Plain English in the EFL classroom

[october]

Hi,
At the risk of sounding pompous myself, I think that there is no such thing as pompous English. Yes, there is a higher level of English that i should hope that is used after comprehending and acquiring a basic level of English (or plain English). After using the term "extra" I would naturally use the term "additional" and hope that the last will be used. I'm all for intellecually challanging the users of English and would love to hear my students (and myself) speak a higher language and not the alternatives suggested.
I think Norm's Italian friend is absolutely correct But i guess that Americans have chosen the fast food way.

[Andrew Patterson]

October, I dare you to tell me that the following is not pompose:

Whereas a hedge situate at Dean Road, Morton belonging to you overhangs the highway known as Dean Road, Morton aforesaid so as to endanger or obstruct the passage of pedestrians.

Now therefore the Council in pursuence of section 134 of the Highways Act 1959 hereby require you as the owner of the said hedge within fourteen days from the date of service of this notice so to lop or cut the said hedge as to remove the cause of obstruction.

If you fail to comply with this notice the council may carry out the work required by this notice and may recover the expenses reasonably incurred by them in so doing.

If you are agrieved by the requirement of this notice you may appeal to the magistrates court holden at Morton aforesaid within fourteen days from the date of service of this notice on you.

Or in plain English:

You are the owner of a hedge at Dean Road, Morton which overhangs the highway, endangering or obstructing pedestrians.

The Council, under section 134 of the Highways act 1959, require you within fourteen days of the service of this notice to cut the hedge, removing the cause of danger or obstruction.

If you disobey this notice the Council may choose to cut the hedge and recover from you its reasonable expenses in doing so.

If you are aggrieved by this notice you may appeal to the Magistrates court at Morton within fourteen days from the date of service of this notice on you.

Now I agree that you need to go out of your way to produce something that pompose, but that doesn't mean that we should encourage milder pomposity.

[october]

I love to be dared but ...o.k... This passage is somewhat pompose BUT its amusing as well and i personaly enjoy it (when a alternitive and more simple translation is added). If one has to go out of one's way to write this way then it is pompous, you are right, but wouldn't it be nice (perhaps...) if we didn't consider this kind of passage (not exactly this kind) to be pompous to begin with. Perhaps i think this way because i lack pompisity, and would like to improve my level of English as well as my students'.
So, i think that i will stick with my theory that we must encourage a higher level of English but not pompisity???

[Norm Ryder]

Hi everyone,
Maybe I was being a bit flippant with the 'time is money' argument. To throw in another idea I could go back to a seminar in an ESL course at the Canberra University a few years ago. A French woman in the course maintained that plain English was patronising and treated readers as simpletons. We distilled the following from the discussion: one view is that the writers' task is to say what they want in the way they want; and it is the readers' responsibility to unravel that meaning: the other view is that writers are responsible for making their thoughts and words as accessible as possible to the reader.

The real question is: who are your readers, and why are they reading? If you are writing for business or government, your readers are wanting to get to the point as quickly and accurately as possible. So learning to write clear English is important, especially in a country like Australia where 25% of the population were born elsewhere, and half of those have English as a second language - clear English means using words and structures that are familiar and easily grasped by your reader.

On the other hand, so many people can't write clear English that we would be failing as teachers if we did nothing to help our learners find their way through the mazes of pompous English as soon as they become capable of it - or as soon as they are confronted with it through necessity.

Of course, plain English need not be confined to business and government. One of its great advocates was George Orwell who saw its opposite as the weapon of dishonest governments. Following Orwell, one could say that plain English is not a system but (as Andrew said earlier) an attitude of mind. We can express that attitude in a set of preferences (for example, prefer to bring your main idea to the fore in your sentence, in your paragraph, in your letter or chapter; prefer words familiar to your readers; prefer to put your meaning more into verbs than into adjectives, adverbs and nouns etc .... and prefer to override any of these preferences if you have a good reason for doing so!)

As I said earlier, it is an approach very much in keeping with the natural character or 'personality' of the English language itself.

"Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue; but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town crier spoke my lines ... "

God be wi' ye.
Norm

[My Dingaling]

October, I dare you to tell me that the following is not pompose:

Whereas a hedge situate at Dean Road, Morton belonging to you overhangs the highway known as Dean Road, Morton aforesaid so as to endanger or obstruct the passage of pedestrians.

