EVENT LISTINGS: November 2012

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November 2–3, 2012: Kamloops Writers Fair

Do you have a completed manuscript ready to pitch to a literary agent or a partially completed manuscript ready to be put through a Blue Pencil or tested at an open mike? Then check out the Kamloops Writers Fair, which “welcomes writers of all genres, as well as published and emerging writers.”

The keynote speaker will be Anthony Dalton, author and past president of the Canadian Authors Association.

  • Time: 19h00–closing (November 2); 9h00–17h00 (November 3)
  • Cost: $100 (full weekend registration: includes Open Mic Night/wine and cheese reception; keynote speech; 2 workshops; Blue Pencil session; Saturday lunch)
  • Location: The Old Courthouse Cultural Centre, 7 Seymour Street West, Kamloops
  • Tickets
  • More information

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November 7–11, 2012: Circle Craft Christmas Market

Want to get a head start on your holiday shopping? Reserve your tickets for this year’s Circle Craft Christmas Market. Browse the works of 280 Canadian artisans; create your own blown-glass tree ornament; see pottery and wood-turning demonstrations; watch performances by the Royal City Youth Ballet Company and the Anna Wyman School of Dance.

  • Time: 10h00–21h00 (November 7–9); 10h00–19h00 (November 10); 10h00–17h00 (November 11)
  • Cost: $12 at the door ($10 online) for adults; $10 at the door ($8 online) for seniors; $10 at the door ($8 online) for students with valid ID
  • Location: Vancouver Convention Centre West, 1055 Canada Place, Vancouver
  • Tickets
  • More information

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November 15–18, 2012: Christmas at Hycroft

Here’s an opportunity to get a head start on your holiday shopping while experiencing the “sights and sounds of Christmas in a traditional Edwardian mansion.”

Christmas at Hycroft is organized by The University Women’s Club of Vancouver. It is the club’s biggest single-event fundraiser of the year, with funds going to promote education, “rights and opportunities for women through advocacy locally, nationally and internationally, as well as ongoing stewardship of the grounds and buildings.”

  • Time: 10h00–21h00 (November 15–16); 10h00–18h00 (November 17–18)
  • Cost: $13 for adults ($10 on November 15); $5 for children age 5–11 (children <5 years of age: free); $30 for a Family Package (2 adults and 3 children)
  • Location: 1489 McRae Avenue, Vancouver
  • Tickets
  • More information

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November 18, 2012: EAC-BC seminar: Grammar Essentials for Writers and Editors (a Seminar for the Fainthearted and the Fearless)

Can you explain how a transitive verb differs from an intransitive one or how a phrase differs from a clause? Can you tell a client or your colleagues what is wrong with a sentence that “doesn’t sound right”? Note: this seminar will be held in Kelowna.

In this seminar, instructor Barbara Tomlin will guide you to a better understanding of sentence structure and grammar terminology through exercises, discussions, and group activities. You will learn about common errors that can mar otherwise good writing and leave the seminar feeling better about your grasp of the language that you use by instinct every day.

Whether you feel anxious when you hear the word “grammar” or are eager to address gaps in your knowledge, you will benefit from this review of how English works—and sometimes doesn’t.

Topics will include:

  • How grammar differs from usage and style
  • Parts of speech
  • Sentence problems
  • Subject-verb agreement
  • Misplaced and dangling modifiers
  • Grammar resources

About the instructor: Barbara Tomlin began working in the publishing industry more than 30 years ago, first for educational and trade book publishers, and then for magazine publishers. Since then she has edited, copy edited, and proofread a wide range of material for a variety of clients. She is certified as an editor in life sciences and is a past chair of the Editors’ Association of Canada Certification Steering Committee. She has also been an instructor for SFU’s Writing and Communications Program for more than 20 years and has developed writing and editing workshops for many organizations. She is a founding member of West Coast Editorial Associates.

  • Time: 9h30–16h30
  • Cost: $120 for EAC members who register by October 26, 2012 (after: $140); $180 for non-members who register by October 26, 2012 (after: $200)
  • Location: Rotary Centre for the Arts, 421 Cawston Avenue, Kelowna
  • Registration

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November 21, 2012: EAC-BC meeting: Language Detectives

What do syntax and CSI have in common?

What do syntax and CSI have in common? Find out in this fascinating glimpse into the world of forensic linguistics. Did a series of text messages sent before a fatal car crash constitute legitimate suicide notes? Can we tell if a 911-call transcript has been altered? In a series of letters, where does the author go from creep to stalker? Dr. Lorna Fadden, linguistics professor and consultant in the field of forensic linguistics, will tell us about these and other cases she has worked on. She’ll also discuss what she and her colleagues look for in their work, and how she came to be a language detective.

