English like what she is supposed to be spoke

December 13, 2005 3:01 AM

The Plain English Campaign Awards have been published again. No Rumsfeldian "known unknowns" this time, just this from Rhodri Morgan:
“The only thing which isn’t up for grabs is no change and I think it’s fair to say it’s all to play for, except for no change.”
The complete shortlist (word doc) and BBC report. 2003 awards previously
posted by patricio (8 comments total)

These awards are funny, but in general I have bad feelings towards the Plain English Campaign. Their examples page certainly does show some instances of truly atrocious thesaurus-aided writing that has been simplified with good results. But I've seen their handiwork on things like product manuals and banking information leaflets -- where you would expect a certain amount of necessary jargon -- and they just seem to dumb it down to the point where it actually becomes harder to understand the message.

</rant>
posted by chrismear at 3:46 AM on December 13, 2005

The problem usually isn't the jargon, it's the convoluted sentence structures people use to sound important, avoid blame, and overspecify details. Instead of explaining things, they hide things -- with the passive voice, no one ever has to know who made an error. And for each thing they declare, they make ten denials ("but not including" and "but not limited to" and so on).

If businesses followed their recommendations, life would be easier for writers and readers. For example, everyone who writes instructions should pay attention to their "Don't be afraid to give instructions" section:

Sit!

Brush your teeth.

Please send it to me.

These are all commands - officially called imperatives. They are the fastest and most direct way of giving someone instructions.

However, if we asked a hardened bureaucrat to write these expressions, we would end up with something like this:

Dogs are advised that they should sit down.

Your teeth should be brushed.

I should be grateful if you would send it to me.

I don't have the time or patience to waste reading constructions of the "Dogs are advised that they should sit down" variety, but many people think they have to write instructions like that.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has a good guide to writing plain English and they require "all securities registrants, including investment companies, to use plain English principles in writing the cover page, summary, and risk factors sections of prospectuses."
posted by pracowity at 4:32 AM on December 13, 2005

That path description was incredible. What on earth were they thinking?

It is marketing speak in particular that makes my blood boil. My company put out a press release about a new product recently and after reading it I had absolutley no idea what the product did. I asked someone and they explained that it didn't actually exist, it was just product X bundled with product Y. Why can't people just tell you what things do? I don't want my key leveraging assets synergised or my periodical task fermentation utilities strengthened, I just want tools that help me do my work a bit better.
posted by chill at 6:28 AM on December 13, 2005

“The only thing which isn’t up for grabs is no change and I think it’s fair to say it’s all to play for, except for no change.”

"No change"? Is that anything like "no tea"?
posted by 40 Watt at 8:43 AM on December 13, 2005

a Word document?

So Clippy can automagically twist your words for you now?
posted by PurplePorpoise at 12:03 PM on December 13, 2005

pracowity
I agree with you about the instructions, but I think there's some merit in the third example you gave, the one concerning a request to send something. When you're making a request of someone, it helps to be polite. "Please send it to me" comes across, at least to me, as a little curt. You usually shouldn't make a request for something using a direct imperative. I don't see the problem with "I should be grateful if you would send it to me," since it seems like a much more polite and less comanding way to ask for something, which people usually appreciate.
posted by Sangermaine at 1:52 AM on December 14, 2005

I'm with odinsdream, they stepped off the moral high ground by failing to make their own awards list accessible to all. They only had to save it as HTML. Poor show.
posted by magpie68 at 6:37 AM on December 14, 2005

chill, do you work for BT?
it was just product X bundled with product Y. sounds like BT Privacy to me (X=CLI and Y=TPS)
posted by magpie68 at 6:39 AM on December 14, 2005