Style guides have nothing to do with dumbing down language. They are intended to create consistency by imposing discipline on writers and editors, and setting expectations on behalf of readers.
They also change frequently to reflect the fact that English is a dynamic language, in which meanings shift over time, new words are introduced, old ones fall by the wayside, etc. You shouldn’t be seeing “whilst” or “amongst” anymore, but you will see, at least for a few more years, “selfie” and “cancel culture.”
Publications do, of course, gear the level of their language to their expected audience. For example, the Guardian assumes the average age of its readers is 14; for The Sun it’s 8. The comprehension level of Economist readers is higher (its style guide is a thing of beauty, by the way). In my experience, editing for The Sun can be way more challenging.
I’m not so sure. I often find, when reading things in newspapers and online, that I am unsure exactly what they are saying, because their use of English can be quite poor.
OK, one more post on this topic then let’s get back to Marmite, interior decorating and the wonderful weirdness of life in Oz, NZ and beyond.
Your comments about poor use of English might be because people aren’t following their style guides correctly (human error, and all that). Also, and this is a biggie, editors are a vanishing breed. And finally: If you’ve ever worked on a daily publication with brutal deadlines and dark overlords cracking bullwhips, you will be aware of the potential for the endless, new and creative ways to screw things up.
English, doesn’t need style guides to be able to understand, it just needs to be used properly. Style guides are for house consistency. (In in the case of a style guide that a UK politician sought to introduce last year in the Ministry he headed, house consistency appeared to favour Dickensian times…)
There is its role - and possibly quite different from its effect. If most of what a person reads is written with 7 or 8 year olds as it target, then how are they going to extend their language skills?
As a kid… c. 9 years to 13 years I took piano lessons. After 4 years I decided playing outside etc… was more fun and chucked it in; it got to an hour a day practice. Everyone told me I’d regret it in later years… Yep they were right… gosh I wish I’d kept it up
That’s a bit unfortunate I never had the opportunity for music lessons of any type. Even if I had I’d probably still just played in the street with the other kids.
Popped round to a mates today and he re-soldered one of my NAC-A5 plugs. The Nova was sounding off and I remember that one of the pins was loose when I had undid it when trying a speaker wire connection to the sub. Now that it’s fixed, it sounds way better with the soundstage and imaging back on form.
He’s serviced his Linn LP12 and it’s sounding quite a bit nicer than his Dennifrips DAC Tidal streaming.
It’s Saturday, so we sneaked a few cheeky snifters in too.