Eggblogg

'Plain English' doesn't automatically mean 'better communication'

Last week I was reading about how The Local Government Association (LGA) has banned a list of words and phrases in the interests of 'effective communication'. Here's the list.

Now I'm all for cutting through the jargon and demystifying things. I have my pet hates when it comes to certain cliches. And I like to think that brevity is my middle name.

But is the word-cleansing promoted by the advocates of 'plain English' the right response?

It's very easy to poke fun at some of the phrases on this list and wonder at their usage - 'horizon scanning' or 'predictors of beaconicity', for example. But are council workers really supposed to stop using words like 'guidelines' or 'priority'?

I have two major issues with 'plain English' prescriptions of this kind.

Firstly, there are no 'good' and 'bad' words when it comes to communicating effectively, in the same way that there are no 'good' and 'bad' foods when it comes to maintaining a balanced diet.

It depends on the context, the participants in the conversation and the intentions of the speaker. Jargon evolves naturally and is not evil in itself, nor are cliches.

The harm occurs when people use language as a weapon of exclusion or obfuscation, without regard to whether or not the message will be understood.

Secondly, simplifying language doesn't necessarily improve its comprehensibility. The reason cliches spread like wildfire is because they are so easily and quickly understood.

And word-choice isn't just a matter of stating facts. Individual words or phrases are loaded with additional meaning, particularly when spoken, which is all part of the communication process.

It might have useful if the LGA could have produced a document spelling out the importance of appropriate word choice, style in context and some illustrations of the effects of inappropriate jargon and how it alienates people or disguises the truth.

But that would probably have required too much effort and relied too much on the judgement of the individual to interpret.

Far easier to produce a list of yet more black and white 'rules' so that everyone now knows how to communicate effectively, and their performance can be measured (rather than 'benchmarked') on an appraisal ticklist. Let's eliminate all jargon, cliches, pet phrases, quirks, creativity, spontaneity and personality, so everyone talks and writes the same. Sorted!

(Photo credit: swcp630)

Another news coup for Twitter as plane crashes into the Hudson River

It's funny how I sometimes see a newspaper headline over someone's shoulder on the train and think 'surely that's not news? I heard about that days ago on Twitter'.

Yesterday's US Airways crash proved the point that Twitter has added a new dimension to citizen journalism. Here's how it was covered.

Twitter was the tool through which the first news and amazing images surfaced, with the TV channels trailing in their wake - I love the caption 'Twitter User on MSNBC' over the 'Breaking News' pictures!

Sponsoring Sophia

The daughter of a neighbour and friend is leaving next month for India, where she will spend 2 months volunteering at Bija Vidyapeeth, a centre for sustainability based on ecological principles. She is travelling mostly overland, and after leaving India will spend time at the Lotus Children's Centre in Mongolia before making her way home, again overland. All this before starting university in October 2009.

When the norm these days seems to be for young people to be obsessed with their iPods, music, celebrities and shopping, it's fantastic to hear of those who clearly want to make a difference to the world and are prepared to do something about it.

Sophia has raised the money for this trip by working all hours at various part time jobs and by completing a sponsored cycle ride to Devon (in November!). I'm delighted to have helped out with a donation towards her trip, which will undoubtedly be both challenging and exciting, and a real education in all sorts of ways.

Sophia is planning to keep her family & friends updated on her journey on her blog and I'll also post news here from time to time.

Giving, saving, mending ... Christmas spirit makes a comeback

Is it just me, or is Christmas enjoying a comeback this year?

I'm thinking of what's often called the 'true spirit' of Christmas, rather than the consumer-fest that it's become in the 21st century. Usually by this time everyone's moaning about the piped music, the drudgery of Christmas shopping, the weather and the dreadful TV ads for perfumes that only get wheeled out in December.

But this year I get the feeling things are subtly different. OK, we've still got the sad TV adverts. But the shopping is less manic. We're sending fewer cards. Old-fashioned board games are being snapped up. The other day I did my first bit of darning in about 30 years. And it felt good!

This morning, the Archbishop of Canterbury on the Radio 4 Today programme talked about the moral urgency to live within our means and spend less, in defiance of what our government tells us. And the interview went on for 15 minutes or more: he was given time and space to speak, not cut short or 'soundbitten' down.

What's it all about? Maybe we should be thankful for the credit crunch, if it means adjusting our lifestyles so that they are more sustainable, and taking the time to reflect on the consequences of our actions.

On the blogs I've been noticing a definite trend towards charitable giving and even more significantly the reasoning behind charitable giving. I do feel that 'corporate social responsibility' has been hijacked to a certain extent as yet another (tax deductible) marketing tool. So these kinds of projects using social media to help charitable causes are a breath of fresh air. We've heard before that giving makes a person happy and now, according to Sonia Simone at Copyblogger, the key to success in business is in fact generosity to others, bucketloads of it.

Charities need our help now more than ever. We are all having to look at our outgoings with a sharp eye. There's less willingness to give stuff away;  many prefer to sell their second hand goods on eBay.

I'm hopeful though. Hopeful that the 'spirit of Christmas' revival is an indicator that we may be thinking harder about what constitutes a civil society, and how giving really is better than receiving. What do you think? Am I reading too much into this?

Should businesses care about grammar, spelling or punctuation?

So Tesco has finally bowed to the weight of complaints about its 'ten items or less' checkout signs and will be changing them. Some of us will be very happy about that. Others will be in the 'who cares?' camp.

At university one of my linguistics tutors instilled in me the idea that language change is inevitable. A truly academic approach to the subject does not involve value judgements about what constitutes correct or incorrect language use.

Not only that, but the grounds upon which we criticise English language (mis-)use are often bogus, thought up by prescriptive Victorians trying to make English fit the Latin mold, much like left-handers used to be forced to write with their right hands.

So when people moan about split infinitives, 'might' versus 'could', 'hopefully' versus 'I hope' and so forth, I try to stay out of it, not always successfully. Although the 'its/it's' problem has allegedly improved over the last 30 years, it still slaps me in the face on a daily basis.

What's acceptable in these days is vastly different to even, say, 20 years ago. Copywriter Leif Kendall recently commented on how the formal style of business letters has relaxed and how the written word resembles the spoken more often than not.

So what about spelling? There are some who want the English spelling system abandoned in favour of something where words are written as they sound. With my 'judgemental' hat on I would say that people are less able to spell these days, from the evidence all around us. Apparently, spelling is just more difficult than it used to be!

From a business point of view, there can be no excuse for consistently poor spelling: why was the copy not proof-read? OK, so typos do slip past more than one pair of eyes from time to time. But spelling or punctuation mistakes aren't always typos: they are often just mistakes. And when a business is this sloppy in its own presentation, what kind of service is it likely to deliver?

Personally, although Tesco changing its signs won't make me shop there, I do welcome it. Just a shame they couldn't go the whole hog and change to 'Ten items or fewer'.

Looks like 'fewer' is on its way to that great rubbish dump of unloved words in the sky. Alas!