Barry: Help for the tricky linguistic questions

Nov 25 2009 by Barry Gibson, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

Val’s style guide claims there is a country near Italy called “Jugoslavia”, while Hazel’s informs me there is a part of the world known as “Indo-China”. It seems that, as late as 1985, the Examiner was still refusing to accept the demise of the French Empire.

On the always thorny issue of capital letters, there is some division.

In 1958 there was a part of Ireland called “co Tyrone” but 27 years later, it had graduated to “Co Tyrone”.

Back in the 1950s one had “French windows”, but by the 1980s they were merely “french windows” – a strange downgrading when you consider the aforementioned French imperialism at the Examiner.

Or should that be “the Examiner”? The 1958 style guide thinks this fine paper deserves inverted commas. The 1985 version does not.

There are also some entries which seem wonderfully obscure now.

For instance, the 1950s style guide informs us that the defending counsel in a Naval court-martial is referred to as “the Accused’s Friend”. I shall bear that in mind next time I am sent to cover a Naval court-martial.

It is fashionable to say that standards of written English have declined in recent decades, but looking at the 1958 style guide I noticed a number of mistakes that really rankled.

For instance, it claims there is a sport called “soccer”. I know of no such game.

The older style guide also alleges there is a drink called “whisky”, but the 1985 version correctly points out that this refers to Scotch. The Irish way of spelling the word is “whiskey”.

Having said that, it is perhaps telling that the more recent style guide bans more words than the older one – perhaps because the use of written English was deteriorating in the 1980s.

In 1958, the Examiner saw fit to forbid just two words: “Xmas” and “Labourite”.

Twenty-seven years later “Labourite” was gone but “Xmas” was still banned, as was “gong” for honour, “folk”, “up to press” and the horrible “slam” for criticise. As in “Politician X slammed Politician Y yesterday.”

But, despite my minor quibbles, it’s hard to argue with the underlying idea behind these style guides.

As it says in the introduction to the 1958 version: “A newspaper’s style is an indication of its character. Dignity, accuracy and consistency should mark it.”

I’m sure folk would agree with that.