Plain English
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Plain English (sometimes known as plain language) is a communication style that focuses on putting across the content in short and clear sentences and words. It recommends using fewer words and avoiding jargon, technical terms, and long and ambiguous sentences.
Supporters of plain English say it lets the audience concentrate on the message instead of complicated language, and that it increases understanding and makes the message more accessible to a wider audience.
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[edit] Recommendations
Some practices that are claimed to make written communication clearer are:
- Use Subject-Verb-Object construction by default.
- For example, instead of this: To update (verb) the address lists (object) may be your primary concern (subject), you should use this: Your primary concern (subject) may be to update (verb) the address lists (object).
- Avoid vocabulary that a good portion of your audience will stumble over.
- Use verbs instead of "nounisms."
- A nounism is a verb rendered in its nominal form. For example, use the verb "introduce" instead of "introduction." Compare: "Jim introduced the speaker" to "Jim made the introduction of the speaker."
- Use active voice instead of passive.
- For example, use "The police stopped the suspect" instead of "The suspect was stopped by the police." Sometimes the passive hides who the agent is, which is considered bad unless you consciously choose to hide the agent. For example, "Thirty houses were visited in three weeks." Unless you want to keep it a secret who visited the houses, or hide the fact that you do not know who it was, the active is better: "The family visited thirty houses in three weeks."
- Avoid overly-long sentences.
- By the time you get to the end of some sentences, you have forgotten what came earlier in the sentence. This example sentence combines two poor choices - pompous vocabulary and excessive length: "If there exist any points on which you require explanation or further explication, we shall be glad to furnish such additional details as may be required via telephone." The following is better: "If you have any questions, please call us."
[edit] History
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Before the 20th century, English-language writers commonly used long sentences and a very complicated style. A sentence could take up half a page with much irrelevant information. In some other European languages, such as German, the use of long and irrelevant sentences was even more extensive; for example, the philosopher G. W. F. Hegel was known for writing sentences that easily occupied three pages.
It is not clear where this tradition came from, but it may have originated with classical Latin, in which such prose was perfectly acceptable. Grammar suffered for similar reasons in the 19th century. Misguided educators observed (correctly) that Latin, regarded as somehow superior to English, uses only one word for the infinitive (rendering it impossible to split). So these educators proclaimed that proper English must follow suit, even though English requires two words for the infinitive (for example, "to go"). Thus was born the mythical English rule against splitting the infinitive form of a verb ("to go") with one or more words ("to boldly go").
Other mythical rules include "Don't end a sentence with a preposition," "Don't use contractions in formal writing," and "Don't use the pronoun 'you' in formal writing." As long as a writer's meaning is clear and the tone is appropriate for the audience, there is no reason whatsoever to follow these "rules."
[edit] Important Influences
In the late 19th century, several gifted writers (e.g., Abraham Lincoln and Mark Twain) demonstrated that plain English could be elegant when executed properly (e.g., the Gettysburg Address); but they were ahead of their time.
During the 1920s, such style guides as William Strunk Jr.'s The Elements of Style actively promoted the idea of writing in plain English. However, it would take over fifty years for Strunk's ideas to become widely accepted.
George Orwell wrote an important essay on the subject in 1946, entitled "Politics and the English Language".
The plain English revolution finally penetrated the fields of law and government during the 1970s, as shown by the passage of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1976, and the popularity of books like Plain English for Lawyers (1979).
[edit] Criticisms
Plain English is sometimes misunderstood as a "dumbed down" version of writing. Engineering is a good metaphor to explain why this is not so. A good engineering design has all the elements needed to fulfill the function, but not more. It accomplishes its task with beautiful efficiency, otherwise known as style or grace. The corresponding concept in software coding is known as "elegance."
[edit] Aesthetics
A sentence written using plain English can be beautiful, but it must not be full of extra, irrelevant things. It should not be confusing or pompous. Everything in the sentence should work toward communicating to the reader what the writer intended. Everything else should be deleted or streamlined. Plain English is efficient but not brutally so. In fact, it is an act of kindness to the reader, sparing them from confusion and from having to read unnecessary words. The resulting refinement makes the words on the page transparent, so the reader can see straight through them to the meaning the writer intended.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Strunk, William Strunk Jr. & White, E.B. (1918) The Elements of Style, ISBN 0-205-30902-X (paperback 4th ed., 2000)
- Wydick, Richard C. (1979) Plain English for Lawyers Carolina Academic Press, ISBN 1-59460-151-8 (paperback 5th ed., 2005)
- Rook, Fern Slaying the English Jargon (1992) Society for Technical Communication, ISBN 0-914548-71-9
- Cutts, Martin (1996) The Plain English Guide Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-860049-6
- Williams, Joseph M. Style, Toward Clarity and Grace (1995) University Of Chicago Press, ISBN 0-226-89915-2
[edit] External links
- PlainLanguage.Com
- Plain English Campaign
- Plainlanguage.gov
- Plain English Foundation
- Plain language and legislation booklet: Office of the Scottish Parliamentary Counsel
- Politics and the English Language
- Plain language in Sweden, the results after 30 years
- The Word Centre
- Nigel Grant Training
- The WriteMark, New Zealand's plain English standard
- Write Group, New Zealand's plain English specialists
- Word Centre, The Plain English People U.K.
- United States Plain Language Network
- The Plain Language Association, International
- Clear as Mud, an Article from the BBC
- The cost of poor writing in business
- EServer TC Library: Minimalism (a collection of resources about plain language)
- The Plain English Movement
