One of the areas of language that I’m particularly interested in is using “Plain Language” to communicate complex and technical ideas and concepts.

The term Plain Language has very general definitions but is generally used when specialists need to communicate their information to a non-specialist audience.  This is not an easy task and often takes training and a lot of deep thinking to be able to do this effectively.

Back in the 1990s, the Canadian government published several guides which taught people how to do this and even had a guide for teachers so that they could lead a 2-day course or workshop.  They were originally for sale and were quite popular in the day but soon went out of print and became hard to find.

Well, no more because Iva Cheung has put a lot of time and energy into reproducing them and making them available as pdfs on her site.  You can find them about half way down the blog post.

Hope you enjoy her article and these original guides.  They are highly recommended by those of us who advocate for and love Plain Language and Iva’s work in restoring them and making them available to anyone who wants them is a true act of random kindness and generosity.  Thank you, Iva!

Cheers,

Rich