atw: Re: Should and would
- From: Kirsty Taylor <kirsty.taylor@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 19:24:18 -0700
Hi Howard,
Modal verbs can be tricky. We have an internal style guideline to try to avoid
them in most instances, as they can cause problems for translation. Our
translation department has this in their guidelines:
[cid:image001.png@01CA5180.3F038720] Modals are open to interpretation and
can cause lengthy (and incorrect) translations
In an example from old documentation, they found a sentence stating " xyz
should be added to pqr". Should it be? Or must it be? Is this a recommendation
or a pre-requisite? Using should makes it unclear. Rewriting without using the
modal makes the sentence clear.
But, as far as a reference for this, beyond our translation department's
experience ...
I've had a quick look in MMoS, there's an entry for should vs must and can vs
may. They say to use should to describe a user action that is recommended but
optional. Use must for an action that is required. Use can for ability and may
for possibility, not to imply permission. Use might to connote greater doubt
than may or eliminate ambiguity when may could be interpreted for permission.
Do not use could when you mean can (except for past tense of can and it is not
ambiguous).
[My summary/paraphrasing of MMoS, this does not necessarily indicate my
preferences or our internal style]
Hope this helps,
KT
Kirsty Taylor
kirsty.taylor@xxxxxxxxxx
From: austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:austechwriter-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Howard Silcock
Sent: Tuesday, 20 October 2009 12:04 PM
To: austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: atw: Should and would
I have been reading through some of the administrative circulars here in the
Government department where I work. I was struck by how much they use 'should'
and, to a lesser extent, 'would'. Typically, you find phrases like 'Staff
should follow this procedure when ...' or 'I would like to remind staff of the
importance of keeping accurate records of meetings'. Why not just write 'Follow
this procedure when...' and 'Keep accurate records of meetings', or maybe
'Remember to keep accurate records of meetings'?
I was tempted to formulate a rule "avoid 'should' and 'would' in technical
writing", but realised that there are a few cases (really very few, I'd say)
when I would [yes, I'm doing it now myself] regard it as OK. Still, I wondered
why so much is written about avoiding passives, and when not to use the future
tense, but no-one seems to point to the deadening effect of strings of
'shoulds' and hypotheticals. Even a sentence like 'If your user name were
jsmith, your personal site's URL would be
http://mysite.com/personal/jsmith/default.aspx' probably reads better (at
least, in my view) as 'For a user name jsmith, the personal site's URL is
http://mysite.com/personal/jsmith/default.aspx '. (On the other hand, I don't
think the sentence 'Edit the information as you would in a Microsoft Word
document' needs changing.)
Does anyone know of any usage guide that addresses this topic? I looked in
'Read Me First', but couldn't see anything. And can anyone suggest other good
examples where 'would' and 'should' are OK - in other words, examples that go
against my proposed rule? Maybe I can reformulate it as a 'rule with some
exceptions' - something linguists would probably feel fine about but which my
mathematical background makes me definitely reluctant to accept!
Howard
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