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(U) Write Right: Brevity Can Impede Clarity (or, A Capital Situation)
FROM:
of the Reporting Board (S12A)
Run Date: 07/18/2005
It's not always true that "less is more"... (U)
(TS) Our colleagues across the river provided the material for this
month's column:
"The ruling former Communist Democratic Left Alliance (SLD)..."
Which adjectives modify what? Is the ruling party something that
used to be called the Communist Democratic Left Alliance? Is there
a ruling coalition called the Alliance, that used to be a left-wing
democracy? The acronym that follows is in the native language and
is therefore no help.
(TS) The situation is further confused by subsequent references to
attempts to form a coalition -- an alliance, in fact, although that
term is not used. A close reading of the report appears to indicate
that the country's ruling party, which used to be a communist
organization and is still the left-most of many political parties, is
called the Democratic Left Alliance... but it's not absolutely clear -and this in a report intended to clarify the possibilities for a
national parliamentary election. In an executive summary, too,
where it's particularly important that readers not have to puzzle
over this the way we did. Brevity can impede clarity, and
capitalization should be used carefully.
(U) Do not capitalize "communist" unless it is part of an entity's
name, since "communist," like "democratic" or "socialist," refers to
certain broad principles -- and that's a very different statement
than their use as part of a party's name. This means that
descriptors derived from a person's name (Marxist, Leninist,
Maoist) should be used with particular care so that readers can tell
at once on the first reading whether such an adjective is part of a
party's name or a description of its philosophy. Otherwise your
readers may feel like they're trying to follow a scene from "Monty
Python's Life of Brian."
(U) The author did unwittingly do us a favor by providing an
opportunity to continue the improvement to the SIGINT Reporter's
Style and Usage Manual entries on both Capitalization and Political
Parties and Philosophies , which are now appropriately linked:
political parties and philosophies...
(U) Capitalize the name of the party and the word party when they
are used together: the Communist Party. Capitalize party when it
stands for a specific political party: The Party controls the country.
(U) Capitalize Communist, Socialist, etc., when referring to
individuals who are members of a specific political party.
(U) Use lowercase to refer to the political philosophy or to someone
SERIES:
(U) Write Right '05
1. Write Right : Too
Much Redundancy is
Redundant
2. Write Right -SIGINT Myths: The
Traffic Fairy
3. Write Right : There
Is No Index of
Forbidden Words
4. Write Right :
Avoiding SIGINTisms
5. Write Right : A Note
on Validity Wording
6. Write Right : Brevity
Can Impede Clarity
(or, A Capital
Situation)
7. Write Right :
Opening the Traffic
Fairy's Packages
8. Write Right :
Management Theory
Applied to Reporting
9. Write Right : Give
the 'Key Points' Style
a Try
10. Write Right : Still
More on the Traffic
Fairy
who advocates a philosophy without being a member of a specific
party: communism, socialism, capitalism, socialist, capitalist.
Exception: descriptors derived from a person's name (Marxist,
Leninist, Maoist).
(U) "You should not aim to be understood, but to be
impossible to misunderstand." -- Marcus Fabius Quintilian,
Roman rhetorician
"(U//FOUO) SIDtoday articles may not be republished or reposted outside NSANet
without the consent of S0121 (DL sid_comms)."
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