Indexing: an actual job
We need to celebrate this intensely human publishing role.
Do you know what hedge-laying is? Regular readers of my non-fiction previews for this magazine may remember me highlighting Of Thorn & Briar: A Year with the West Country Hedgelayer by Paul Lamb. I loved this 2025 debut because, prior to reading it, I had no idea that hedgelaying was an actual job. But now I appreciate why this ancient human skill – which depends on an intimate understanding of how to cut and cultivate hedges properly – is essential to the whole hedge ecosystem. You can cut a hedge by machine but it’s a bit like cutting hair by hacksaw. You end up with something that does nothing for nature, and looks pretty awful as well.
Indexing is another actual job that more people should appreciate. This skill also supports an ecosystem, that of well-crafted non-fiction books that last for years. Most of us can testify to the uses of a good index that directs us to the precise information we need. And yet when asked what they do for a job, indexers are typically met with blank looks when they answer: “I’m an indexer."
This customary incomprehension moved indexer Paula Clarke Bain, now chair of the Society of Indexers, to write the following limerick at her first indexing conference in 2004 when she was still a newbie:
"Well, the back of this book, as you see,
Has a great list of words, A to Zee.
Now you may find it odd
But some poor old s*d
Has to make that lot up and that’s me.”
Splendid rhyming, but – as I’ve had the privilege of discovering – members of the Society of Indexers aren’t poor old s*ds at all. Rather, they are highly trained creative professionals who typically spend two to three years cultivating their indexing skills before they can qualify as fully accredited members of the society.
Can’t a computer do the index? It can, but the result is the lexicographical equivalent of attaching a flail to a tractor and slashing at a hedge.
Can’t a computer do the index? Another question typically asked of indexers. The answer is: it can, but the result is the lexicographical equivalent of attaching a flail to a tractor and slashing at a hedge. It does little for the overall ecosystem. Whereas an index compiled by a professional indexer is laid with great care, taking into account what a fellow human might want to look up in it. As Dennis Duncan puts it in his fascinating book Index, A History of the, “the ideal index anticipates how a book will be read, how it will be used, and quietly, expertly, provides a map for these purposes”.
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And here’s what the indexers themselves say:
“Computers are really good at spotting words, and they’ll make something that looks like an index. But it will be a frustrating one to use. Computers don’t understand synonyms, near synonyms, antonyms, irony, subtlety… all the things that humans are really good at using." – Sue Penny
"A computer might tell you there is a reference to something or someone on page two. It will also tell you if there are further mentions on pages 10, 15 and 20. But it can’t judge whether such mentions contain useful information, or whether there is a straight duplication of points that have been made before." – Rob Gibson
"A computer can index a book in much the same way as a word processor can write one." – Christopher Phipps
In summary, just as a hedge benefits from individual human care and attention, an index benefits from the injection of such distinctly human qualities as empathy – the ability to put oneself in the place of the reader, and consider what they need from an index, what they might search for, and what their priorities might be. And judgement: the ability to make rational decisions about what to include in the index, what to leave out, which concepts need to be included as well as which words.
Today – Tuesday, 31st March – is National Indexing Day. As honorary president of the Society of Indexers I’ll be at the Publishers Association with dedicated members of the society’s executive board who are running a series of workshops for publishing professionals who would like to improve their understanding of the indexing process (and why wouldn’t any publishing professional?). This annual focus day was co-created by Ruth Ellis and Paula Clarke Bain in 2017 to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Society of Indexers in 1957. National Indexing Day is a chance to highlight the actual job of indexing and the reasons why it won’t be replaced by computers anytime soon. Not if you want a decent index to refer to.
So by all means go outdoors today, and if you are lucky enough to be in the vicinity of some well-managed hedgerows then take a moment to admire them. Then skip back indoors and join us on #IndexDay by picking up a book, and admiring the human-laid glories of its index. For, as author and editor Rossiter Johnson once put it: “Any simpleton can write a book but it requires high skill to make an index.”
Here is more information about the Society of Indexers and National Indexing Day.