Now therefore the Council in pursuence of section 134 of the Highways Act 1959 hereby require you as the owner of the said hedge within fourteen days from the date of service of this notice so to lop or cut the said hedge as to remove the cause of obstruction.

If you fail to comply with this notice the council may carry out the work required by this notice and may recover the expenses reasonably incurred by them in so doing.

If you are agrieved by the requirement of this notice you may appeal to the magistrates court holden at Morton aforesaid within fourteen days from the date of service of this notice on you.

Dear Andrew Patterson

I don't find it pompous, but legalistic. You are accusing the legal writers of being pompous, but there are reasons for their different style of writing and it isn't to sound pompous. These reasons include but are not limited too; adherence to a logical writing structure, avoidance of rhetorical techniques, keep consistancy in structure and meaning with other legal documents and to assist readers in identifying the text type- a legal document. Moreover, I do find that the conditional action statement 'If you fail to comply..' to be less high and mighty sounding than saying 'If you disobey....' , which sounds dictatorial.

Regards,

My Dingaling

[Stephen Jones]

The purpose of the "Plain English" campaign is to ensure that official documents are written in a language the person on the Clapham omnibus would be completely at home with (if of course anybody actually did catch the Clapham Omnibus anymore, and allowing for the fact that if they did they wouldn't understand the phrase "the person on the Clapham omnibus" anyway.)

The list of alternatives are there for a good reason; when an official document "advises" you of something, you had better not ignore its advice as you might feel you had the right to do, since "advise" is "officialiese" for "we're telling you buddy and you'd bettr listen". Equally, many less people know the meaning of "fail to comply" than know the meaning of "disobey".

Now, we still need to teach students to understand these kind of convoluted phrases, but they should be told to avoid producing them at all costs.

Another factor to be born in mind with speakers of Romance languages is that they often do no understand that the Romance word, which is perfectily commonplace in their language, is often stillted or formal in English.

So Andrew, keep up the good work!

[My Dingaling]

Dear Stephen Jones

Just as many people know 'fail to comply' as ' disobey', maybe more. The plain English campaign is not only pompous itself, but truly degenerate because of its lower standards of English usage. There is nothing convoluted about legal English any more than there is about Business English or Scientific English. The discipline ( are you familiar with this word) of the legal practises requires its own special brand of English and someone on the omnibus should seek the professional advice of a lawyer if their English comprehension is too plain and cannot understanding the legal document issued. In fact, for Andrew Patterson to use legal English as an example of where to apply plain English was pathetically miscalculated and even suggests a corrupt nature about him. Your campaign to inject an inappropriate and less valuable form of English into the professions and practises may be some con game or cult you are taking in unsuspecting people with, but it really is pompous and useless itself and they will sooner come to despise the contained expression it offers than have respect for it.


Warmest Regards,

My Dingaling

[Andrew Patterson]

Dear Stephen Jones

Just as many people know 'fail to comply' as ' disobey', maybe more. The plain English campaign is not only pompous itself, but truly degenerate because of its lower standards of English usage. There is nothing convoluted about legal English any more than there is about Business English or Scientific English. The discipline ( are you familiar with this word) of the legal practises requires its own special brand of English and someone on the omnibus should seek the professional advice of a lawyer if their English comprehension is too plain and cannot understanding the legal document issued. In fact, for Andrew Patterson to use legal English as an example of where to apply plain English was pathetically miscalculated and even suggests a corrupt nature about him. Your campaign to inject an inappropriate and less valuable form of English into the professions and practises may be some con game or cult you are taking in unsuspecting people with, but it really is pompous and useless itself and they will sooner come to despise the contained expression it offers than have respect for it.


Warmest Regards,

My Dingaling

Are you playing devil's advocate or do you really believe all that.

As Norm Ryder already pointed out, insuranse policies are usually written in plain English. (Note that I used a passive sentense there because there was a good reason for doing so.)

In fact, the legal profession is where plain English has proved most useful. You are failing to distinguish between legal technical vocabuary and language that mearly smells of the law.

Technical vocabulary cannot and should not be replaced. It includes words and phrases such as estopple and lien, and even some Latin phrases such as obiter dictum although the last is often shortened to obiter.

