RE: Apple permits "then" to be used as a coord. conjunction in instructions?

["Wilcox, Rose" <rwilcox -at- ssqi -dot- com>]

Just a minor historical footnote to this interesting and on-going
discussion (with the underlying prescriptionist vs. natural language
problem that will always be with us as long as there are professional
writers...):

The "then as a coordinating clause" has been in technical writing for
quite a long time.  I remember being taught it in a technical writing
seminar (my first!) in either late 1984 or early 1985.  

The teacher, who had been a technical writer, recommended the clause on
the grounds that "and then" was unnecessarily wordy and that the "then"
version worked just as well and carried the meaning.  This example was
part of an entire section on avoiding verbosity.  

I believe the reason this example stuck in my mind so long is that I had
never heard of it previously, whereas all the other examples were
familiar to me from college days.

So all these years, I have been thinking that the usage was quite common
in technical writing.  I've had the opposite feeling to the person who
started this thread -- I feel surprised when I see "and then" used.

I remember in my first four years as a writer, I ran into many similar
questions -- questions made items I had been taught as grammar into
style decisions.  There were enough of these that I learned to
continually question my own assumptions about grammar.  I regularly dip
into email lists such as the American Dialect Society's and/or web sites
like the Language Log to keep my knowledge of the issues fresh.  I also
remain continually willing to re-think my assumptions.

Of course, here I'm a lone writer, so for now, I can prescribe the style
I like.  But there still is interplay between the time it takes to
re-write things "Rose" style and the time to press.  In other words, the
user needs a manual in "their" (sorry, couldn't resist) hands that they
can understand. That trumps my need to enforce style -- unless as others
have said, the style obscures the meaning.

(BTW, I tend to avoid the singular use of "they" in formal writing... so
I do have prescriptionist tendencies, in spite of some of my radical
ideas about certain grammar/style decisions.  In the above I would
rewrite to make the subject plural.)

I will now kindly avoid a cataloguing of the (personally to me
emotionally distressing) choices I am having to make (between "Rose"
style and getting the darn thing out) in the manual I am updating!  

Rosie
______________________
Rose A. Wilcox
Senior Technical Writer
480-586-2645 
480-580-0530 (cell)
Rwilcox -at- ssqi -dot- com

WRITING TIP FOR PROFESSIONALS: To make your writing more appealing to
the reader, avoid ``writing negatively.'' Use positive expressions
instead. 

WRONG: "Do not use this appliance in the bathtub."
RIGHT: "Go ahead and use this appliance in the bathtub.'' 
-Dave Barry



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