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Common errors in academic texts: word usage, register, verb tenses (and moods), and when dealing with quoted matter

The originally scheduled webinar on Plain Language has had to be postponed to sometime in 2024. This webinar replaces it.

Join PEG for our webinar series, where you will have the opportunity to upgrade your knowledge and skills as editors and proofreaders in a variety of ways: linguistic, stylistic, business, digital, technical, professional and more. Are you new to academic editing and needing to expand your range of skills or a more experienced editor of academic texts wanting to hone your skills in this genre? During this webinar on 7 December, the aim will be to share with you knowledge, hints and tips based on real-life examples.

Focus: Your presenter will share with you the typical errors of word usage and verb tenses (and moods), and quoted matter, as they pertain to academic register and correctness.

Date: Thursday, 7 December 2023

Time: 17:30 to 20:00

Place: Online (Zoom meeting)

Facilitator: John Linnegar

CPD hours: Attendees will receive a certificate confirming their attendance and their having earned 2,5 hours’ worth of core CPD; those who opt to listen to the audio recording of the webinar instead, without actually attending, will earn 30 minutes’ worth of discretionary CPD time.

A pre-webinar exercise will be issued to registrants on confirmation of their registration.

About our facilitator

Trained as a secondary school teacher, John Linnegar has been active in the publishing industry for more than 40 years, as writer, editor, proofreader, technical writer, industrial editor and publisher. He cut his editorial teeth as an editor of texts for one of South Africa’s foremost law publishers and played a leading role in formalising its House style for authors and editors. He has also edited and proofread numerous school and academic textbooks and articles, for both local and international publishers, and, latterly, academic theses. In 2009 he published the best-selling Engleish, our Engleish: Common errors in South African English and how to resolve them (Pharos; rev ed 2013). In 2012, a standard text he co-authored with professors Wannie Carstens and Kris Van de Poel – Text editing: A handbook for students and practitioners (ASP Editions, Brussels) – was published, a text that has been well received internationally. He has also co-authored several PEG guides: on house style; the business of editing, and marketing freelance editorial services. His latest publication (with Ken McGillivray, 2019) is grammar, punctuation and all that jazz (MLA Publishing), which is aimed at any wordsmith whose use of English needs polishing through familarisation with the essentials of usage. Besides grammar, he specialises in developing house style guidelines and converting texts to Plain Language/English.

John is an Accredited Professional Text Editor (SATI), an ATE (English), a life member and a past chair of PEG, until 2022 an executive member of the Society of English-language Professionals in the Netherlands (SENSE), and a member of the Nordic Editors and Translators (NEaT) and the Canberra Society of Editors (CSE), Australia.

About the webinar

This webinar will look in detail at the style of writing peculiar to academic texts and in particular the common errors that authors typically make: incorrect word usage and tenses (and moods), in particular, that lead to an inappropriate register.

Cost

Affiliation Early-bird registration fee
(by 3 December latest)
Registration fee
(from 4 to 6 December)
PEG members R275 R350
LAMP members* R475 R550
Non-affiliated members R675 R750

*LAMP members: Association of Southern African Indexers and Bibliographers (ASAIB), ProJourn, Southern African Freelancers’ Association (SAFREA), South African Science Journalists’ Association (SASJA) and the South African Translators’ Institute (SATI).

Please register by completing and emailing the registration form to Sharon Rose.

Deadline for registrations: 12:00 on 6 December.

Cancellation policy

If members are unable to attend this webinar after having registered and paid for it, a full refund is possible if cancellations are received by Sharon Rose by no later than 12 noon on 6 December. Once the final number of attendees has been confirmed on the eve of the webinar, no refunds are possible.

In addition, should you be prevented from participating in full or in part on the day of the webinar owing to Eskom loadshedding, you will be entitled to take either the same webinar or another on the 2023 webinar programme. When this occurs, the onus will be on you to inform the webinar coordinator of your disqualification on this ground and to specify which alternative webinar you would like to transfer your registration to.

Remember, though, that as a would-be or part-participant on the day, you will in any event receive the audio recording of the entire event plus PDFs of the PPT slides.

Use the early-bird special: save money and secure your spot at this webinar by registering early!

7 December, 2023 @ 17:30 - 20:00 Africa/Johannesburg at Online (Zoom) by PEG | Fourth quarter Webinar Zoom

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