Language which "smells" of the law includes words and phrases such as, hereintofore, the aforesaid notwithstanding, hereannent. They can safely be replaced by plainer alternatives and sometimes simply dropped.

Legal writers often also try to use 18th centuary grammar. What is the point of that?

Plain English is not the same as Ogden's Basic English. It must be in keeping with the rules of the English language. You just ask yourself, did I put that as clearly as I could have?

Andrew Patterson.

[My Dingaling]

Dear Andrew Patterson,

Insurance is not bought from a lawyer, thus needn't be written in legal form. It is a contract, falls under contract law and contracts can be written and agreed upon without the services of a lawyer. Why do you persist in your attempts to identify plain English with the legal profession, apart from that it may have a rhetorical affect on the unsuspecting reader? Perhaps some shifty insurance scams are wording their policies in plain English, and guess who they are marketing their insurance to; Joe DWI, Harry Hit and Run, Sally Sleepy at the Wheel and Sammy the Compulsive Speeder. It has nothing to do with legality, but marketing, and carefully worded so the aforesaid clients, should they not correct their driving faults and launch a claim with the insurance company, will likely face problems in those aforesaid insurance policies due legal technicalities that is the result of the wonderfully worded plain English contract, or the not so wonderfully worded fraudulent legal writing. If some party is using Legal English, and is merely using it as you are for rhetorical affect, this is not a basis to credit the use of plain English: it should be recognized for what it is, an abuse, debasement and fraudulalization of Legal English. The opposite case is true of plain English being used for legal documents.

In respect of to the clarity of your writing, no it is not clearly stated. It reflects a disposition of a con man or cultist. You have not given satisfactory evidence of any kind that plain English does anyone any good, instead you continue to persist to delude yourself and others with your terrible errors of logic that plain English has a status, scope and benefit that it does not ,nor will ever, have. Truly your time could be better spent than this futile pursuit of persuading the English speaking world to adopt an inferior and severely restricted form of expression.
It is a violation of human rights and a freedom of speech, the foundations of modern developed societies. The plain English campaign will not get away with its attempt to execute such a hideous crime on the speakers of the English language. It is not the nature of the English language or its speakers to fundamentalize dictionaries for any man, reason or campaign.

Cast in evil, the dark age of communication repression and suffocation that the plain English cult seeks to bestow on the world will not occur, neither will it con, meddle and manipulate our laws and thinking. No one has need for such pompousness, radicalism or such uselessness, especially the legal profession and the ESL classroom.

Warmest Regards,

My Dingaling

[Andrew Patterson]

My Dingaling,

If you feel that strongly, I suggest that you complain to the Plain English Campaign. I have written their contact details below:

Plain English Campaign
PO Box 3
New Mills
High Peak
SK22 4QP

Phone 01663 744409
Fax 01663 747038
[email protected]

Make sure you write your complaint clearly and concisely in words that they will understand.

Andrew Patterson.

[Norm Ryder]

At the risk of infringing the etiquette of this post, can I ask which of the above posts has been the most difficult to read?

As the poet said three hundred years ago:
"Words are like leaves; and where they most abound
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found".

Norm.

[Duncan Powrie]

At the risk of infringing the etiquette of this post, can I ask which of the above posts has been the most difficult to read?

What etiquette?!

[Norm Ryder]

Indeed, Duncan, indeed

[Andrew Patterson]

To throw in another idea I could go back to a seminar in an ESL course at the Canberra University a few years ago.

The seminar sounds interesting; I'd like to know more. Do you have any materials from it?

To go back to your question on who is the clearest writer, ironically October and My Dingaling seem to write as clearly as everyone else.

They say they don't write in plain English, but they do.

[Norm Ryder]

Pardon gentles all. Lacking for the nonce
the merest pinch of wit, I trusted in
a knowing nod and did you an injustice;
for the which I crave indulgence and forgiveness.

Sorry, Andrew. The discussion on the relative responsibilities of writers and readers was, to use your abbreviation, something of an obiter. The French woman's advocacy made it memorable, and led to some naturally inconclusive reflections on whether the differences were culturally based.

I doubt I could find my notes on it now, as I've been assiduously culling my papers to reduce the work of my executor!

Yours in persiflage,

Norm.