About the speaker: Dr. Lorna Fadden is an assistant professor of linguistics at Simon Fraser University (SFU). Over the past decade, her research has focused on discourse analysis, mostly of police interviews, and the methods and ethics of dealing with language evidence. She has consulted on numerous cases in Canada and the United States. She’s also SFU’s First Nations languages coordinator and a regular moderator for SFU’s Philosophers’ Café.

  • Time: 19h00–21h00
  • Cost: free for EAC members; $10 for non-members; $5 for students with valid ID
  • Location: YWCA on Hornby, 535 Hornby Street, Welch Room, 4th floor, Vancouver
  • Registration: at the door

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November 24, 2012: Canadian Authors Association workshop: Research—The Key to Writing Historical Fiction

In this workshop, instructors Robert Mackay and Margo Bates will teach you how to develop your ideas, characters, storyline, and story outcome based on research.

This workshop is hosted by the Canadian Authors Association (CAA).

  • Time: 13h00–16h00
  • Cost: $30 for CAA members; $60 for non-members; $35 for students with valid ID
  • Location: Alliance for Arts and Culture, 100-938 Howe Street, Vancouver
  • Registration

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November 24–29, 2012: Jewish Book Festival

Each year, the Jewish Book Festival attracts a large and varied audience to the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver for lectures, workshops, film screenings, book launches, and more. This year, more than 20 established and emerging Jewish and non-Jewish writers will be speaking at the event about subject matter ranging from literature and philosophy to history and current events.

  • Bookstore hours: 19h00–22h00 (November 24); 10h00–21h00 (November 25–29)
  • Cost for each event: varies (admission is charged for most events; some are free)
  • Location: Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver, 950 West 41st Avenue, Vancouver
  • Tickets for events
  • Events program

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November 24—December 24, 2012: Vancouver Christmas Market

Looking to experience an authentic German Christmas market while you shop for traditional German Christmas decorations, toys, pottery, food and drink, jewellery, and crafts? Fancy a stroll through “romantic rows of little wooden huts decorated in pine branches and illuminated with strings of little white lights”? This market is for you!

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYPjFvJnecs?rel=0&w=640&h=360]© Vancouver Christmas Market

  • Time: 11h00–21h00 (November 24–December 23); 11h00–18h00 (December 24)
  • Cost: $5 for adults (Monday–Friday: 16h00–21h00; Saturday–Sunday: 11h00–21h00); $2 for adults (Monday–Friday: 11h00–16h00); $2 for children age 7–12; no charge for children <7 years of age
  • Location: Queen Elizabeth Theatre Plaza, 650 Hamilton Street, Vancouver
  • More information

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“The History of English” (video)

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Love history, the English language, surreal comedy, and voice-over artists with Oxford English accents? Check out “The History of English in Ten Minutes”; it’s 1,600 years of language history, crammed into ten one-minute tracks.

Track titles

  1. Anglo-Saxon (Whatever happened to the Jutes?)
  2. The Norman Conquest (Excuse my English)
  3. Shakespeare (A plaque on both his houses)
  4. The King James Bible (Let there be light reading)
  5. The English of Science (How to speak with gravity)
  6. English and Empire (The sun never sets on the English language)
  7. The Age of the Dictionary (The definition of a hopeless task)
  8. American English (Not English but somewhere in the ballpark)
  9. Internet English (Language reverts to type)
  10. Global English (Whose language is it anyway?)

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3r9bOkYW9s?rel=0&w=640&h=360]© The Open University; also licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0: UK: England & Wales.

YouTube compilation: OUlearn (Learn with The Open University YouTube channel).

Voice-over: Clive Anderson.

Event Audio: What Editors Need to Know about E-Books

Couldn’t attend EAC-BC’s October 17, 2012, lecture on e-books? Listen to the audio recording.

Couldn’t attend EAC-BC’s October 17, 2012, lecture on e-books? The lecture, given by Lara Smith, print and digital coordinator at D&M Publishers, was detailed and educational. She reviewed different e-book formats and the kinds of content best suited to each.

She also:

  • Discussed different conversion methods and compared in-house and conversion-service workflows.
  • Reviewed a typical conversion and explained what kind of work is required after export, particularly to accommodate various e-reading devices.
  • Reviewed the inside of an EPUB file and metadata requirements.
  • Discussed digital rights management options.
  • Discussed how deciding to produce an e-book can affect the editing process.

