Me Fail Typing? That’s Unpossible
Mrs. Werner, the gradeschool keyboarding nazi-marm of my youth, used to tell us, “You are entering the computer age. The future for you is exciting and unknowable, but the one thing we do know is that you will all need to become skilled typists.” 1
She uttered these and other prophetic threats (“if you do not know how to format a business letter you will never find a job, your parents will die, and you will have to beg for your food”) as she paced the rows of circi-1989 IBM computers, correcting students’ posture, pointing, pecking, and giggling, and good moods. She wore white nursey soft-soled shoes, and I still remember how it felt to realize she had slipped up from behind to scrutinize me. Hell. It felt like hell.
The hell didn’t just come from Mrs. Werner’s stealth. It also came from ridiculous rules that make up a grade school keyboarding class. Rules like, “strike the ‘Z’ only with the little finger on your left hand,” “use five spaces intent the first line of each paragraph,” and most annoyingly to me, rigorous standards for the number of spaces after each sentence. Mrs. Werner said two. My instinct, gut, and stubbornness said one, two, ten, it doesn’t make a difference. It’s a space, right? What does two accomplish that one does not? And let’s face it: what is so horrible about ten that doesn’t apply to two? It’s messy? Thoughts are messy! Keyboarding is messy! I’m nine years old for heaven’s sake! As you might predict, she beat it out of me in the end, but it took longer for the itch to go away: what the hell is really so wrong with one space?
I admit that the debate over whether a sentence should be followed by one space or two may seem petty. Even if petty however, it is a debate I lost once in elementary school when Mrs. Werner broke me, and it’s a debate I lost again tonight when the internets convinced me to go back to the heathen ways of my nine-year-old self.
That’s right folks, it looks like I’ve been lost, saved, and then saved again. Tonight, I asked Google to how to make Microsoft Word stop “correcting” the spaces after my sentences when I copy and paste. Mrs. Werner had made me into a double-tap the spacebar kind of fellow, and it bothered me that Word wasn’t adapting. But instead of a handy Word shortcut, what Google gave me was an internet assault on my pre-pubescent psychological imprinting. Two spaces, according to the world’s largest electronic brain, went out in 1947, right alongside sailor-top dresses and victory lipstick.
The rationale for double spacing, according to the internets, came from problems typesetting fixed-width fonts - problems longer relevant in the age of proportionally spaced computer-generated text. Unbeknownst to me, The Chicago Manual of Style began recommending in the mid-1970’s. So too with The Associated Press Style Book, The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, and The Gregg Reference Manual. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers appears to poo-poo two spaces as well, because although it states that two spaces are permissible, all its examples are rendered with only one.
Of course I know I can write my damn sentences however I want – that part of my nine-year-old spirit survives. But what about all those judges, partners, and slightly too big for their britches junior associates who will soon preside over me in professional judgment?
With my deepest apologies to Mrs. Werner, and not without a fearful peek over my shoulder, I accede. I am back to one space.
___________________
1 Or, "You are entering a world of pain."
She uttered these and other prophetic threats (“if you do not know how to format a business letter you will never find a job, your parents will die, and you will have to beg for your food”) as she paced the rows of circi-1989 IBM computers, correcting students’ posture, pointing, pecking, and giggling, and good moods. She wore white nursey soft-soled shoes, and I still remember how it felt to realize she had slipped up from behind to scrutinize me. Hell. It felt like hell.
The hell didn’t just come from Mrs. Werner’s stealth. It also came from ridiculous rules that make up a grade school keyboarding class. Rules like, “strike the ‘Z’ only with the little finger on your left hand,” “use five spaces intent the first line of each paragraph,” and most annoyingly to me, rigorous standards for the number of spaces after each sentence. Mrs. Werner said two. My instinct, gut, and stubbornness said one, two, ten, it doesn’t make a difference. It’s a space, right? What does two accomplish that one does not? And let’s face it: what is so horrible about ten that doesn’t apply to two? It’s messy? Thoughts are messy! Keyboarding is messy! I’m nine years old for heaven’s sake! As you might predict, she beat it out of me in the end, but it took longer for the itch to go away: what the hell is really so wrong with one space?
I admit that the debate over whether a sentence should be followed by one space or two may seem petty. Even if petty however, it is a debate I lost once in elementary school when Mrs. Werner broke me, and it’s a debate I lost again tonight when the internets convinced me to go back to the heathen ways of my nine-year-old self.
That’s right folks, it looks like I’ve been lost, saved, and then saved again. Tonight, I asked Google to how to make Microsoft Word stop “correcting” the spaces after my sentences when I copy and paste. Mrs. Werner had made me into a double-tap the spacebar kind of fellow, and it bothered me that Word wasn’t adapting. But instead of a handy Word shortcut, what Google gave me was an internet assault on my pre-pubescent psychological imprinting. Two spaces, according to the world’s largest electronic brain, went out in 1947, right alongside sailor-top dresses and victory lipstick.
The rationale for double spacing, according to the internets, came from problems typesetting fixed-width fonts - problems longer relevant in the age of proportionally spaced computer-generated text. Unbeknownst to me, The Chicago Manual of Style began recommending in the mid-1970’s. So too with The Associated Press Style Book, The Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, and The Gregg Reference Manual. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers appears to poo-poo two spaces as well, because although it states that two spaces are permissible, all its examples are rendered with only one.
