The Five Editors You'll Meet in Publishing
Since a lot of people out there have never even heard of copy editing, today I'm going to discuss the different types of editors and their responsibilities.
When people think of an editor, there are two types that traditionally come to mind. One is the editor-in-chief at a metropolitan daily newspaper. This is the cigar-chomping, suspender-snapping, grumpy guy in the big office responsible for agenda setting, giving assignments, and harassing the help. You might also think of the star editors of the early 20th century, turning literary riffraff into authors of classic novels used to torture tenth-graders forevermore.
As far as real editors go, the highest ranked is a managing editor. In addition to supervising the editorial staff, managing editors do most of the things mentioned above. They might find suitable writers for an idea they had for a piece, or set the overall tone of their publications. They might also get their hands dirty with substantive editing.
Substantive editors do the work we're most familiar with. They examine a work as a whole, and may remove or rearrange large sections to better express an author's point or theme. They might also ask the author to rewrite or write additional portions. A developmental editor does the same kind of work, but helps the author along while the manuscript is being written. In this sense, developmental editors are collaborators, and are often ghostwriters as well.
Copy editors work more closely with the language of a text. They examine and correct spelling, grammar, syntax, word usage, and address style. Style doesn't necessarily mean linguistic style, but a consistent way of using certain features of the language, formatting the text, and presenting the whole work. They are aided in this by style manuals, long books of guidelines for writers and editors. The style manual used depends on the publication. For example, newspapers use the Associated Press Stylebook, which is geared toward news writing.
Line editors, I believe, used to be the same thing as copy editors, except they existed in the era of Teletype machines, a sort of primitive electronic typewriter that only allowed their users to work with one line of text at a time. Line editors apparently still exist at some software companies, where they edit code, line by line.
Proofreaders have similar responsibilities to copy editors, but are the last people to work with a piece of text before it is ready to be published. Therefore, most of the errors have already been caught, and it falls to the proofreader to catch any outstanding errors in facticity, grammar or spelling.
That should explain the major distinctions between the types of editors. Of course, the responsibilities of an editor will vary depending on the type and size of the organization the editor works for - at small publications, one staff editor might have to do everything - but these are general categories, pretty distinct from one another. There are also a lot of other specialty groups, like acquisitions editors, technical editors, etc., but most of these have names that explain the essence of what they do.
And if I've raised any questions, feel free to e-mail me or leave a comment, and I will do my best to write a stimulating, enlightening answer, right here.
When people think of an editor, there are two types that traditionally come to mind. One is the editor-in-chief at a metropolitan daily newspaper. This is the cigar-chomping, suspender-snapping, grumpy guy in the big office responsible for agenda setting, giving assignments, and harassing the help. You might also think of the star editors of the early 20th century, turning literary riffraff into authors of classic novels used to torture tenth-graders forevermore.
As far as real editors go, the highest ranked is a managing editor. In addition to supervising the editorial staff, managing editors do most of the things mentioned above. They might find suitable writers for an idea they had for a piece, or set the overall tone of their publications. They might also get their hands dirty with substantive editing.
Substantive editors do the work we're most familiar with. They examine a work as a whole, and may remove or rearrange large sections to better express an author's point or theme. They might also ask the author to rewrite or write additional portions. A developmental editor does the same kind of work, but helps the author along while the manuscript is being written. In this sense, developmental editors are collaborators, and are often ghostwriters as well.
Copy editors work more closely with the language of a text. They examine and correct spelling, grammar, syntax, word usage, and address style. Style doesn't necessarily mean linguistic style, but a consistent way of using certain features of the language, formatting the text, and presenting the whole work. They are aided in this by style manuals, long books of guidelines for writers and editors. The style manual used depends on the publication. For example, newspapers use the Associated Press Stylebook, which is geared toward news writing.
Line editors, I believe, used to be the same thing as copy editors, except they existed in the era of Teletype machines, a sort of primitive electronic typewriter that only allowed their users to work with one line of text at a time. Line editors apparently still exist at some software companies, where they edit code, line by line.
Proofreaders have similar responsibilities to copy editors, but are the last people to work with a piece of text before it is ready to be published. Therefore, most of the errors have already been caught, and it falls to the proofreader to catch any outstanding errors in facticity, grammar or spelling.
That should explain the major distinctions between the types of editors. Of course, the responsibilities of an editor will vary depending on the type and size of the organization the editor works for - at small publications, one staff editor might have to do everything - but these are general categories, pretty distinct from one another. There are also a lot of other specialty groups, like acquisitions editors, technical editors, etc., but most of these have names that explain the essence of what they do.
And if I've raised any questions, feel free to e-mail me or leave a comment, and I will do my best to write a stimulating, enlightening answer, right here.
posted by Kevin at
10:37 AM
1 Comments:
this post could use some editting... Did you compose this in notepad or what
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