I finally completed Functional Method Dictation. I selected this one for my first intermediate text at Carlos's suggestion. He had particularly noted the phrasing employed by Mr. Zoubek.
He wasn't kidding! There are enough phrases to make your head spin. (How unfortunate that they weren't indexed!)
But I was also surprised at how many phrasing possibilities were overlooked. For example, Mr. Zoubek consistently wrote out "every day" and "if possible." These are commonly phrased even in the beginner level texts, and both are listed in the official Anni Phrase Book.
Moreover, I was reading concurrently the latter chapters of the 1929 Speed Studies and also Mr. Bowman's Dictation Studies book. I repeatedly encountered phrases in both not used in FMD.
I do not say this in criticism of Mr. Zoubek; on the contrary I found it reassuring. Even an exceptionally brilliant phrase writer as he didn't avail himself of every phrasing possibility. For me this served as a reminder that phrasing isn't something that should "burden" a stenographer. It mustn't be a weight that will cause hesitation in writing.
I recognize more clearly that phrasing is something that is part of an ongoing development process, learned mostly by absorption through reading (and copying) lots and lots of well-written shorthand. I run across phrases every day that I haven't seen before. (Just ten minutes ago I learned "with-regard" from the Bowman book.) Nobody is ever going to memorize all of the phrases that can be made--except maybe Carlos. :-)
And then there's the testimony of long-time expert reporters who observe that "The longer I write shorthand, the longer I write shorthand." Some of the old greats actually dropped the uber-phrasing over time as unnecessary.
Anyway, just a few observations from a grateful intermediate shorthand student. Feel free to smack them down. :-)
And now a question for Carlos (which Marc might appreciate): Based on the Anni dictionary, how would you distinguish between "resplendence" and "resplendency"?Labels: general