Of course I know I can write my damn sentences however I want – that part of my nine-year-old spirit survives. But what about all those judges, partners, and slightly too big for their britches junior associates who will soon preside over me in professional judgment?
With my deepest apologies to Mrs. Werner, and not without a fearful peek over my shoulder, I accede. I am back to one space.
___________________
1 Or, "You are entering a world of pain."
Labels: Grammar Snarks, Technology Rants
posted by Patrick Bageant at 9:05 PM
22 Comments:
Yup. That's how they do it now - those that care to notice.
I'm disgusted. It should always be two spaces.
I am a two-space man as well. To paraphrase LBJ, "a one space man is not worth a damn to me!"
I enjoyed your anecdote about grade school typing instruction. I remember my teachers making similar threats, but my school was far too ghetto to allow us to practice on actual computers. Instead, we had laminated paper keyboards. The teacher would very carefully examine each stroke we made on the paper surface, without allowing us to look down, and then chastise us when we missed a key or used the wrong finger.
I wanted to say, but ma'am, there is no TACTILE FEEDBACK, if my 8 year-old brain only knew that term. Alas, if I had paid more attention then, maybe I wouldn't have so much trouble with these new touch screens.
But what does Harvard Law Review do?
Thank god for my instructor, Mavis Beacon. She never once stopped smiling. And I can crank out a sturdy if unspectacular 40 wpm.
If you're interested in how the world of business documents made all sorts of ugly concessions to accommodate the shortcomings of the typewriter -- and how we can haply revert to more elegant modes, including one space after sentences -- go read "The Mac Is Not a Typewriter."
My apologies for straying off topic, but over at Concurring Opinions, a professor is asking for student views on the question of whether you all are students or consumers.
http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2010/01/are-they-law-students-or-legal-education-customers.html
A related question is whether students feel that they have enough control over the curriculum or not.
Amen. But note that the CDO prefers the two-space model for cover letters.
There are grammar issues in this piece.
Shh. I'm channeling my inner nine-year-old.
My co-clerk just today tossed out an externship application because the writing sample used single spaces and not double after the periods. I thought it was overreacting... but yeah.
I use one space as well, depending on the font. There are some instances when it just isn't possible to tell how many spaces are used in a printed document. Some fonts have very tiny space widths, and some have much larger widths. Some word processors (LaTex comes to mind) allow users to define the width of the space, regardless of the font used. The idea that someone would toss an externship application because they thought someone was using single spaces is ludicrous... If I define a space to be equal to 1/10 the width of a normal space, then my "single space" is actually Patrick's 9-year-old-self's dream 10-space spacing.
Another interesting note: regardless of the number of spaces you insert into your sentences, Blogger will only render a single space. For instance, when I typed this up I put around 20 spaces between each word in this paragraph. Can you tell? Liar.
Luda is a federal court clerk? And he's a grammar Nazi? Never would have guessed.
Long live TWO spaces!
Why is this an issue? Why does anyone even care?
Two spaces is definitely the way to go if you're using courier, or an actual typewriter. For everyone else, there's the twenty-first century, to which I summon you and bid you welcome.
I've always been especially fond of the two-spacers who right justify. Yep. That works.
But in all seriousness, when I was an extern, the clerk corrected my one-space sentences. Switching between the two-space (and windows) keyboard at work and the one-space (and mac) keyboard at home nearly drove me mad that semester.
Oh. And one space is definitely better when you're trying to squeeze that 20.5 page brief into 20 pages.
I can almost guarantee you that the law clerk that threw away the application based on the spacing style is a lonely, miserable sack of shit that doesn't get enough sunlight, secretly watches Dancing With The Stars, and cries himself/herself to sleep on New Years.
Hard to say, Hersh. You could be wrong.
I've been thinking about this for basically the past five years or so. There are a lot of what should I call it, commonly accepted practices that are nothing more than the by-product of typewriters. Beginning with the creation of word processor machines (not software) and continuing through the computer revolution, these "CAPs" have become irrelevant.
But you will still find more experienced attorneys who use the rules made for typewriters. For example, some firms insist on two spaces after a period. Some partners insist on underlining a case name. I can keep going, but you get the picture. I see it as a continuum, and depending on when/where you learned your typing largely determines whether you follow some of these rules or not. I learned typing like Patrick and considered the two space rule sacrosanct. But I did not learn legal citations until much later and consider underlining of case names an affront to my personal dignity. Similarly, straight quotes must be banished. That is, unless I'm working for a partner who thinks precisely the opposite...then I just snap my heels and stand at attention. In conclusion, Libya is a land of many contrasts.
The two-space convention may be an anachronism, and a good one for most purposes, but there is a cost to dropping it. If you want to parse a text for sentences using, e.g., a regex, those two spaces come in mighty handy.
2:19,
You are correct, but your regular expression should not depend on text consistently using two spaces. The situations where a '.' is not the end of a sentence can be dealt with.
Although I agree that one space is philosophically ideal, it is still practically helpful to use two. You are highly unlikely to get any complaints if you use two spaces. If you use single spaces, however, be prepared to argue your decision from here until eternity. Double spacing is unlikely to disappear until we are all using html for everything, or speech recognition finally catches on.
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