Contemporary Editing Book

	Preface	xvii
Part 1	Approaching the Story	1
Chapter 1	Focus on fundamentals: The editor within	2
	Editing is Reading with an Attitude	2
	The Editor Emerges	4
	The Editor Shifts From Me to We	7
	What Editors do and Why It Matters	8
	The Editor's Changing Role: From Print to Multimedia	12
	The Changing News and News Judgment	18
	Preparing to be an Editor	22
Chapter 2	Focus on news judgment: The editor's attitude	25
	The Editor Steps Forward	25
	The Editor's Attitude	26
	News Values and News Judgment	30
	Applying the News Values	36
	News Judgment in Action	37
	Doing the Right Thing: Fairness and Ethics	41
	The Starting Point: Your Stylebook	51
	A Look Around the Newsroom	52
Chapter 3	Focus on skills and tools: The editor in the newsroom	56
	The News is in the Details	56
	Skills for Today's Copy Editor	58
	Organization: the Shape of the Story	65
	Accuracy: the Substance of the Story	73
	Numbers in the News	82
	Tools for Today's Editor	90
Chapter 4	Focus on grammar: The mechanics of language	100
	Why Grammar Matters	100
	What are Grammar, Style and Usage?	102
	Building Grammar Skills Step By Step	104
	Sentences: Putting the Parts Together	130
	Punctuation	137
Chapter 5	Focus on good writing: Strong and graceful prose	151
	Correct Writing and Good Writing	151
	Style and Usage: Let the Writer's Voice Be Heard	153
	The Editor's Role: Seeing the Details and Hearing the Song	153
	Clarity Through Word Usage: Be Simple, Be Brief	156
	Misused Words	164
	More on Quotations and Attributions	176
	Building Graceful Sentences	185
Part 2	Inside the Story	199
Chapter 6	News close to home: Editing local stories and community news	200
	The Importance of Local News	200
	What's Different About Local News?	203
	The Characteristics of Strong Local News	205
	Raising the Standards in Community News	219
	The Debate Over Civic Journalism	228
Chapter 7	News from afar: Editing wire stories	235
	News From Afar	235
	Looking Inside the Wire	238
	The Wire Editor's Tasks	239
	Reading and Selecting Wire Stories	247
	Editing and Trimming Wire Stories	250
Chapter 8	Making a long story short: Editing for brevity and clarity	267
	Cutting Stories Without Cutting Corners	267
	Old Tools for New Needs	269
	Thinking Through the Story	272
	Editing Briefs: The Shortest of the Short	294
Chapter 9	After the fact: Editing features and more complex story forms	305
	Feature Editing is Creative Editing	305
	Features, News and News Features: Some Distinctions	307
	The Feature Editor and the Feature Writer	308
	Changing Priorities: News Values and More	311
	Leads and Language in Features	315
	Focus and Organization in Features	328
Chapter 10	No safety in numbers: Poll and survey stories	339
	Polls Can REflect or Distort Public Opinion	339
	A Primer on Polling	340
	Key Concepts in Poll Results	343
	Bias in the Questioning Process	346
	Scientific and Nonscientific Polls	356
	The Impact of Polls on the Public	361
Chapter 11	Doing justice: Legal issues, ethics and bias	367
	The Lessons of 1998	367
	Developing A Sense of What is Right	370
	The Concept of Libel	376
	The Right to Privacy	386
	Ethical Guidelines	389
Part 3	Beyond the Story	403
Chapter 12	Headlines: Precision, power and poetry	404
	The Voice of Authority	404
	What Headlines Do	405
	Getting Started: Headline Basics	406
	The Language of Headlines	410
	Four Stages of Headline Writing	412
	Intention: What Good Headlines Must Do	413
	Approach: What Good Headlines Should Do	421
	Mechanics: Compressing Meaning, Maintaining Clarity	424
	Structure: Headlines on the Page and Screen	435
Chapter 13	An eye for news: Editing photos	447
	The Power of Pictures	447
	Image and Reality	451
	Selecting Photos	452
	Ethical and Legal Issues	458
	Cropping and Sizing Photos	468
	Writing Cutlines	475
Chapter 14	Showing the story: Editing information graphics	481
	The Value of Showing the Story	481
	Types of Information Graphics	483
	Data and Distortion	494
	Editing Text in Infographics	504
Chapter 15	The balancing act: Designing pages	509
	Communicating Through Design	509
	Why Design Matters	510
	Design Concepts	516
	Story Design with and Without Art	522
	From the Module to the Page	530
	Typography: the Visual Dimension of Words	535
	Advanced Issues in Design	539
	Laying Out Inside Pages	546
	Color Considerations	548
Chapter 16	From gatekeeper to guide: Online news and 21st-century editing	556
	The Leap from the Page to the Screen	556
	Audience, Advertising and Ethics: New Realities Online	561
	The News and the Newsroom Go Online	567
	Adapting Your Skills to Online Editing	577
	The Web, Free Speech and Democracy	585
Appendix A	Frequently Misused Words	593
Appendix B	Glossary	597
Appendix C	Sample Dummy Sheets	607
	Acknowledgments	611
	Index	613