Week 8 – Revision: Global and Local
Editing
Dr. Erica Cirillo-McCarthy
Assistant Director of Graduate and ADEP Writing
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Invention
Drafting
Revision
Editing
◦ Today we will focus on the last two steps
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To Re-See your text
To Re-Visit your ideas
A time to improve your ideas, to clarify your
arguments, to strengthen your evidence, to solidify
your academic voice
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First is the global revision where we look at the larger
issues in the text
Then and only then will you focus on the local revision
which entails close line-editing and proofreading
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Always start with the global issues – usually your
ideas, arguments, support, organization, and voice/tone
◦ Thesis or main argument or main purpose
 The reason behind your text
◦ Go over each section carefully
 Does the text follow the parameters of the assignment sheet? Are
the section headers appropriate? Do they give the reader enough
information and prepare them for what’s ahead? Is there continuity
in the headers? Does the organization flow logically?
◦ Go over each paragraph carefully
 Look at each topic sentence. Does it give the reader an idea of
what the paragraph will cover? What the paragraph will do? Is it in
your language and not a quote? Does it connect the previous
paragraph? Does it connect with the larger
thesis/argument/purpose?
 Do a reverse outline: take the intro paragraph and the first sentence
of each paragraph and cut and paste into an outline form. Do the
topic sentences flow?
 Ask yourself – what does the audience need to know first, second,
third?
◦ Print out and cut up the different paragraphs to ensure
organization is optimal.
◦ Lay out the cut out paragraphs on a table. Read them aloud,
then decide their order.
◦ Always consider audience – try to step out of your head when
considering organization and instead consider how the
audience will read your text.
◦ Remember there may be a few paths to optimal organization.
Choose one, justify it, then move on.
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Then let the text sit while you go do something else –
you want to distance yourself from the text so that you
come back to it with fresh eyes.
Work on something else, make dinner, call a friend, go
for a walk…anything to take your mind off the text.
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Read your text over with a Writing Center tutor,
professor, or colleague
Look for the global issues – clarity, flow, support,
argument or purpose, and paragraph unity
You should be able to see what the process of re-seeing
or re-visioning can do to your text!
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Global issues are the big things: big ideas, big support,
big organization…
Local issues are the very focused things: grammar,
syntax, word choice
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EVERY writer has a certain number of errors that they
make in their texts
These errors repeat themselves throughout the texts and
are often called “patterns of error”
Strong writers know their pattern of errors and look for
those first in the editing process
Example…
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It could be comma splices, or verb tense agreement, or
article usage
Your professor and/or Writing Center tutor can help
you discover your pattern of error
Create a pattern of error worksheet to serve as a
reference for when you draft and edit
Sentence as written in
your text
Chinese corporations
wants to engage with US
investors.
Sentence written without
grammatical error
Chinese corporations want
to engage with US
investors.
Description and rule of
error
Subject/verb agreement:
corporations is plural so
verb must agree: want not
wants (which is singular)
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Print out your drafts and proofread a hard copy.
Research has shown that we catch things in a hard copy
that we wouldn’t in an electronic copy
Edit your text carefully BEFORE you visit a Writing
Center tutor. Bring the tutor the questions you have
AFTER you finish a close editing session on your own.
In this way, you become more independent
Understand that the revision process can potentially
take as much time or more than the drafting process, so
give yourself enough time to revise carefully and
effectively!
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Read the hard copy aloud – to yourself, to your pet, to
your roommate, to whomever will listen
The trick isn’t getting them to catch your errors, but to
catch them yourself (and to practice your English
pronunciation)
Understand that becoming a strong writer is a process –
good writers aren’t born that way; they become good
writers through feedback and revision, revision,
revision!
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Questions?
Thank you!