Whither the indent?
September 7, 2011 9:31 AM Subscribe
Whither indentations? I've noticed lately that people are not using paragraph indentations for business correspondence and other public writing (e.g., public policy whitepapers.) Why is this? Is it good or bad?
Nobody can answer your last question--that's an aesthetic judgment.
But yes, I've noticed this creeping into just about every kind of writing I see.
posted by yellowcandy at 9:41 AM on September 7, 2011
But yes, I've noticed this creeping into just about every kind of writing I see.
posted by yellowcandy at 9:41 AM on September 7, 2011
Haven't traditional full block business letters always been this way? No indents, all text is aligned to the left, paragraphs are separated by lines.
While I am pretty confident full block precedes the Internet, I think the other influence is that text online nowadays is rarely indented. Just look at the answers in this thread.
posted by andrewesque at 9:42 AM on September 7, 2011 [7 favorites]
While I am pretty confident full block precedes the Internet, I think the other influence is that text online nowadays is rarely indented. Just look at the answers in this thread.
posted by andrewesque at 9:42 AM on September 7, 2011 [7 favorites]
Previously.
It's traditional to use extra space, with no indentation, to indicate a new paragraph in a business letter. So to ask why this isn't happening "anymore" is to ask the wrong question.
posted by John Cohen at 9:46 AM on September 7, 2011 [10 favorites]
It's traditional to use extra space, with no indentation, to indicate a new paragraph in a business letter. So to ask why this isn't happening "anymore" is to ask the wrong question.
posted by John Cohen at 9:46 AM on September 7, 2011 [10 favorites]
There was a previously on this but I can't find it. Basically, when the internet was invented, we couldn't indent. (No, really.) As more and more reading began to take place online, the formatting styles of thelinternet became de facto formatting styles in business correspondence.
posted by DarlingBri at 9:47 AM on September 7, 2011
posted by DarlingBri at 9:47 AM on September 7, 2011
'People' is a broad category. House style varies, individual usage is influenced by the perceived textual environment. The first push against indents came with the word processor replacing the typewriter; the second came with email; the third because HTML paragraphs don't indent without explicit styling.
It's possible to point to legibility studies suggesting that the loss of indentation is a problem, but it's a moving target, because you have a generation of readers who grew up with manual typewriters and hot-metal presses being replaced by one whose experience of text is defined by the web.
posted by holgate at 9:48 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
It's possible to point to legibility studies suggesting that the loss of indentation is a problem, but it's a moving target, because you have a generation of readers who grew up with manual typewriters and hot-metal presses being replaced by one whose experience of text is defined by the web.
posted by holgate at 9:48 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
when the internet was invented, we couldn't indent. (No, really.) As more and more reading began to take place online, the formatting styles of the internet became de facto formatting styles in business correspondence.
By that logic, shouldn't all business letter paragraphs begin like
>We have received your letter of interest and will contact you ....
posted by Miko at 9:50 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
By that logic, shouldn't all business letter paragraphs begin like
>We have received your letter of interest and will contact you ....
posted by Miko at 9:50 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
The format has been fixed since at least the 60's: the Purdue Online Writing Lab suggests a full-left flush format.
Peg Bracken's "I Try to Behave Myself" etiquette book suggests the same format, and it was published in 1960.
posted by jrochest at 9:51 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
Peg Bracken's "I Try to Behave Myself" etiquette book suggests the same format, and it was published in 1960.
posted by jrochest at 9:51 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
Seconding Claudia: indents' only purpose is to give a visual clue that you are in a new paragraph. In most modern mediums, that is best done with a little after paragraph spacing. It breaks the text up better and makes it digestible.
Indents make sense when losing or gaining lines (or half lines) will increase page counts (such as in print docs like books and magazines).
Also, grid layout, like magazine text or books will tend to use indents, in part because having a consistent line spacing between all lines (regardless of whether they are starting new paragraphs or not) will keep all of the text on the same grid layout. ie. all the lines of text will line up.
As someone who does lay out text in different mediums, I personally use whichever method is right for the job, so no, it's not disappearing.
Hope that makes sense.
posted by hamandcheese at 9:51 AM on September 7, 2011 [2 favorites]
Indents make sense when losing or gaining lines (or half lines) will increase page counts (such as in print docs like books and magazines).
Also, grid layout, like magazine text or books will tend to use indents, in part because having a consistent line spacing between all lines (regardless of whether they are starting new paragraphs or not) will keep all of the text on the same grid layout. ie. all the lines of text will line up.
