Blogger’s Note: This is the third installment in the Writing to Be Read” series of guest posts by Eleanor Ely, editor of EPA’s The Volunteer Monitor, which facilitates the exchange of ideas, monitoring methods, and practical advice among volunteer environmental monitoring groups across the nation. Eleanor is a noted environmental communications speaker and trainer. Click here to contact her directly.

In the previous column I talked about “shoptalk” — specialized technical language, also known as jargon. “Bureaucratese” or “officialese” is another kind of language that’s sometimes called jargon. It seems unfortunate that the word “jargon” is used for both shoptalk and bureaucratese, since the two languages are almost the opposite of each other. Shoptalk is specific and succinct, whereas bureaucratic language is vague and wordy.

Orwell rewrites Ecclesiastes
It’s easy and fun to parody bureaucratic writing, which tends to convolution and pretentiousness. In his 1946 essay “Politics and the English Language,” George Orwell skewered the academic version by taking a verse from Ecclesiastes and rendering it into what he called “modern English of the worst sort.”

The original:

I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

Orwell’s version:

Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.

Environmental bureaucratese
Environmental agencies and organizations have their own brand of bureaucratic writing, with its own set of favorite words—develop, implement, identify, priority, collaboration, watershed, and so on. I’m not saying these words are “bad” per se, but they are mercilessly overworked. String a bunch of them together, sprinkle in some vague feel-good adjectives like “key” and “effective,” use the passive voice, and voila — environmental bureaucratese.

Inspired by Orwell, I took a different biblical passage (with a subject matter closer to an environmental project report) and imagined how an environmental agency bureaucrat might have written it:

Innovative and effective approaches for construction of a planetary body were developed and implemented. Insufficiency of light was identified as a priority concern. Post-project monitoring documented the attainment of appropriate light levels.*

The bureaucrat’s intent is to make projects sound more impressive. But the effect is the opposite — every project report sounds the same and it’s hard for a reader to figure out what happened, or why anyone should care.

______________
* “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep…. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good …” (Genesis 1:1-5; King James Version)

Blogger’s Note: This is the second installment in the Writing to Be Read” series of guest posts by Eleanor Ely, editor of EPA’s The Volunteer Monitor, which facilitates the exchange of ideas, monitoring methods, and practical advice among volunteer environmental monitoring groups across the nation. Eleanor is a noted environmental communications speaker and trainer. Click here to contact her directly.

Eutrophic. Phosphorus loading. Hydrologic cycle.

Technical jargon like this is “shoptalk,” and as long as it’s kept in the shop it’s a friendly animal that helps make communication more efficient and specific. But it isn’t good with strangers, and outside the shop it behaves badly, pushing away the people we are trying to reach.

You often hear the categorical advice to “avoid shoptalk,” but that’s an oversimplification, because some audiences will want to learn the lingo. For example, all the above-listed terms have been used in The Volunteer Monitor (but sparingly, and accompanied by explanations).

Writing for the local paper
However, when writing for a broad audience you do want to avoid shoptalk. This was the case for my friend Joan Martin at the Huron River Watershed Council when she wrote a short article that she hoped would be carried by local newspapers in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Joan’s goal was to raise public awareness and support for construction and landscaping techniques that protect streams.

Had Joan been addressing her shoptalk-fluent peers, she could have talked about how stream “impairments” like “excess sedimentation” and “habitat destruction” can be prevented by “site-design practices” that reduce “stormwater runoff.”

For her newspaper article, Joan needed to make this subject material not only understandable but also interesting to the average reader. In addition, she had to sell a solution to people who probably weren’t aware there was a problem.

Shoptalk-free version
Joan titled her article “When Rain Becomes a Problem” and built her case with words like streets and creek and fish. Following classic principles of good writing, she used strong active verbs and concrete details — for example, depicting a stormwater surge as “a powerful torrent that gouges the channel, tearing away the banks and clogging with dirt the gills of fish.” She then explained that damage like this can be prevented by landscaping designs that “provide a place for water.”

Joan also appealed directly to readers’ hearts, calling the improved designs “a great gift to our grandchildren” and a way to “recreate what we have lost.” She ended the piece with a simple and clear call to action: “The next time you hear that a new development might be built in your community, ask what it will do with the rain.”

