Indexes:good vs bad
- Geraldine Begley
- Jan 19
- 4 min read
Do you know how to distinguish a good, helpful index from a bad, unhelpful index?
Read on to find out a few features of unhelpful indexes and helpful indexes.
In my opinion, the only thing worse than a bad index in a non-fiction book is having no index at all. At least an attempt was made to produce an index to help readers find text in the book. However, a bad index will not help a readers to find information quickly and easily. A bad index might frustrate the reader because it could take them more time to find the information they are looking for.
Ruth Martin, in the Society of Indexers blog Qualities of a Bad Index outlines things that shouldn’t appear in an index. These include excessive length, excessive subheadings and sub-subheadings, long and discursive headings, double-posted entries where cross-references would be better (and vice versa), excessive synonyms, passing mentions and entries starting with insignificant words.
Here, I will focus on a few other features of unhelpful indexes and then I will look at characteristics of a good, helpful index.
Bad indexes can have some of the following issues:
Confusing presentation
Long strings of undifferentiated page numbers
Spelling mistakes
1. Confusing presentation
Here is an example of an index which lost the indents for the subheadings. This index should have subheadings which are clearly distinguishable from the main headings. For instance, ‘Bakewell Tart’ and ‘Banoffee Pie’ should be indented under ‘almonds, flaked’ to make the recipes easier to find.
A clearly laid out, well-presented index makes it easier for readers to scan the entries to find the terms that they are looking for and to see what a book is about.
2. Long strings of undifferentiated page numbers
Pat Booth, in Indexing: The Manual of Good Practice, discusses “long strings of locators”. Indexers differ in their views on a reasonable length of locator strings. A string of six to seven undifferentiated locators is acceptable to readers, anything more than ten or so is off-putting to users. They don’t know what page is relevant to their search or which pages are the most important. Sometimes, in biographies for instance, it is difficult to avoid long strings.
Here is an example of an index entry with a long string of undifferentiated page locators.
Bloggs, Joe 2, 4, 19, 23, 27, 30-1, 33, 40, 50, 55, 89, 91, 97, 100, 102-103, 105
The reader will have to search a lot of pages to find the information they are looking for.
The above index entry could be improved by reducing the long string of page numbers and adding the following subheadings:
Bloggs, Joe 27, 97, 102-103
birth and early life of 2
career of 27
children of 33
death of 19, 100, 105
diaries of 40, 89, 91
education of 4
marriage of 23
memories of 30-1
publications of 40, 50, 55
2. Spelling mistakes
Typos can slip through editing, proofreading and indexing processes. I try to avoid spelling mistakes in the index by doing the following:
(i) Copying and pasting entries from the PDF into the indexing software to avoid introducing spelling errors;
(ii) Checking words on online dictionaries to see if the word is spelled correctly in the text;
(iii) Running the spell checker in the indexing software or in a final Word document to flag up some typos that crept in;
(iv) Printing out the index and checking them entry by entry, sometimes inconsistencies in spellings of names are easier to spot on print-outs;
(v) Checking with the editor which spelling (US or British English) is preferred, if the editor did not specify in the brief which spelling to use. Sometimes in a multi-author book, a mix of synonyms or US/British English spellings are used.
Now what is a helpful index?
Nancy Mulvany, in Indexing Books, discusses the ideal index and the criteria formulated by the American Society of Indexers (ASI) for judging an annual book indexing competition. The criteria focuses on the content of the index and structure and accuracy of the index entries.
Pat F. Booth in Indexing: The Manual of Good Practice discusses characteristics of a good index and the intellectual and presentational features of indexes.
Lyndsay Marshall, in a Society of Indexers blog post, discusses qualities of a good index, International Standards, Best Practice Guidelines, Competition Judging Criteria and Resources.
The American Society for Indexing states on its home page that “A good index is a minor work of art but it is also the product of clear thought and meticulous care.”
A good index depends on the ability of an indexer to analyse the text to identify which concepts/themes/names to include in the index. Indexers try to anticipate the reader’s needs and include various entry points for the users to find information in the index.
An introductory note, placed at the beginning of an index, is helpful to readers to explain features of the index, such as:
(i) if the index uses letter-by-letter or word-by-word alphabetization;
(ii) how tables, figures, boxes or notes are indicated (for example figures can be indicated using an italic f after the page number or the page number could be in italics);
(iii) if there are multiple indexes, such as a subject index and a names index.
(iv) any other details if the text or index is non-standard.
Presentation of indexes is important. A well-presented index which has subheadings which are clearly distinguishable from the main headings (either indented or run-on) are easier to read and makes it easier for users to find information/scan the text. Page numbers in bold font are useful to indicate to the reader where they would find the most detailed discussion about a topic.
Not all indexes need or have cross-references but when included they are helpful to readers to link related terms (see also) and from synonyms to a preferred term (see).
This is a quick overview of a few features of good indexing. For further information I suggest the following resources:
Websites:
Society of Indexers https://www.indexers.org.uk/
American Society for Indexing https://asindexing.org/
Books:
Booth, Pat F. Indexing: The Manual of Good Practice
Mulvany, Nancy C. Indexing Books
Images from https://www.istockphoto.com/
For anyone writing a book which needs a proofread or an index, hire a professional from AFEPI (Association of Freelance Editors, Proofreaders & Indexers of Ireland) , the Society of Indexers, or CIEP (Charter Institute of Editing and Proofreading) to lighten your load!