As someone who does lay out text in different mediums, I personally use whichever method is right for the job, so no, it's not disappearing.
Hope that makes sense.
posted by hamandcheese at 9:51 AM on September 7, 2011 [2 favorites]
Best answer: I was taught decades ago that business correspondence did not have indents. This style predates the internet.
Based on a cursory search just now, business letters I've seen scanned from the 1940s and 1950s did have indentations. But when the 1960s came along they seem to be in the current style.
posted by birdherder at 9:55 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
Based on a cursory search just now, business letters I've seen scanned from the 1940s and 1950s did have indentations. But when the 1960s came along they seem to be in the current style.
posted by birdherder at 9:55 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
Best answer: I just went on Google books and did a search between 1960 and 1980 for "business letter" and found almost every text recommending "block form" or "full block" or "modified block" form. It's definitely much older than the internet. It's interesting to see where it's applied and not applied, though. Every book I read is indented, and my research papers are required to be. Online, I don't seem to mostly bother with it, and I agree it's often because the tab function does something different almost everywhere you go so it's a little unpredictable.
posted by Miko at 9:55 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
posted by Miko at 9:55 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
Seconding John Cohen. When I learned to write business letters in the 1970s, I was taught to use a blank line between paragraphs, with no indentation.
It's also common for western Europeans (I'm most familiar with France and Germany) to use a blank line between paragraphs instead of an indentation in academic typescripts.
I do find it irritating when published books, like Oxford's "Very Short Introductions" series, eschew traditional paragraphing in favor of blank lines, though.
posted by brianogilvie at 9:56 AM on September 7, 2011
It's also common for western Europeans (I'm most familiar with France and Germany) to use a blank line between paragraphs instead of an indentation in academic typescripts.
I do find it irritating when published books, like Oxford's "Very Short Introductions" series, eschew traditional paragraphing in favor of blank lines, though.
posted by brianogilvie at 9:56 AM on September 7, 2011
I just pressed tab to indent. It took me out of this text entry box. Screw that!
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
posted by pjaust at 9:58 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
posted by pjaust at 9:58 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
I just pressed tab to indent. It took me out of this text entry box. Screw that!
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
You should almost never use tab to indent anyway. In word processors (such as Microsoft Word), there is an option to automatically indent the beginning of every paragraph.
posted by grouse at 10:01 AM on September 7, 2011
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
You should almost never use tab to indent anyway. In word processors (such as Microsoft Word), there is an option to automatically indent the beginning of every paragraph.
posted by grouse at 10:01 AM on September 7, 2011
Way back in the dark ages (aka a typing class circa 1969 --- with actual typewriters! Manual typewriters, 'cause we didn't have none of them there fancy electric typewriters..... and by the way: get those kids off my lawn!) Ahem. Anyhoo, we were taught that proper business letters were indented with the 'tab' key, which had a couple different settings for how deep of an indentation you wanted, plus the body of the letter was to be single-spaced, without extra space between the lines at paragraph breaks.
Seems to me that the lack of indentations is a internet-era development.
posted by easily confused at 10:09 AM on September 7, 2011
Seems to me that the lack of indentations is a internet-era development.
posted by easily confused at 10:09 AM on September 7, 2011
I learned to type on a manual typewriter in the 70's. (We practiced to the song "Popcorn" by the band Hot Butter.) We had to learn both styles of paragraphing - the indent and the block, since I guess both were still in use.
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 11:14 AM on September 7, 2011
posted by ThatCanadianGirl at 11:14 AM on September 7, 2011
Response by poster: Birdherder, those old business letters are very elegant, both in format and in diction.
Does anyone know of any style guides that call for indent PLUS space between paras?
posted by yarly at 11:35 AM on September 7, 2011
Does anyone know of any style guides that call for indent PLUS space between paras?
posted by yarly at 11:35 AM on September 7, 2011
Based on a cursory search just now, business letters I've seen scanned from the 1940s and 1950s did have indentations. But when the 1960s came along they seem to be in the current style.
I don't think it suddenly changed in the '60s: if you look at letters to and from President Eisenhower in the '50s, they generally used the no-indent, line-break style.
posted by John Cohen at 11:35 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
I don't think it suddenly changed in the '60s: if you look at letters to and from President Eisenhower in the '50s, they generally used the no-indent, line-break style.
posted by John Cohen at 11:35 AM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
The answer is simpler than that:
Open up gmail, and hit the "tab" button when composing an email. Same deal for facebook messages.
