[kictanet] Declining English grammar in our Newsprint

Tue Oct 4 23:58:30 EAT 2011

Grammer? :)

Yes, there's an awful lot of bad spelling, haphazard punctuation, and so on.
The Financial Standard treated us to 'The boy who often got into trouble
with his father for not tacking in his shirt' in an article about the CBK
governor. It also claimed that 'The sale of the Grand Regency Hotel bloated
the otherwise good work by the governor.....'

But two points: Victor is right that ICT may be part of the problem - in
particular the mobile phone. SMS English has become pervasive, and you
regularly find graduates who literally can't string a sentence together
anymore. I receive internship applications in SMS English.

Also, hiring unemployed graduates isn't the solution: proofreading, editing,
subbing isn't something that you just know how to do even if you have an
English degree.

Figuring out how to use spellcheck isn't very difficult. But many people
just don't use it because, I suspect, they don't see the value in it
anymore. Also, spellcheck won't fish out everything: sparking and sparkling
are both proper words. Except there's nothing that sparkles a riot.

And then there's the school system - remember the 'misclennous' expenses
listed by the striking teachers? Or the many, many typos on the
Elimuportal.net?

Yes, it's a topic I'm a bit obsessed with:
http://the-star.co.ke/business/andrea-bohnstedt/36970-when-english-becomes-greek

.
On 4 October 2011 23:29, Victor Bwire <victor at article19.org> wrote:

> Infact it is the ICT use that is the cause of the problem- given the little
> ICT literacy by some of our newsrooms- most of our sub editors learn
> computer by on job-rarely able to master command of the computer functions-
> including grammer, spell checks-it will continue happening
>
>
>
> Previously, we used to print hard copies of the articles for editing
> manually with red pens- thus very few mistakes- but now
>
> Many of journalism courses do not include introduction to computer lessons-
> so how will the graduates know how to use them
>
>
>
> Who regulates journalism training or draws the course or approves the same
> in the country anyway- if you even happen to see some course outlines
> offered in some of the colleges and universities offering journalism
>  including Government ones- you will feel sorry
>
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: kictanet-bounces+victor=article19.org at lists.kictanet.or.ke[kictanet-bounces+victor=
> article19.org at lists.kictanet.or.ke] on behalf of james ratemo [
> jratemo at gmail.com]
> Sent: 04 October 2011 21:16
> To: Victor Bwire
> Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
> Subject: Re: [kictanet] Declining English grammar in our Newsprint
>
> Bwana PS what are you insinuating? We open our newsrooms fro the so called
> English majors? Some of them are in the newsrooms already...maybe they are
> sleeping on the job...my opinion
>
> On Tue, Oct 4, 2011 at 11:11 PM, <bitange at jambo.co.ke<mailto:
> bitange at jambo.co.ke>> wrote:
> All of today's newspapers had several grammatical errors.  At this time and
> age of ICT, is it not too embarrasing to have such errors?  We have
>  thousands of English majors without jobs.  It is time for media to be
> thorough in what they do by utilizing our many graduates without jobs.  As a
> Kenyan I get embarrased to see such errors.
>
> Ndemo.
>
>
>
>
> Sent from my BlackBerry®
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Grace Githaiga <ggithaiga at hotmail.com<mailto:ggithaiga at hotmail.com>>
> Sender: kictanet-bounces+bitange=jambo.co.ke at lists.kictanet.or.ke<mailto:
> jambo.co.ke at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> Date: Sun, 2 Oct 2011 13:32:57
> To: <bitange at jambo.co.ke<mailto:bitange at jambo.co.ke>>
> Cc: KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions<kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke<mailto:
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>>
> Subject: [kictanet] GSMA: Calls will remain high between African countries
>
> _______________________________________________
> kictanet mailing list
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke<mailto:kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet
>
> Unsubscribe or change your options at
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/bitange%40jambo.co.ke
>
> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform for
> people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>
> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
> _______________________________________________
> kictanet mailing list
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke<mailto:kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke>
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet
>
> Unsubscribe or change your options at
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/jratemo%40gmail.com
>
> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform for
> people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>
> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>
>
>
> --
> James Ratemo
> Online Sub-editor/ICT reporter
> Nation Media Group,
> P.O Box 49010-00100,
> Nairobi
> Cell Phone: 0724960649 OR 0731960649
> Email: jratemo at ke.nationmedia.com<mailto:
> Emaili-jratemo at standardmedia.co.ke> or ratemoj at hotmail.com<mailto:
> jamrats2001 at yahoo.com>
> Website:www.jratemo.wordpress.com<http://www.ictcradle.com/>.
> Twitter accounts: http://twitter.com/kenyacurrent or
> http://twitter.com/jamesratemo
> Skype account:ratemoj
> My facebook account: http://www.facebook.com/Rats.the.menace
>
> Who is rich? He that is content. Who is that? No one.
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> kictanet mailing list
> kictanet at lists.kictanet.or.ke
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet
>
> Unsubscribe or change your options at
> http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/andrea.bohnstedt%40ratio-magazine.com
>
> The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform for
> people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and
> regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT
> sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
>
> KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors
> online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth,
> share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do
> not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
>

-- 
Andrea Bohnstedt <http://ke.linkedin.com/in/andreabohnstedt>
Publisher
+254 720 960 322

www.ratio-magazine.com
Find/post East Africa careers<http://www.ratio-magazine.com/careers/index.php>
Find/post conferences, workshops, trainings, other business
events<http://www.ratio-magazine.com/businessevents/index.php>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://lists.kictanet.or.ke/pipermail/kictanet/attachments/20111004/0c57a512/attachment.htm>