Re: Thank You from new tech writer

[Bastette <bastette -at- sonic -dot- net>]

Leonard C. Porrello wrote:

 > It's not at all clear that coming up through "a bilingual education
 > system" makes someone a "native speaker." Arguably, native speech is
 > what you use in your culture, in your home. In India, "29 languages are
 > spoken by more than a million native speakers, 122 by more than 10,000"
 > (Wikipedia: Languages of India).
 > 
 > And even if we were to concede that Indians are native speakers of
 > English, you'd still have to contend with the problem of dialect. Even
 > if there is an Indian equivalent to "edited American English", it is not
 > the same as Edited American English. What's done to render their docs
 > into Edited American English (where the target audience resides in the
 > US)?

The woman who had my job before I was hired two years ago is Indian.
I am still rewriting sections of the manuals that say things like,
"Click the button 'OK' to confirm." I change this to "Click the OK button
to confirm". (I remove the quotes around "OK" and bold it instead.
That's not a language issue, I just prefer bolding to quotes.)

There are also many misuses of articles (articles used where there
shouldn't be one, and missing articles where there should be one).
Incorrect prepositions pop up occasionally, too.

Her writing is clear enough to be understood, but it doesn't sound like
the English any American I know would speak. (Or, as far as I know, like
any other native-English speaker.)

Joyce
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