Tabs have gone away, because the most popular forms of written correspondence cannot include them properly.
posted by Slap*Happy at 12:03 PM on September 7, 2011
Open up gmail, and hit the "tab" button when composing an email. Same deal for facebook messages.
Tabs have gone away, because the most popular forms of written correspondence cannot include them properly.
posted by Slap*Happy at 12:03 PM on September 7, 2011
This has been going on for years and as someone has said, it's bad, very bad. Without indents, people read more slowly, retain less, and just generally dO worse at getting the message. The style is almost as foish as typIng on an iPhone in the sun.
My theory is that the first impression of a block-form doc is the selling point,
posted by Lesser Shrew at 12:15 PM on September 7, 2011
My theory is that the first impression of a block-form doc is the selling point,
posted by Lesser Shrew at 12:15 PM on September 7, 2011
Response by poster: Without indents, people read more slowly, retain less, and just generally dO worse at getting the message.
Is there scientific support for this? It's my intuition that this is true, but it seems testable.
posted by yarly at 12:45 PM on September 7, 2011
Is there scientific support for this? It's my intuition that this is true, but it seems testable.
posted by yarly at 12:45 PM on September 7, 2011
Why is this?
Among Internauts, one reason might be pre-CSS HTML couldn't do indents properly (until we learned the <ul> tag workaround) so many got out of the habit. Also, email tends to favor the block format.
posted by Rash at 12:53 PM on September 7, 2011
Among Internauts, one reason might be pre-CSS HTML couldn't do indents properly (until we learned the <ul> tag workaround) so many got out of the habit. Also, email tends to favor the block format.
posted by Rash at 12:53 PM on September 7, 2011
I have seen letters etc use both the skipped line and the indent. The idea is to signal the reader that a new paragraph (containing one main idea) is now being presented. Try reading six paragraphs without any indication and you will see how useful a signal can be.
The internet seems though is bringing about change. We now skip but one space after a sentence when beginning a new one (we used to skip two). So, too, we seem always online to give a title beginning with a number instead of spelling out that number ("3 Men Drowned in the Accident" rather than "Three Men Drowned in the Accident."
As usual, though, follow style used where you work or if known method used where you are sending the letter.
posted by Postroad at 1:02 PM on September 7, 2011
The internet seems though is bringing about change. We now skip but one space after a sentence when beginning a new one (we used to skip two). So, too, we seem always online to give a title beginning with a number instead of spelling out that number ("3 Men Drowned in the Accident" rather than "Three Men Drowned in the Accident."
As usual, though, follow style used where you work or if known method used where you are sending the letter.
posted by Postroad at 1:02 PM on September 7, 2011
If the tab key isn't for indenting, what's it for?
I just pressed tab to indent. It took me out of this text entry box. Screw that!
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
posted by pjaust at 9:58 AM on September 7 [1 favorite +] [!]
I agree with this completely. It wasn't standard for a lot of communication, and since its more difficult to use, it isn't getting used anywhere else either.
I doubt I'd ever NOT indent in a handwritten letter, however.
posted by gjc at 4:45 PM on September 7, 2011
I just pressed tab to indent. It took me out of this text entry box. Screw that!
I'm so frequently switching between writing in web-based email, MS Word, plain text editors and my standalone email client, that I've stopped indenting anything anywhere. The tab key is too goddamn unpredictable.
posted by pjaust at 9:58 AM on September 7 [1 favorite +] [!]
I agree with this completely. It wasn't standard for a lot of communication, and since its more difficult to use, it isn't getting used anywhere else either.
I doubt I'd ever NOT indent in a handwritten letter, however.
posted by gjc at 4:45 PM on September 7, 2011
If the tab key isn't for indenting, what's it for?
Moving from field to field.
posted by grouse at 6:02 PM on September 7, 2011
Moving from field to field.
posted by grouse at 6:02 PM on September 7, 2011
If the tab key isn't for indenting, what's it for?
On typewriters, making tables with correctly aligned columns. Hence the name.
posted by Hither at 10:00 PM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
On typewriters, making tables with correctly aligned columns. Hence the name.
posted by Hither at 10:00 PM on September 7, 2011 [1 favorite]
This thread is closed to new comments.
Of course when I am writing a brief or other document that is double spaced, indents are always necessary.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 9:36 AM on September 7, 2011