Language question - can someone tell me how (sic) should be used?

[beansprout]

Please?

Thanks

it's when you're quoting from someone else, and they've made a mistake, and you reprint their mistake in order to give a faithful quote.

E.g. say an MP, Ms Joan Smith, wrote a letter to you that said 'I can't help you with your prooblem.'

Then you write about this to someone else, you would write 'Ms Joan Smith wrote 'I can't help you with your prooblem (sic)

It means 'thus' in Latin, like saying 'this is what the stupid whatsit said in the first place and I know it's wrong but this is what s/he said'

!

It's used when you are quoting something that is technically wrong (in whatever way) to show that the mistake is not yours.

For example ............

Beansprout describes Moondog as a 'fantastic women who's always very supportive' (sic).

It's really snidey and mean, though, and best avoided if you can. It's like standing up in the middle of the text saying "neener neener, you made an error!".

What I think it's for is to show that something is deliberate, so for example if you are quoting someone else and they make a spelling mistake, you put (sic) (in brackets) to show that although you realise it is incorrect, you are quoting their error.

E.g. if you were quoting someone who had mis-spelled the name Shakespeare you might put:

Professor Lio says, "this is one of Shakspear's (sic) greatest works".

No,not necessarily NQC!

Agree it should really only be used when you want to be snide - compare:

Dear Sir / Madam,
I was appalled to receive this morning a letter from your Customer Service department stating that the shoes I ordered last week 'wont be comin in till after crismas' (sic). The shoes were intended for an event in September, and as they will not be available for this I would be grateful if you could send me an immediate refund.
Yours faithfully,
Mrs Badger

with:

Dear Sir / Madam,
I was appalled to receive this morning a letter from your Customer Service department stating that the shoes I ordered last week will not be in stock until after Christmas. The shoes were intended for an event in September, and as they will not be available for this I would be grateful if you could send me an immediate refund.
Yours faithfully,
Mrs Badger

Really? It always seems snidey to me. I mean, I realise it has a point, making clear that the typo wasn't yours or whatever, but still ...

Agree with NQC about it being snide, it only needs to be used in cases where your professional reputation would be harmed by someone mistaking it for your work. And that is only if you are obliged to reproduce the mistake for technical purposes.

Yes, quite, MrsB.

Oh, and "sic" should be in square brackets, and italicised, thusly: [sic].

I wouldn't want to have to quote one of you, putting a proper [sic] after your improper (sic).

No.if you're writing a serious academic text or whatever and trying to be as accurate as possible,it's important to disassociate yourself from incorrect assertions and beliefs.

lol at (sic) [sic]

Hmm, but generally, if you're disagreeing with something significant, you don't use sic, you just disagree with it, after quoting it. It's really just for weird spelling stuff. cite . It's only for trivia.

[ha ha]

hmm - academia-wise I've always got round it thus:

Other studies (Watford & Duster, 2001) have suggested sheep mortality is a good indicator of driving competence, however, these data suggest that this is not the case.

Thank you, thank you!

I have to refer to a paragraph in a legal document but the numbering is out (there are two article 27s) so I think I do need to use it.

Yeah, that's not unreasonable ... do you need to refer to both paragraph 27s? If not, I maybe wouldn't bother mentioning the bad numbering, and leave anyone checking your references to work it out? (Hard to make clear, unless you're quoting both para 27s that the problem is the numbering?)

It's not always snidey; I've just written something in which I've referred to something or other by its given name and had to put [sic]. As in World Health Organization [sic]when the rest of the article's stuck to a style sheet of English spelling (and therefore 'sation').

Hmm, but I wouldn't put a [sic] on that - if it calls itself an Organization, that's its name. It's a name, in that context, not a world. Would you put a [sic] on "Medecins sans Frontieres" (sorry for lack of accents) because it's not in English?

I'm sure it can be used in a non-snidey way, if you're quoting something really old maybe ...

The s/z thing is a touchy subject with me, tbh, as my own bloody son corrects me these days because my accent isn't the same as his.

I'd put a [sic] on, I should explain, as a marker to the subs that they shouldn't 'correct' it.

Ah, yes, that makes sense. I can see that if a document is meant to be in a certain spelling style etc etc. It just seems a bit rude to [sic] at something's name. Is the next step using [sic] at a person's name, if it's not spelled with the most popular spelling?

I would [sic] it, yes, as a marker to subs: on the assumption they'd then remove the [sic],obviously. The alternative is to explain in brackets that you've checked and this is how it's spelled!

Quite a lot of organisational names require this, I find. Like the Peoples [sic] Dispensary for Sick Animals. It's the correct name, but not gramatically correct. I could go on....

Ah, yes, but you're putting the [sic] in there just for the subs, which is a different thing than publishing it with a [sic].