Great way to start the day.

Sent to me by my wonderful colleague Linda Edwards (here).  Enjoy!

Best parody EVER.

Here.

An update for editors everywhere.

From my buddy Kathleen Lyon, some thoughts about editing (here) in response to my frustrated screed (here). 

Thanks, Conglomerate!

For the shout-out (here).

A timeless essay on writing by George Orwell.

Here.  It's just marvelous.

I want my commas back.

For years, I've been one of those truly obnoxious people pointing out grammatical errors and typos in signs.  Sometimes, I've even surreptitiously (and not so surreptitiously) erased such glaring errors as misused apostrophes.  When asked, I've explained that no one can make a noun plural by adding an apostrophe and an "s" and that "its" really does mean something different from "it's."  I know.  It's annoying for me to do that.  But--like Lynne Truss, the author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves--I believe that the decline in language ability is a precursor to the destruction of civilization as we know it.  I'm . . . a "wordie."

So when I see the latest anti-Harry Reid ad, with its "Really[,] Harry?" slogan (see here), I ask myself how an advertising company could manage not to insert the comma.  Would having a comma somehow scream "elitism" and fail to resonate with the voting public?  American Crossroads puts the comma in when announcing the ad (see here).  What happened to the missing comma in the ad itself?

Imagine how happy I was, then, to see an op-ed in today's Las Vegas Sun (I'd publish the link, but the Sun doesn't have it up) by Jan Freeman, my new favorite grammarian (see here).  The column discusses the history of various word pairs that supposedly connote distinctions (e.g., "authentic" vs. "genuine").  It's enough to make a wordie sigh happily.  Brava, Ms. Freeman!

Update:  For the opposite point of view, see here and here.   Hat tip to my buddy Bruce.

Classic exam bloopers (and a rant)

I'm working my way through grading my PR exams, and one blooper (well, two, actually; but they were actually the same blooper) cracked me up last night (see here).

On a more serious note, although I don't count off for bad writing on exams--and maybe I should, given that my exams are 72-hour take-homes, with plenty of time to proofread the submissions--I'm stunned by the sheer illiteracy of some of these exam answers. Some of the answers are riddled with the sort of mistakes that even fourth-graders shouldn't be making. And Boyd School of Law students are smart.

I refuse to believe that bad writing can go hand-in-hand with clear thinking. How difficult is it, really, to learn when and how to use commas, to maintain a consistent tense within the same sentence, or to understand the difference between "it's" and "its"?

Let's assume that someone managed to get a high school degree without learning any basic rules of writing. Let's also assume that he got a college degree without learning any of those rules. When he goes to law school, knowing that his livelihood will consist of analyzing problems and communicating that analysis, isn't it time for him to take the time to learn the rules that he missed, or at least to develop a checklist to catch his known predilections for errors?

The refusal to learn to write decently while in law school strikes me as unadulterated laziness. In my first year of law school (yes, a long time ago), my Criminal Law professor, who had taught English in his former career, told me that my writing needed improvement. He spent time with me to rid me of passive voice and some funky usage, and I worked hard to fix my bad habits. (And I wasn't a particularly bad writer before he started working with me; Bob Weisberg just wanted to make me a better writer.)

So, Boyd students who don't write well, here's an offer for you: Take our comments about your writing to heart, and offer to work with a professor to improve your writing while you're in school. Your future clients will thank you.

I told you that judges and lawyers care about good writing....

See here. Bravo, Judge Kressel! And a hat tip to one of my best friends (who's going to be unnamed in this post) for pointing this notice out to me), and to the Wall Street Journal Blog, for the whole story (here).

Law students, grammar, and the practice of law

I'm hearing through the grapevine that some of my law students were unhappy with the grades that they received on their group papers this semester. I told them to find a movie with legal ethics issues and write about those issues. (Sneaky way to reinforce what they're learning, eh?)

The good news: for the most part, they did good work analyzing the ethics issues in the movies. The bad news: most of them made proofreading and grammatical mistakes.
The statistics: because virtually every group did a good job on the analysis, I curved the grades based on their mistakes in proofreading and grammar.

I'd warned them that no one could get an A on this assignment without good grammar and few proofreading mistakes. Why am I so strict? Because no matter how good their analysis is, if they can't showcase their work with decent writing skills, their employers and their clients won't be impressed.

I don't know where students get the idea that employers and clients (and law professors) don't care about writing skills. It's one of the key skills that lawyers must have. And our writing program at Boyd is not just good--it's superb.

So here's a request for my lawyer (and client) friends out there: please weigh in on this post. Do you care about how your lawyers write? Does it matter to you if they say good things, but say them poorly?

Many thanks.

If non-lawyers can push for writing in "plain language," why can't lawyers?

I woke up this morning to this delightful article (here) in the Wall Street Journal. Now there's a woman after my own heart! If she can argue for forms and announcements written in plain language (and she does -- persuasively), then we should continue her crusade. Brava, Ms. Maher!

Finally--graphic proof!

more music charts

Actually, we think that the green part of the graph should be much, much smaller. Thanks, GraphJam!