Revising an Ambiguous Library Notice
A class is editing a translated school notice. The draft reads: “Students who have not returned their library books should bring them to the office. They will be fined. The librarian said the new system is stricter than the former one, and the committee will sanction late returns.” Several students disagree about the notice. One asks who “they” refers to. Another asks what “the former one” means, since the notice mentions only one system. A third looks up “sanction” and finds two definitions: “to approve or allow” and “to punish or penalize.” The teacher asks the class to revise the notice so that a reader who has not seen the draft can understand it on one reading. The revision must keep the same information but remove ambiguous references and choose the intended meaning of “sanction” from the context.
1. Resolve the reference of “they” and explain why the original is ambiguous.
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In “Students who have not returned their library books should bring them to the office. They will be fined,” the pronoun “they” is ambiguous because two plural nouns precede it: “students” and “books.” Grammatically, “books” is closer, but books cannot be fined, so the intended referent is “students.” The original is ambiguous because it relies on proximity and on a real-world assumption. Rewrite: “Students who have not returned their library books should bring the books to the office. Students who fail to do so will be fined.” Repeating the noun removes the ambiguity.
2. What does “the former one” refer to, and how should the sentence be rewritten?
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“The former one” is a comparative reference that requires two previously mentioned systems. The notice mentions only “the new system,” so “former” has no stated antecedent. The writer probably means the system used before the new one, but the reader must guess. Rewrite: “The librarian said the new system is stricter than the previous system” or “stricter than the old one.” If the old system was already described earlier in a longer document, the notice should still repeat “the previous system” because this excerpt is meant to stand alone. The revision should make the comparison explicit rather than rely on “former.”
3. Which meaning of “sanction” fits the context, and what clue decides it? Revise the whole notice in two or three sentences.
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“Sanction” here means “punish or penalize.” The context supplies two clues: the preceding sentence says students “will be fined,” and the librarian calls the new system “stricter.” A committee that “sanctions late returns” in a notice about fines is not approving them. Revision: “Students who have not returned their library books should bring the books to the office. Students who fail to do so will be fined. The librarian said the new system is stricter than the previous one, and the committee will penalize late returns.” This version resolves “they,” replaces “former,” and chooses the contextually correct sense of “sanction.”