Help for Academics and Researchers
Whether you’ve written a new scholarly article or conference paper, a report or academic book chapter, I’ve designed services that help to get your writing ready for the next stage. Each service focuses on the needs of a text. I will communicate if your text requires more than I can do, or if it isn’t quite ready for the stages of editing I offer. No matter what level of editing we agree your writing will benefit from, I will edit objectively, non-prescriptively and, above all, invisibly – as that is the art (and science) of good editing. And at any point throughout the editorial process, I’ll be happy to answer your questions.
If you think we’d be a good fit, let’s go.
The Tailored Makeover. Or Sensitive Rewriting
(Substantive Editing, Language Editing, Line Editing)
What you can expect me to do/not do
This service focuses on the bigger picture – your message, medium and audience. If you’re unsure about the clarity of your message, less confident about writing in English than in another language, I can reassure you and build confidence to publish. With this service, I will
- help to clarify the message of a text, while maintaining the author’s voice
- identify problems and suggest solutions, with a focus on conscious language use.
Rewriting can involve adjusting the level/tone of a text to better serve the target readership. I will
- highlight things that work well and assess and explain why sentences and sections may not work
- focus on strengthening the clarity in a piece of writing, using plain English where appropriate, and minimising confusion in sentence construction.
Being multilingual and of multicultural Indian heritage, I understand well how other languages and culture can influence English-language writing. You may use this to your advantage in fiction or creative non-fiction even. Academic, formal writing, however, needs to communicate ideas and research lucidly and simply, unbiased and caring of context. So that the core is not misinterpreted, lost. Although I am not a subject expert, rest assured my editing experience will respect your knowledge – I will take care to retain specialist vocabulary and focus on improvement overall.
I will also copyedit, addressing (but not limited to) the following:
- check for clarity and consistency in spelling, grammar and punctuation as well as hyphenations, capitalisations and use of numbers
- apply a house style and/or template
- identify and query obvious factual errors/inconsistencies
- mark up typesetting elements, such as heading levels, display quotes, equations, textboxes, figure and table call-outs
- check appropriateness of figure and table captions
- highlight potential legal issues, such as copyright.
But I will not check
- accuracy of citations or formatting of references, bibliography and notes
- accuracy of figure labels to context or formatting of labels
- accuracy of tables and data presented
- formatting of other supporting materials (e.g. appendix, index).
This service is not the same as a developmental edit. It is appropriate for texts that have already been worked on by a developmental editor.
With this language editing service, you can leave your writing in my care in the knowledge that it will be tailored to you and your readers, within the English-language framework of scholarly publications.
The Technical Fix. Or Copyediting Nuts and Bolts
What you can expect me to do/not do
This service involves a methodical edit that focuses on clarity and consistency in your writing at sentence level. In a standard copyedit, I will work on the text addressing (but not limited to) the following:
- check for clarity and consistency in spelling, grammar and punctuation as well as hyphenations, capitalisations and use of numbers
- query unclear sentences and provide solutions for rephrasing
- minimise repetition where applicable
- apply a required house style and/or template
- identify and query obvious factual errors/inconsistencies
- mark up typesetting elements, such as heading levels, display quotes, equations, textboxes, figure and table call-outs
- check appropriateness of figure and table captions and labels
- highlight potential legal issues, such as copyright
- check reference citations and mark up missing and mismatched sources.
Copyediting tries to make writing adhere to rules, and that too is essential. My aim is to increase clarity, accessibility and inclusivity in a piece of writing by applying recognised (but changing) language norms to aid and not harm.
The focus of this service is to leave well alone. Not to improve by substantial rewriting, but to avoid trip-ups by smoothing bumps so the readers’ accessibility of the text is not affected. Ideally, your text should have gone through a developmental edit (and language edit, if necessary) before it is ready to be copyedited. Copyediting is a thorough polish of a piece of writing before it is ready to be typeset, laid out in the chosen publication format or worked on by a designer followed by an indexer and proofreader.
The Backstage Essentials. Or References, Bibliography and Notes
This is – you guessed right! – the backbone of academic writing and scholarship. I will help you check and style your references or bibliography and footnotes/endnotes. With this service, I can also
- fact-check sources and complete the incomplete ones
- double-check URLs and add DOIs if required
- help you find the missing source for which you only noted the author’s surname and year or article title. (Yes, that happens – and commonly too – when you forget to use a reference manager while researching, for example. I do not claim to have magic powers, but I do know how to summon the internet elves!)
Whether you need to follow the Chicago Manual of Style or Harvard or Vancouver or APA or MLA or something else entirely, I’ve got you covered. While I’m most familiar with the first two styles, I’m surprisingly excited by references and bibliographies in general and am happy to use whichever style the text requires.
Yes, you can use reference management software to capture and organise your references, but the software vary in functionality and cost. They can but won’t necessarily tell you if the one instance of Roy Chowdhury should be Roychowdhury or Chary should be Chari because that’s how the author spells their name in the original publication and something got lost in translation. (The same way a tech-bot is unlikely to tell you that that should be a hat!)
And whenever possible, I will aim to highlight whether the use of resources is balanced, inclusive and adequately representative in the field.
What you will receive
- A Word file with all edits tracked. (I can accommodate your preferences for tracking formatting and similar changes.)
- A separate Word file with a list of sequentially numbered queries and comments. I recommend using this as a checklist to record and track whether all queries have been addressed/resolved.
- A comprehensive stylesheet with editorial decisions we’ve agreed on about language use and styles, which can also be shared with your proofreader and/or publisher.
- Referrals to trusted colleagues for proofreading, indexing, typesetting and/or design, if you need.
- Email support throughout the editorial process.
All services include two rounds of editing. The second pass is a clean-up that incorporates your clarifications and any final revisions. When completed, I will send you a clean file of the edited text and the invoice with payment terms as agreed at the start.
Independent Editor
Sensitive editing for academic and scholarly writing. Because your ideas are important.
