The American Society for Indexing held its 2023 Virtual Conference, “The Eyes Have It: The Indexer Perspective–Past, Present & Future,” on Friday, April 28, 2023 and Saturday, April 29, 2023. Four sessions were held virtually on Zoom each day.
The second session on Friday, Another Set of Eyes: How and When to Hire Someone to Edit or Proofread Your Indexes, was presented by Michelle Guiliano. She discussed her relationship with index editor Laurie Hlavaty. Her experience with index edits originated from subcontract work, and with an editor who specialized in scientific and medical texts, then with an indexer who also provides editing and proofreading services. She found that since she was going over and over her indexes before submitting them, that having index evaluations with feedback would be beneficial.
Types of index edits:
- indexing skills evaluation with feedback
- proofreading
- She said it is helpful to have another set of eyes going over your index.
- editing
- This checks structural issues, word choice, metadata, main headings, cross-references, double-posts, and page references. Editing also checks for clarity and conciseness.
- proofreading and editing
- She said that this is the ideal situation.
- peer reviews vs. index edits
- She said that peer reviews are not a substitute for index edits.
She outlined the downsides–the cost of paying for the index edits, the time working the index edit into your schedule, the time reworking the index after the edit, and the upfront investment. Then she weighed them with the upsides–time of cushion built into indexing schedule, as well as forced distance from index, cost as tax-deductible, efficiency, quality of reader’s perspective, catching mistakes, and improved indexing process, and peace of mind.
In the next blog posting, I will discuss the following Friday session of the ASI 2023 Virtual Conference. For more information about the services provided by the author of this blog, see the Stellar Searches LLC website, http://www.stellarsearches.com.