If you’re reading this newsletter, you probably already understand the importance of word choice, especially in news coverage.
Just last week we covered language surrounding abortion, for example. Choosing your words carefully when you’re covering political or social topics often carries extra importance.
But it’s not just these big “vocabulary words,” such as antiabortion or pro-abortion rights, that matter. Our friends at Trusting News, whom we’re partnering with to update our style guide this election season, have asked news consumers what signals indicate that a news story is unfair. The respondents often point to words that journalists might not give a second thought to, such as “surprising” or “unapologetic.”
This might sound, well, surprising, but these words can convey a point of view or reflect a journalist’s assumptions. You might be turning people off, or polarizing your coverage, even as you’re trying to remain neutral. And with trust in news at a record low, every word counts, especially in an election year.
So if you want to build your audience’s trust in your election coverage, consider bookmarking this Trusting News resource and double-checking yourself when you use one of the words on the list. And now when you ask Stylebot about one of these words, we’ll share Trusting News’ advice with you.
If you’d like to get advice like this in your newsroom’s Slack or Teams workspace this election season, reach out to us or see if you qualify for free access through the Knight Election Hub.
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Stylebot helps media professionals save time without sacrificing quality by answering copy editing questions on Slack and Microsoft Teams. We’re on a mission to make editing faster, easier and more fun ✨Lean more about Stylebot or follow us on Twitter and Instagram.