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Title:
Journalistic writing : building the skills, honing the craft / Robert M. Knight.
Author:
Knight, Robert M., 1940-
Publication Information:
Portland, Or. : Marion Street Press, 2010.
Call Number:
PN4783 .K558 2010
Abstract:
"Offering budding writers suggestions on how to improve their skills - even when faced with a tight deadline - this guide also reviews many elements essential to the occupation such as utilizing strong nouns and verbs, paring down adjectives and adverbs, describing with concrete detail, and avoiding clichés and the passive voice. Going beyond a standard presentation of information, this reference encourages students to put its methods into practice, making each and every word count and maintaining the appropriate energy level in their content. With expert analyses of real-world articles, this book also provides advice on avoiding poor sentence structure that can kill reader interest and includes perspectives on diversity sensitivity. Accessible, humorous, and engaging, this revised edition offers a practical approach for those seeking to improve their communication skills."--Publisher's description.
Edition:
3rd ed.
ISBN:
9781933338385
Physical Description:
315 pages ; 23 cm
Contents:
Why and how good writing counts : The deadline dilemma ; Getting the subject from one mind to another ; The jargon trap ; The blessings of a well-crafted lede for the reporter and reader ; The time-saving, on-deadline formula ; The style trap ; Some basic guidelines for developing writing skills ; A word about the English language ; Bigger does not always mean better ; The beauty, and bane, of a big vocabulary -- Is it newsworthy? : The lede, the story, the medium ; Audience and audiences ; The prime criteria of newsworthiness ; Human interest: the grab-bag criterion ; Newsworthiness for the eye and ear ; Designer newsworthiness: creating "news" for ratings and profit ; Taking the electronic hits ; But does it matter? -- Leading the reader on : The lede: the critical element ; Avoiding dull or generic ledes ; Leading with a question ; Leading with a direct quote ; Ensuring the lede makes sense ; The "nut-graf" approach ; Getting to the point ; Avoiding lede intimidation -- Building the story : How not to conduct an interview ; Bringing the story together ; One reporter's example ; When to stop describing ; Developing the breaking story ; Developing an issue by using specifics ; The feature: writing about how and why ; Writing for magazines: a category in search of a definition ; The magazine feature -- The craft : The rewards of murky writing ; Separating the craft from the profession ; Avoiding wordiness ; Caution: concise writing doesn't always enhance clarity ; Eliminating redundancy ; Compounding the sentence with complexity ; Correctly using "that and "which" (and "who" and "whom") ; Writing with precision ; Using parallel structures: making your numbers agree ; Sexist language versus good English ; An American dilemma? ; Your antecedents are showing: dangling participles and misplaced modifiers ; Writing directly, without apology: avoiding tiptoe (or weasel words) ; Replenishing the word supply -- Active voice, action verbs : The relationship of active voice and action verbs ; Active voice and honesty ; Active voice, clarity and crispness ; Action verbs and imagery ; Being (or linking) verbs ; Creativity killers? -- An appearance of honesty : Journalistic ethics: an oxymoron? ; A passion for accuracy ; Avoiding generalizations, assumptions, pomposity and overblown statements ; Euphemisms: when tact and truth don't agree ; Fudge marks: how not to embellish your prose ; Of opinion and ethics: the elusiveness of truth ; Don't editorialize unless you are writing a column or editorial ; Respect the reader ; Make sure the reader knows what you're writing about ; Quotations and attributions: taking the onus off the reporter ; Is the reporter making this up? ; The power of the direct quote ; Keep the reporter out of the story -- The eternal cliché : Word exhaustion and the death of originality ; Avoid the empty and the trite ; The making of a cliché ; Clichés to avoid ; Apprentice clichés and slang ; Juggling jargon: the mark of a lazy writer ; Business jargon ; Cop and criminal lawyer lingo ; Journalese ; The comic value of clichés -- Red flags and no-nos : THe need to exist versus the need for surgical removal ; The big red flag: "that" ; Special red flags: "there is" and similar usages ; Another special red flag: "feel" ; Red flag tenses: perfect doesn't always mean good ; No-nos: only use them in direct quotation ; Special no-nos: "currently" and "presently" ; Rules to write by -- Broadcast style : Medium versus message ; Comparing the media ; Writing for broadcast: how to cater to the ear and eye ; Some broadcast style pointers ; The anchor and the reporter ; Variations for the visual media ; An alphabetical digest of broadcast writing rules -- Appendix A. Various points of style -- Appendix B. The beautiful mongrel : Learning the history of English: the point ; English language: Celtic expression ; A question of pedigree, or lack thereof ; Geoffrey, WIll and the boys ; Dr. Johnson and the beginnings of modern Englis ; English, the equal opportunity borrower.
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