A sentence diagram (reproduced from the English Grammar Revolution website by kind permission of Elizabeth O’Brien).

by Gregory Hicks

On April 11 we had a small but animated meeting on the intricacies of sentence diagramming. Ellie had put together a short lesson on the topic wherein we watched a couple short videos about the history and process of sentence diagramming. We spent the rest of the meeting working through and discussing a set of examples prepared by Ellie based on the English Grammar Revolution book and website.

Everybody had an easy time picking the process up until we started running up against the nuances of participles and subordinate clauses. This led to Elizabeth to crowd-source some expert opinions via Twitter (special thanks to Editors Toronto member James Harbeck, a.k.a. @sesquiotic, and to U.S. editor @MadamGrammar, for sharing their grammar wisdom). It should also be reported that several Twig members temporarily lost their ability to apply normal English syntax, erupting into vaguely poetic declarations like “Dough is!” and “Socks had gone where was mystery.” It was a good time, overall.

Working through the examples, many of us were at first struck by the elegance of the system but then perplexed by its ambiguities. The system is not particularly interested in designating tense or differentiating adjectives from adverbs, for example, or in signalling the order of sentence elements; it remains relentlessly focused on the relationships between sentence elements. As one of the interviewees in the clips above pointed out, it does indeed have a bit of a “punk rock” aspect, as it forces the diagrammer to question and dismantle everything they take for granted in a sentence.  

Announcements

Elizabeth d’Anjou announced that early registration was open until April 19 for the Editors Canada national conference coming up May 25–27 in Saskatoon. The theme is Bridging Communities: Bringing Together Communications-Related Professions. One particularly interesting element is a stream of sessions related to editing texts relating to Indigenous people. Greg Younging, author of the Elements of Indigenous Style, is presenting one of the pre-conference workshops on Friday. The conference room rate at the Radisson Hotel is $139 for single or double occupancy.

The upcoming webinars include

• The Mighty Verb Under the Microscope (May 2)
• Starting a Freelance Editing Career (May 5 & 12)
• Manuscript Evaluation (May 14)
• Demystifying Permissions (June 5, 6, & 7)
• Eight-Step Editing (presented by Elizabeth herself)

Stephanie Stone reminded everyone that the twig’s new fee policy was now in effect: Editors Canada members continue to attend twig meetings free, and visitors are charged $5 per meeting (after the first).

Coming Up

Meet Leigh Nash of Invisible Publishing, a non-profit indie publisher located in Picton, Ontario.

“It was a bit like art, a bit like mathematics. It was much more than words uttered, or words written on a piece of paper: it was a picture of language.”

— Kitty Burns Florey

For nearly a hundred years, diagramming sentences was a standard part of the English curriculum in North American schools. (There is even a description of a teenaged Laura Ingalls diagramming sentences in Little Town on the Prairie.) Like much of the rest of formal grammar education, diagramming fell out of favour in the 1960s, but it is enjoying something of a renaissance.

Elizabeth and Ellie know and love grammar and have always been curious to try sentence diagramming. Come explore this wonderfully word-nerdy pastime with us! We’ll focus on modifiers (one of the most useful aspects of sentence structure for editors and writers, as it can help clarify what elements go with what).

If you enjoy playing with language and grammar, if you like charts, diagrams, and other graphic organizers, or if you just want to snack and socialize with the Editors Kingston gang, come on out!

If you’d like to investigate sentence diagramming a bit in advance, check out the Grammar Revolution website.

Reminder: New Meeting Fee Policy

After much discussion and with overwhelming support from the group, we began in March to ask nonmembers of Editors Canada to pay $5 each to help cover the costs of room rental, gift cards for speakers, and refreshments. Newcomers will be invited to attend their first meeting for free.

Join Us!

We meet at the usual place and time:

• Ongwanada Resource Centre, 191 Portsmouth Avenue
• 7 to 9 p.m. (Doors open at 6:30)
• Light refreshments
• Both Editors Canada members and non-members welcome

Coming Up

Wednesday, May 9

Meet Leigh Nash, publisher of Invisible Publishing, an independent, not-for-profit publisher, located in Picton, ON (population 4800) that is committed to publishing diverse voices and stories in beautifully designed and affordable editions.

Wednesday, June 20

NOTE unusual timing (this is the THIRD Wednesday of June).

Summer social. Join us for a pay-as-you-go meal and/or drinks in a casual Kingston spot. All welcome! Location & time TBA.

Picture Credit: Sample Diagrams by Tjo3ya, used under Creative Commons Licence 3.0.

To market ourselves effectively to the clients we want to work with, we should

• understand what we can offer them and what makes that offering valuable
• have a clearly defined set of goals and to-do list of steps that will help us reach them.

These were key takeaways from our March 14th gathering, a follow-up to January’s marketing-focused evening.

We started the evening sharing overviews of our goals with one another: some of us wanted to develop websites and fluency with social media, while others hoped to attend more publishing-related events or print up-to-date business cards. The most frequently mentioned goal among the freelancers present was to achieve a greater level of income stability. Using Adrienne’s worksheets, we noted such things as who our ideal clients were, what types of editing we could offer them, in what areas of publishing (subject/genre) we desired to work, and what other qualities we had that would differentiate ourselves and our skills from other editors. We compiled notes for cold calling, elevator pitches, and to-do lists.

Who knew competitive marketing could be such a strenuous exercise of looking inward? Some of us might feel overwhelmed just by the idea of marketing ourselves competitively. We’re editors first, after all—our primary focus should be the quality of our editing, right? Nevertheless, good marketing needs to be one of an editor’s priorities.

At night’s end each of us trudged out into the cold from our gathering more confident and ready to do better marketing for our businesses.

Special thanks to Adrienne Montgomerie, who granted us permission to use several worksheets from her upcoming book on marketing a  freelance editorial business. (The book is currently available as handouts for Adrienne’s online course through Copyediting.com.)

Announcements

Elizabeth d’Anjou announced that registration was open for the Editors Canada national conference coming up May 25–27 in Saskatoon. The theme is Bridging Communities: Bringing Together Communications-Related Professions. Come party on the prairie with 150 editors! Hear the hilarious James Harbeck, in full tux, host the post-banquet Oops Awards! Stay at the (surprisingly affordable) Radisson Hotel in Saskatchewan’s City of Bridges!

She also mentioned the upcoming webinars, which include

• The Mighty Verb Under the Microscope (May 2)
• Starting a Freelance Editing Career (May 5 & 12)
• Manuscript Evaluation (May 14)
• Demystifying Permissions (June 5, 6, & 7)

Stephanie Stone reminded everyone that the twig’s new fee policy was now in effect: Editors Canada members continue to attend twig meetings free, and visitors are charged $5 per meeting (after the first).

Photo by Justin See (licensed under Creative Commons).