Friday 19 March 2010

The burden of proof

Although Scotland is a rather small country, with an unusual legal system, the quality, and quantity, of legal texts is really remarkably good. (Of course, it could suggest that we are over-lawyered.) We have many splendidly learned academics and practitioners, and as several specialist Scots Law publishers and imprints - Avizandum, Tottel, W Green, and the various university presses.

When you have this kind of supply it's churlish to complain. But I'm going to, anyway. Recently, I've been noticing rather poor proof reading standards - homophones, misspellings, and even in one case, whole line dropouts -- and that in a book in its 3rd edition, and one that is probably bought by almost every LLB student in the country (I'll leave you to guess which one it might be.)

This problem isn't unique to legal texts, it's true. But given the premium that is placed upon careful, clear, and correct, communication within the profession, it's just a little disappointing.

(I do hope there are no unfortunate errors above.)

1 comment:

  1. I don't know, does "and as several specialist Scots Law publishers and imprints" count as an unfortunate error? Or is that construction one of those unique Scottish locutions I'm unfamiliar with?

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