A recent article by Mr. Peter Simmons, published in the Sunday Sun of January 11th 2009, made me remember the old adage, “people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones”.
In his article entitled, “Power of the Press”, Mr. Simmons, first mentions some other articles which were recently written by Dr. Leonard Shorey and Fay Ellington about the falling standard of Standard English and misspelling which occurs in the press.
Mr. Simmons then goes on to say “It is ironic that the Advocate, which carried the comments of both Dr Shorey and Ms Ellington, is recidivistic and guilty of repeatedly assaulting the English language and making elementary spelling and other mistakes”.
He then goes on to give 7 examples of errors made by the Advocate and later on says “When I read the Advocate these days I ask: Where have the proofreaders and sub-editors gone? Gone home to sleep, everyone?”
Mr. Simmons, I can ask the same of the publication in which your article has appeared. I make an effort to read the Nation newspaper every day and wonder if you do the same. If so, how can you be critical of the Advocate when the Nation seems to be no better.
Readers, I make no claim to be an expert on the English language, so I will let you be the judge.
- In the same article in which Mr. Simmons condemns the Advocate, when he mentions the name of Dr. Leonard Shorey and Fay Ellington, incorrect abbreviations are used when referring to these persons. Instead of having “Dr. Shorey and Ms. Ellington”, the period after the Dr and Ms are missing. How ironic.
- In an article published on January 5, 2009 (page 11) which was a review of the popular “Singing Tree” presentation staged at the Peoples Cathedral, a paragraph in part reads “Those who had to settle for seats outside viewed the presentation on close circuit television…” It should read closed circuit television.
- The past tense has been a regular victim of abuse by the Nation. How many times have we seen advance instead of advanced, escape instead of escaped (in the instance of escaped prisoner), and toss instead of tossed (in the case of tossed salad).
- On Friday January 9th, (page 24) a caption under a photograph of an inspector checking under a PSV reads “This inspector left no stone unturned checking for any deficiencies in the Pine”. Hmm.. was the inspector checking the PSV or the Pine as suggested by the caption. And while the word deficiency could be used, a more appropriate word to work into the sentence would have been defective.
- In the January 12th edition of the Barbados Business Authority (a publication by the Nation Publishing Company Ltd.) an article on page 3 refers to the president of the Barbados Bankers’ Association as Mr. OIiver (that reads capital O, capital I, iver, rather than Oliver) Jordan. In the same article, the word looses is used instead of loses i.e. “…the financial intuition looses…”
- In the Saturday Sun of January 17th, the front page reads “It was a celebration yesterday at the Bridgetown Port as Barbados welcomed seven cruise ships in one day – the first time ever”. Yet both articles on the centre pages contradict this claim by stating “It was a first for the tourism calendar, since ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 to berth seven cruise liners at the Bridgetown Port…”
- On page 15 of the same publication, the article entitled “Crown rocks to Blunt” written by Wendy Burke tells us that after James Blunt left the stage and the fans called for more, “…he came back out and sang about three more songs”. How many songs was it, 2 or 3 or 4? – about three doesn’t cut it.
- Lastly, the Nation seems to have coined a new abbreviation for time in the morning. Under Best Bets on page 18, we are invited to visit Harrison’s Caves where viewing begins at 9 ayem. I would also suggest that a more appropriate phrase would have been “…where tours begin”…please, leave the viewing for the funeral parlour.