Listen to audio recording (EAC log-in identity and password required).

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Writers Wanted: The Bookshelf

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You there. In the library. We want to know: what’s that you’re reading? EAC-BCers are avid readers. We want to know what you’re reading so we can read it too.

Sign up now to become a guest columnist for West Coast Editor’s recurring column The Bookshelf. Have your three favourite books (or magazines, or mangas, or catalogues, or whatever most strikes your reading fancy) featured in a future issue.

To reserve space, email westcoasteditor@editors.ca.

Learn more about writing for The Bookshelf.

Semicolons: aids or affectations (poll)

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Imagine. You’ve been captured by a plunder of punctuation-hating pirates and forced to walk the plank. As you teeter, The Oxford Guide to Writing and The Chicago Manual of Style clutched to your breast, the pirate king speaks. “The semicolon has no place in online writing!” he says. “Renounce your admiration for it and live!”

What do you do?

Take the West Coast Editor poll and tell us. Are semicolons essential aids to understanding—even in online writing—fulfilling a role distinct from that of the full stop? Or are they mere affectations, relics from our print-bound past?

Take me to your poll!

Event review: #LFMF

Couldn’t attend EAC-BC’s #LFMF event? Don’t worry. Programs co-chair Frances Peck has compiled a list of the “editing lessons learned”—editors’ true confessions, if you will—that were shared that evening.

At EAC-BC’s first meeting of the season (on September 19, 2012), about 35 of us gathered at the YWCA in Vancouver to drink wine, nibble cheese, catch up with fellow editors, and confess our failures. Humility was the watchword of the evening as we tweeted editing lessons we’ve learned the hard way (using the hashtag LFMF, learn from my fail) or described our embarrassing moments to the group.

See slide show.

The “winning” #LFMF lesson

The (unofficial) winner, for its black humour and high “uh-oh” factor:

Always turn off autocorrect. My instructor’s last name, Vigna, was autocorrected to vagina without my noticing.

More #LFMF lessons

The various lessons—about the importance of proofreading, the need for careful estimating, the pitfalls of technology, and more—were too valuable to keep to ourselves, so we’re sharing them with WCE readers. A big thank you to those who laid bare their biggest gaffes so that others needn’t repeat them.

“Materiel” isn’t always a misspelling. Learned the hard way from a military client.

Always review the document, or a good sample of it, before estimating. What’s described as an easy edit may really be a nightmare.

Proofread every invoice. I once tweaked my template and got my postal code wrong! Delayed payment, red face.

Say yes to every project and you’ll sacrifice quality. I look back on work from hectic times and know it wasn’t my best. Ouch.

If you’re sending an attachment, attach it BEFORE you write the email and forget to do it.

Before sending a style sheet to the client, don’t forget to give it one last A-to-Z sort.

Proofread your invoice template. There is no such thing as the GSH tax.

Mix estimate with educate for big jobs. Itemize the tasks you’ll do at each stage. Helps client appreciate the value for the $$ estimate.

Make sure all comments to self are deleted from final edit. Author should never see “Boring!” or “Gibberish.”

Always estimate based on word count—never on page count.

I edited a dissertation in LaTeX. When the (now) prof gave me the published copy (in person), I saw I’d edited no footnotes.

Your awesome new time-tracking software doesn’t do much good if you don’t press the “start” button.

Sent out a resumé several times mentioning articles I had published in a “newpaper.” Applying for copy-editing jobs.

When signing off with “Regards” in a memo to an author, keep in mind that the G and T keys are in close proximity.

See slide show.

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Buying Twitter Followers: A Penny a Person

Psst! Have you heard? Many people, including politicians, celebrities, and reality-show hopefuls (but, we hope, not editors), are buying “large blocks of Twitter followers.”

So says Austin Considine in his article “Buying their way to Twitter fame” (The New York Times, August 22, 2012). He continues:

the practice has become so widespread that StatusPeople, a social media management company in London, released a Web tool last month called the Fake Follower Check that it says can ascertain how many fake followers you and your friends have.

Although Twitter “filed suit in federal court … against five spammers, including those who create fake Twitter followers,” we suspect that few will be dissuaded from the practice; it’s cheap (as little as a penny a person) and easy (when we searched “buy Twitter followers” on Google, we received 8,490,000 hits), and we suspect that for every Twitter-follower provider Twitter shuts down, 10 new ones will emerge.

Read the complete article.

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