User:Tony1/Advanced editing exercises

This is a set of exercises in which you are presented with a portion of faulty text.

• First, read the text carefully and try to determine where and how it can be improved.
• Click on [Show] on the right-margin below this text to discover where the text is faulty.
• Click on [Show] to display our suggested solution, with explanations below.

The examples are all taken from featured article candidates.

QUESTION A: Agriculture continues to be a major part of the economy of Somerset. Apple orchards
were once plentiful, and to this day the county is linked to the production of strong cider. The unemployment rate in the county is lower than the surrounding counties. The largest employment sectors are retail, manufacturing, leisure/tourism and health/social care.

HINT: WHAT THE ISSUES ARE

There are four issues.

• A problem of logic and of vagueness.
• A wrong lexical item (that needs to be substituted with a more appropriate item).
• A false comparison.
• A MOS breach.

HINT: WHERE THE ISSUES ARE LOCATED

QUESTION A: Agriculture continues to be a major part of the economy of Somerset. Apple orchards
were once plentiful, and to this day the county is linked to the production of strong cider. The unemployment rate in the county is lower than the surrounding counties. The largest employment sectors are retail, manufacturing, leisure/tourism and health/social care.

THE SOLUTION

SOLUTION A: Agriculture continues to be a major part of the economy of Somerset. Apple orchards
were once plentiful have been plentiful for more than five centuries, and to this day the county is linked to known for the production of strong cider. The unemployment rate in the county is lower than that of the surrounding counties. The largest employment sectors are retail, manufacturing, leisure/tourism leisure and tourism, and health/social care health and social care.

• The problem of logic and of vagueness: "Once" suggests that the orchards were plentiful at some time in the past and are no longer so; but the subsequent clause implies that plentiful orchards have ever since been and still are plentiful, since the county is known for its apple cider. An indication of when "in the past" was is required, even if as vague as "for at least five centuries". We have guessed a solution; the author(s) need to be asked to check this.
• A wrong lexical item: "Linked to" is ambiguous; "known for" is presumably what the author intended.
• A false comparison: The unemployment rate in Somerset is being compared with the unemployment rate in the surrounding counties, not with the counties themselves; "that of" can stand for "the unemployment rate of" those other counties.
• A MOS breach: Slashes are usually avoided.