elaborate on published photographs.Captions more than a few sentences long are often referred to as a "copy block". They are a type of display copy...
- ProofreadingProofreadingProofreading is the reading of a galley proof or computer monitor to detect and correct production-errors of text or art. Proofreaders are expected to be consistently accurate by default because they occupy the last stage of typographic production before publication.-Traditional method:A proof is...
- Robinson PrizeRobinson PrizeThe Robinson Prize is one of two awards given out by the American Copy Editors Society annually to one copy editor whose work demonstrates exceptional effectiveness.-History:...
External links
General- Sub-editing style and directories1 (UK)
- Proofreading practice at Project Gutenberg Distributed Proofreaders
Organizations
- American Copy Editors Society
- Society for Editors and Proofreaders (UK)
- Technical Editing special interest group (SIG) of the Society for Technical Communication (STC)
Newspaper copy editing
- The Slot, includes What exactly is a copy editor? and How a copy desk works, by Bill WalshBill Walsh (author)Bill Walsh is the copy chief of the national desk at The Washington Post, where he has worked since 1997. He speaks on copy editing and is a regular presenter at annual conferences of the American Copy Editors Society. His books include Lapsing into a Comma and The Elephants of Style.-External...
of The Washington Post