Maybe it's the English professor in me coming out, but as I've been reading a number of missionary blogs, I've discovered that some posts are not conveying the right impression because the spelling isn't so good.
Here are a few misspellings found on missionary blogs:
"differnt" [different]
"ment" [meant]
"togeather" [together]
Maybe those were just sloppy fingers. But it starts to hurt when missionaries refer to very common aspects of missionary work or to church doctrine and misspell. Some other misspellings found on missionary blogs:
"dissuctions" [discussions]
"apostacy" [Apostasy]
These were found in the titles of blog posts where they really stuck out:
"lession" [lesson]
"indentity" [identity]
Two strong suggestions for avoiding this problem:
- Have someone else (your companion?) read over your post before you publish it. He or she will help you avoid embarrassing yourself, and you might get some helpful feedback on content or media while you are at it.
- Use an online spellchecker. Spellchcker.net is simple, free, and works great.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteHow true about people judging you by your spelling/writing. Several years ago I worked for an education professor as his doctoral fellow. Our job was working with twenty superintendents and setting up training for them. In the course of our work we had to correspond with them. My boss used to send out correspondence to them from time to time and he was a notoriously bad speller. He was arrogant and didn't have anyone including me help him.
ReplyDeleteOne superintendent had a problem with him over letters he sent out. This particular superintendent was the son of the former president of the university and was still well connected there. He was a very meticulous man and well respected. My boss sent him a letter that was filled with misspelled words. My boss was up for tenure and promotion. The superintendent influenced the rank and tenure committee's decision. He sent the department chair and the university president back a letter my boss wrote which contained fourteen words misspelled and circled in bright red.
Needless to say my boss did not get the promotion and left to go work at another university where he had to start over in the academic process. Those spelling mistakes cost him a few years of his life in terms of career advancement.
In talking later with the department head I asked why it was such a big deal since it destroyed the career of my boss. He said: "When you write something while working for the university it reflects on the organization and people judge the quality of the organization by the people in it." The same can be said for missionaries representing the Church and their individual missions. People judge us collectively by how well you spell and write.
I'd agree that spelling is among the good reasons to have a companion look over your posts. I have Google Chrome check my spelling, and when Elder Sabin looks over my posts before I send them, he often still finds many grammar and spelling errors that the browser did not find.
ReplyDeleteOften, people find the lack of abbreviations, slang, or spelling errors in missionary writing to be too professional. I've learned not to give into that pressure, because as missionaries, we are professionals, even when we get personal. :D