Plain language

Plain and conscious language

My plain language work is inherent in my (nonfiction) editing and much of my content strategy work. Besides the projects I cover in those sections, I’ve also created several plain language rewrites of government websites.

My conscious language work flows through all my projects. One notable example is that at a previous job in the intelligence field, I wrote up a conscious language section in the style guide explaining our decisions and reasons for choices about language referring to and affecting a wide range of populations. If you work with me, you can be assured I’ll have conscious and inclusive language in mind at all times, and I’m always learning more.

Projects

New York City Family Homelessness & Eviction Prevention Supplement

Filing a Complaint with the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force (City and County of San Francisco)

My process

For both sites, I read over the main page—several times, until I could decipher the government jargon—and then clicked around to the surrounding and linked pages to get a sense of the page’s environment and supplemental information. I looked for information that was key but hidden, to integrate it into the main page. I then went step-by-step over the page, translating the text in its current order into plain, person-first language. This included:

Using “we” and “you” instead of formal, unfriendly terms
Rewriting headers as questions or instructions based on what users might be looking for
Adding page navigations
Making link labels accessible
Explaining key terms directly in text instead of making the user hunt through other pages
Using simpler alternatives for complex words, using fewer words where possible, and avoiding the dreaded “hidden verb“
Reading over each sentence to make sure I can understand it at first read—and with only partial attention
Keeping sentences and paragraphs short
Using bulleted lists instead of blocks of text

Once I had text I was reasonably happy with, I looked at the structure of each page as a whole.

For the New York City page, I actually kept the high-level structure as is, though I changed all the headers. I changed the order of information, removing filler sentences such as “Eligibiility includes a range of requirements” and moving links to frequently asked questions lower down—since these often aren’t a great source of information. I also added information from surrounding pages, such as about Homebase, which was referenced frequently as a valuable resource but never explained. I tightened up the contact information in each section so it took up less space and was clearly subordinate to the main information on the page.

(If you’re from the New York City government and you like this page, please contact me! I’d love to work with you!)

The San Francisco page was more complicated—I had to search through multiple pages on the site to get enough background understanding to be able to rewrite the “Filing a Complaint” page. First I needed a simple definition of the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force. (In a final version of the page I’d likely shorten or move that information, but for the purposes of the exercise and for my own understanding, I wanted to start by plain-language-ifying the basics.) Next, I actually lengthened the page by adding more information to each section—pulling from the links, as well as pages that were mentioned but not linked. I moved the content at the top, about the resolution of complaints at meetings, much lower down, surmising that people visiting the page likely wouldn’t need that information until later in the complaint process.