Indexing Society of Canada 
The 2017 conference was a success. Reports are to come.
In the meantime, here is a photo of some happy ISC/SCI Conference Attendees
Left to Right: Anna Oliver, Noeline Bridge, Christine Jacobs, Alex Peace, Judy Dunlop, Heather Ebbs, Margaret de Boer (Photo: Elizabeth Huyer)
Many of our members volunteer in various capacities, however one person in particular stood out this past year. At our awards banquet in Montreal on June 2, JoAnne Burek was honoured as our 2017 Tamarack award recipient .
JoAnne is deserving of this award for many reasons: JoAnne has a “yes, I’ll do that” work ethic and has shown dedication in improving the experience of members in our Society. In her creative and skilful style, she has crafted compelling and well-researched promotion pieces for our Society. She has taken the time to be present at events in order to promote the benefits of ISC/SCI. Finally, JoAnne continues with the detailed assignment of our website renewal project.
We are honoured to have JoAnne as a member of our Society. Congratulations to her!
Three indexing courses are being taught by ISC/SCI members:
These courses represent excellent opportunities to learn from experienced members of the Society. For more information on these and other indexing courses, seminars, and workshops, please go to the Education and Training section of the Resources page.
We came to Montreal to learn from the experts, meet and chat with colleagues, and celebrate our 40th year—our Ruby Anniversary!
Nous sommes venir à Montréal pour apprendre des experts dans votre domaine, rencontrer vos collègues et célébrer le 40e anniversaire de la société.
At the ISC/SCI annual general meeting and conference in June 2009, Katherine Barber, founding editor-in-chief of the Canadian Oxford Dictionary department of Oxford University Press, gave a fascinating talk on the history of the word “magpie” and what it has to do with indexing.
The English language is flavoured by the many cultures that have held sway in that country over the course of time: Celts, Saxons, Romans, Vikings, French, and that motley crew of people known as “English”.
The French tended to squish Latin words that came into the language by removing consonants. So the Latin “pica” (magpie) became “pia” in French and then “pie” in English. We added “mag” so that now we have “magpie” to refer to the bird that collects bits and pieces of this and that to take to its nest, much as indexers take pieces of the book and put them in their index nest. So indexers are like human magpies.
The pie we eat is related, because pies began as a collection of many foods baked together in a crust. Reference books of feast days, themselves not unlike indexes, were also called “pies”, possibly because the black ink on white pages was reminiscent of the bird’s colouring.
One last surprising connection between indexes and magpies. A type of geographical index is a gazetteer. The word is derived from “gazette”, a 17th-century tabloid-style newspaper sold in Venice for a gazeta (penny), a word derived from gazza. You guessed it: gazza is Italian for magpie.
You will be able to buy them at local meetings and the national AGM and conference, and you can also order them by mail. For the last, shipping costs will comprise the price of a small bubble-wrap envelope and whatever Canada Post charges to mail to your area of the world; for specifics, and to order, contact the presidents.