The opposite of dumb
Knowing how hard it is to write like this, I get aggravated by dismissive phrases like “dumb it down” and “keep it simple, stupid,” which get it exactly backward. In reality, you have to “write smarter” when you can’t rely on the familiar shoptalk.

Joan says she went through about eight rewrites and tested her drafts on friends in other fields before submitting her article to three local newspapers. All three published it.

(By the way, the “Words That Don’t” link on this site has a great list of shoptalk-y words, and better alternatives.)

Blogger’s Note: Some of the most thoughtful comments and emails I have received since launching this blog have come from Ellie Ely, who has many years experience transforming scientific jargon into plain English as editor of EPA’s Volunteer Monitor newsletter. Ellie has graciously agreed to pen a series of guest columns for Water Words That Work, and the first one appears here today. Welcome Ellie!

– Eric

Learning From Journalists
Journalists know that goal No. 1 is to hang onto the reader. In particular, journalists agonize extensively over crafting their leads (the opening sentences or paragraphs). After all, if your reader stops reading, it won’t matter what you wrote.

Unfortunately, many publications (and presentations) from environmental organizations and agencies disregard this basic reality. One common mistake is the lengthy introduction that’s all about the organization itself – its history, goals, partners, accomplishments. The reader has no reason to stick around because the writer hasn’t answered the reader’s most important question: “What’s in it for me?”

Coming up with an intriguing and inviting lead for a complex technical article is especially challenging, which is why I appreciated the way Stephen Hochbrunn started off a recent article about New England’s first desalination facility (published in the Winter 2007 issue of New England Interstate Water Pollution Control Commission’s Interstate Water Report.) A less experienced writer would likely have begun the article with a big dose of background about the complicated history, technology, and politics of desalination.

Instead, Stephen’s opening paragraphs introduce Jeff Hanson, the man who originated the idea for the desalination plant, and quote Hanson’s description of what happened when he first presented his concept, back in 1993: “It got a great big laugh. Everybody laughed. They thought it was absurd.” This lead gives the desalination story a human face, and arouses the reader’s curiosity: What changed between 1993 and 2007?

William Zinsser’s classic book On Writing Well has the best advice I’ve seen for writing leads, plus wonderfully helpful and entertaining examples. (This book is available everywhere, and since it has sold over a million copies it’s easy to find used.) Zinsser says there are no firm rules for writing a lead “except the broad one of not letting the reader get away.”

Zinsser’s “no firm rules” observation applies to writing as a whole. But even if there are no, or few, firm rules, there are plenty of useful principles and tips. These columns will review some of these and show specifically how they apply to writing about the environment.

– Ellie Ely, Writing To Be Read

Hello, fellow Water Words readers!

A little background: Eric’s blog serendipitously went live at the same time our organization was considering developing a number of short movies related to water use and watershed management. Needless to say, we’ve found the information very useful. Currently, it is our intention to develop a series of 4-­7 minute shorts, each with a different focus, and take them on the road to local rural and urban communities. We intend to partner with a group that travels the province (New Brunswick) during the summer and fall and presents old Hollywood movies in the outdoors. We envisage that each screening will be preceded by one of the short water movies. An individual from our organization will also be present throughout the evening to offer more information and answer questions.

We’re not entirely new to filmmaking but we have never secured funding for this type of venture before. Given that there are likely to be other videographers with similar interests and/or greater experience reading this, I would welcome any comments or suggestions you may have related to funding.

Are there common pitfalls to avoid with this type of project, and what should we consider if requesting assistance from arts and culture bodies (a first for us) as opposed to environmental trusts (our traditional source of project funds)?

Many thanks to Eric for the opportunity to post this request publicly.

Dave Riddell is the Project Manager at the Environment and Sustainable Development Research Centre at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, Canada, which works to enhance the understanding and adoption of sustainable development principles through education, outreach, research, and community involvement. Dr. Riddell’s background lies in aquatic ecology, toxicology, and education, and he is currently involved in environmental education regarding impacts to and stewardship of urban and rural watersheds and aquatic habitats.

WEBSITE:
Work: http://www.unb.ca/enviro; Personal: http://daveriddell.byethost4.com