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ode on a serial comma
Feb. 28th, 2023 11:11 pmOkay, not really an ode. But a gentle lament in the general direction of all my Chicago Manual of Style peeps.
Starting in a month or so, I'll have to use a house style that's based firmly on AP. :(
For many years, my company's house style was based on a document I helped write, and every iteration of it had serial commas front and center - every time the company got bought or what have you, my little corner of it had either the only house style guide or the most complete one, and even if we were the little fish, it got adopted with just a few changes just because it existed, and that was one of the things we didn't budge on. (And other CMS-based guidelines as well - that was our base overall. But this is a specific lament.)
But we were recently bought by another, bigger company that actually believes inherently in style guides and had a very detailed one. Based on AP.
This was a big purchase, big enough that it's being treated more like a merger in terms of harmonizing processes, so our legacy editing team crossed our fingers and hoped (vainly - we knew it was vainly, but we had to hope!) that the other team would see the light and embrace the serial comma.
Spoiler: there was no embrace.
The new, combined style guide is being rolled out now after months of hashing out by people on both legacy teams, and the serial comma is right out. With the usual caveat of "unless it's necessary" but no acknowledgment that it's always necessary, because why on earth would you make people stop to parse a sentence they didn't have to? Argh.
Anyway. Sigh.
At least overall the two style guides were simpatico, and I like some of the changes that have been introduced. Not all, but some. And some of our legacy style made it in as well.
But our house style, their house style, and other house styles just work better with serial commas, dammit.
Starting in a month or so, I'll have to use a house style that's based firmly on AP. :(
For many years, my company's house style was based on a document I helped write, and every iteration of it had serial commas front and center - every time the company got bought or what have you, my little corner of it had either the only house style guide or the most complete one, and even if we were the little fish, it got adopted with just a few changes just because it existed, and that was one of the things we didn't budge on. (And other CMS-based guidelines as well - that was our base overall. But this is a specific lament.)
But we were recently bought by another, bigger company that actually believes inherently in style guides and had a very detailed one. Based on AP.
This was a big purchase, big enough that it's being treated more like a merger in terms of harmonizing processes, so our legacy editing team crossed our fingers and hoped (vainly - we knew it was vainly, but we had to hope!) that the other team would see the light and embrace the serial comma.
Spoiler: there was no embrace.
The new, combined style guide is being rolled out now after months of hashing out by people on both legacy teams, and the serial comma is right out. With the usual caveat of "unless it's necessary" but no acknowledgment that it's always necessary, because why on earth would you make people stop to parse a sentence they didn't have to? Argh.
Anyway. Sigh.
At least overall the two style guides were simpatico, and I like some of the changes that have been introduced. Not all, but some. And some of our legacy style made it in as well.
But our house style, their house style, and other house styles just work better with serial commas, dammit.
