I've been trying to grade a pile of papers this afternoon but I keep getting distracted by an annoyingly insistent internal debate regarding spelling. The writing assignment calls for a straightforward summary of the ideas of a particular literary theorist, and the papers I've looked at are competent if not brilliant; however, in three out of four papers, the author's name is spelled wrong. We're not talking about Baudrillard either; the names under discussion are no more difficult than Smith or Jones. It annoys me to see the same author's name spelled three different ways in the same paper, but how do I translate this annoyance into a grade?
If a name is a word like any other word, then spelling the author's name wrong should be no more serious than spelling any other word wrong. But somehow it is more serious--of this I am certain. How can anyone write an entire paper about a particular author and never bother to notice how that author spells her name? That kind of carelessness makes me wonder how accurately the paper conveys the author's words and ideas--and sure enough, further checking reveals a whole host of inaccurately transcribed quotations and sloppy paraphrases, all brought to light by a bit of carelessness with names.
Before I make big red marks all over the page, though, I am reminded of a book by a noted ecocritical scholar (and published by a university press) in which he spelled the same author's name three different ways on the same page. That combination of carelessness and bad copyediting made me question the reliability of the entire book, a response that strikes even me as excessive.
After all, it's just a name. Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me, regardless of how they're spelled. As long as the ideas are explained clearly, who cares how the names are spelled?
The answer, I'm afraid, is I do. I care deeply. I realize this makes me a bit of a pedant, but I frimly bleieve that anyone wishing to be taken seriously in a conversation, literary or otherwise, ought to accord others the basic respect of calling them by their names--their own names, and not some clumsy approximation.
Now that that's settled, my next challenge also involves putting letters in the right place: what leters will I place on that big pile of papers?
3 comments:
You could always start by putting these letters in the right order: "I frimly bleieve."
:p
Yes, but then my adoring readers would never have the pleasure of spotting such solecisms themselves. To quote that noted pedagogical expert Lina Lamont, "If we bring a little joy into your humdrum lives, it makes us feel as though our hard work ain't been in vain for nothin'."
Yes, but Lina makes more money than Calvin Coolidge, put together, so she oughta know.
That said, I bleieve you're correct that an author's name is of utmost importance. Mis-spelling it smacks of disrespect. It also would make me dismiss somewhat the validity of the entire paper. After all, if a student can't be bothered to verify the spelling of the author's name, what else has she disregarded, and why should I take her seriously?
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