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Article on manuscript copy editing.

Manuscript Copyediting

At One World Press, we break down the copyediting process into three degrees of complexity. The following are detailed lists of our standards within each of the levels of editorial concern, for light, medium, and heavy edits.

LIGHT COPYEDITING

A light edit should be performed on a manuscript that is relatively error free. That is, a manuscript that is well organized, clear, consistent, grammatical, and conforming to American standard editorial style guidelines. These may vary somewhat from editor to editor. When in doubt please consult The Chicago Manual of Style.

An editor performing a light edit should;

Review basic spelling, grammar, and punctuation, with reference to the standard editorial style guidelines, correcting the manuscript using standard editor’s marks, or tracking changes in the manuscript file.
Keymark the text. This is the use of standard codes to identifying typographic elements that need to be changed. Also keymark style online using templated styles.
Check, confirm and mark callouts to figures, tables, and other floating display material if editing on paper.
Check for correct numeric sequences of heads, figures, tables, and any other numbered elements.
Eliminate cross-references to physical positions of material (such as “above” or “below” on a page) if the client desires. This is becoming less of a concern with most editors, however.
Mark callouts for references to a page in the book by its number when editing online.

An editor performing a light edit should not;

Completely rewrite otherwise grammatically tolerable sentences to remove ambiguities or improve clarity, concision, or felicity of style.
Move material farther than an adjacent sentence to correct clarity or logical flow of presentation.
Verify originality of material.
Add material to bridge gaps in logical flow.
Revise the head structure.
Research the accuracy of statements of fact.

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