plain language defined: see palin, sarah
Clarity cannot be legislated, just like common sense cannot be taught.
-Alan Siegal, Siegal+Gale
On October 30th, the branding firm Siegal+Gale sponsored a symposium for the Center for Plain Language* (who knew there was such a place?!) in Washington, DC.
The event was titled Achieving Transparency Through Plain Language and was aimed at discussing “plain language initiatives in government, and clarity and transparency in financial communications.”** In their summary of the event, Siegal+Gale mentions the Plain Language Act of 2009, which, as of this writing, has been referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. When reading this, I couldn’t help but chuckle at the thought of a Representative having to introduce a bill requiring government agencies to communicate in a coherent fashion with its “audience”.
Presumably, that means us.
How far we have come from the days of our Founding Fathers and the four pages of parchment that are the original United States Constitution. That brief document is the foundation of our government and the very existence of our country. Yet, in terms of heft, it is dwarfed by the documents that regularly make their way through Congress these days (i.e. the recently-passed health care bill weighing in at nearly twenty pounds and two thousand pages).
Who are these people and what are they thinking?! No wonder many of us are rejecting whatever it is that comes out of the halls of Congress, and the White House. Fortunately, the antidote for our predicament appears to be Governor Sarah Palin.
Even when dealing with complex issues like healthcare, energy policy, or state budgets, Governor Palin’s language exhibits a clarity of thought that leaves no doubt about her message. As a result, those of us listening to, or reading her words spend less time parsing her words, and more time absorbing them. There is a reason she is often referred to as a charismatic “every-woman”: She uses language like most of us do when we want to be understood by the person on the other end of our message.
Perhaps that is the problem.
If our representatives in Washington, D.C. truly wished to communicate with the People, they would spend less time legislating the process, and more time, say, studying Governor Palin’s Facebook page. The thousands of responses she elicits - from supporters, detractors, and the media alike - are proof of the power of her messaging, and her ability to reach her audience.
Too often, though, our government leadership attempts to use complicated language as way to separate themselves from the very people they purport to represent. Their goal is not so much communication as obfuscation (see previous reference to the healthcare bill), and they have become quite adept in achieving the latter.
Thankfully, Governor Palin does not subscribe to this philosophy and she uses her considerable voice to add clarity to national debates. For those of us seeking more common sense from our government, and less legislation, her concise messaging has become a welcome reprieve from the linguistic clutter we have come to expect from our politicians.
- tdc
*The Center for Plain Language website is here
**The Siegal+Gale write-up about the symposium is here
Photo credit: alaskacommons.wordpress.com
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