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Smart sentences: workplace writing solutions
a conference paper presented by HOWARD WARNER of Plain English People
Howard Warner explains why he believes sentences are the key to unlocking the plain English conundrum — more now than ever. But first he gives a perspective on plain English ‘practice’ and ‘practitioners’, how they fit into the whole ‘community’ of plain English professionals. And at the end, he considers whether the community is ready for 'benchmarking'.
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Writing English as a second language
by WILLIAM ZINSSER, The American Scholar
What is good English...? It’s not as musical as Spanish, or Italian, or French, or as ornamental as Arabic, or as vibrant as some of your native languages. But I’m hopelessly in love with English because it’s plain and it’s strong. It has a huge vocabulary of words that have precise shades of meaning; there’s no subject, however technical or complex, that can’t be made clear to any reader in good English — if it’s used right. Unfortunately, there are many ways of using it wrong.
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Plain English: the story so far
by HOWARD WARNER, of Plain English People
In the early 1980s, a major shift took place. In Britain and North America, a new breed of entrepreneurial pragmatists started to think about who actually read the stuff. They realised that the long-suffering public had a right to understand processes that affected their daily lives.
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