Writing, Clear and Simple

Almost a year ago, I posted “Me, myself, and aye-carumba,” in which I lamented the fact that so many people use the reflexive personal pronoun myself when they can’t decide whether they should use me or I. Thus, you hear them saying things like “Helouise went shopping with Marva and myself.”

The trick here is to get rid of the second person and ask “If it were just me and Helouise, how would I say it?” Of course, you’d say “Helouise went shopping with me.” Adding Marva doesn’t change which pronoun you use.

Anders recently added a comment to that post, pointing out another situation that can appear a bit thorny, and in which some people, not knowing what to do, fall back on myself. Anders’ example was “He’s in the same business as ___.” So, what is it: me, myself, or I?

The key here is to note that the sentence leaves out the verb am: “He’s in the same business as I am.” When it comes to sentences that make comparisons like this, look for the missing words; they’ll help you decide which pronoun to use. (And you should consider putting the omitted words back in, just to keep things clear.)

Here’s another: “Maya likes klezmer music more than ___.” Which is it?

The answer is, it depends. It depends on what exactly the sentence means. Does Maya like klezmer music more than I like klezmer music, or or does she like it more than she likes me? In cases like this, it might be better to revise the sentence—add the omitted words, or re-organize it—to eliminate the ambiguity.

Yet another reason to use plain language: People are more likely to find you and your information on the web. Think about the last time you were looking for information on the internet: What did you turn to first? I’m willing to bet you went to Google, Yahoo, or some other search engine and typed in a few key words. You’re not alone. Web usability guru Jakob Nielsen says “Search is how people discover new websites and find individual pages within websites and intranets.” Furthermore, he says that people are more likely to use old, familiar words when searching for information.

Old words rule because people know them intimately. Familiar words spring to mind unbidden. Thus, users are likely to employ old words when they boil down their problem to a search query, which is typically only 2-3 words long.

Nielsen offers some specific guidelines for writing for searchability (the fancy term is “search engine optimization,” or SEO), including this:

Call a spade a spade, not a digging implement. Certainly not an excavation solution. Many marketers like to embellish products to make them seem grander than traditional fare. But customers define their needs in known terms, so be sure to use them, even if you don’t think they’re exciting. The very fact that a word is unexciting indicates that it’s frequently used. People search for terms like “cheap airline tickets,” not “value-priced travel experience.” Often, a boring keyword is a known keyword.

He doesn’t use the term, but it sounds to me like plain language; that is, “communication that your audience can understand the first time they read or hear it.” If you don’t know the key terms your audience is most comfortable using, if you don’t write your web pages in that language, they’re a lot less likely to find you through search engines. And if they can’t find you, as far as they’re concerned, you don’t exist.

The semicolon—sometimes called the love child of the comma and the period—must be an important punctuation mark. After all, the designer of the typewriter keyboard put it on the home row, right under your right pinkie.*

But it isn’t like the period, you know. Everybody knows what to do with a period. You put it at the end of a sentence. Like that. Or you use it with abbreviations, like Dr. or Mr.

What’s the semicolon for? It’s not all that mysterious, really; you use it to join two sentences into a compound sentence. Like that. The beauty of the semicolon is it eliminates the need for a conjunction. In the example I just showed you, I could have joined those two sentences with because: “It’s not all that mysterious, really, because you use it to join two sentences into a compound sentence.”

The semicolon is entirely optional. You can live your whole life without ever using it (and many writers have). There’s no rule that says you have to join two independent sentences together, and even if you decide you want to, there’s no rule that says you have to do it with a semicolon rather than a conjunction.

But I encourage you to experiment with it. Noah Lukeman, in A Dash of Style, says that “The semicolon elevates punctuation from the utilitarian (from punctuation that works) to the luxurious (to punctuation that transcends).” Lynne Truss, author of Eats, Shoots & Leaves, agrees:

The semicolon has been rightly called ” a compliment from the writer to the reader.” And a mighty compliment it is, too. The sub-text of a semicolon is, “Now this is a hint. The elements of this sentence, although grammatically distinct, are actually elements of a single notion. I can make it plainer for you — but hey! You’re a reader! I don’t need to draw you a map!”

Given that using a semicolon implies a level of trust in the reader’s ability to “get it,” you may want to approach it with some trepidation if you’re writing for an ESL audience. Be sure that the connection between the sentence elements is quite clear.

Some recommendations, then:

• Use a semicolon to join two grammatically separate, but thematically linked sentences into a unified whole. “Always try to do things in chronological order; it’s less confusing that way.”
• Use a semicolon before adding a clause introduced by a conjunctive adverb like however, nevertheless, or for example. “Tweedledee was angry at his brother for spoiling his rattle; moreover, he said Tweedledum had poor taste in haberdashery.”
  
• Some style guides call for semicolons in things like bibliographic citations and indexes (for example, The Chicago Manual of Style indicates that you may need to use them when listing several authors), so if you’re bound by a particular style, be aware of its requirements.
  

*Actually, the story of the design of the QWERTY keyboard layout is a complicated one; suffice it to say here that much of what people “know” about it is folklore and not hard fact.

PowerPoint is everywhere—in business, in government, in non-profit agencies, and in the military. Whether it has been a force for good or evil, I won’t speculate.

I will say, though, that sometimes I think we should require that PowerPoint users be trained and licensed the same way that automobile drivers and gun owners are licensed.  The burden of bad slide decks is nearly impossible to calculate, but everyone who has had to endure “death by PowerPoint” can testify to it.

The critics of PowerPoint are legion: For example, in 1997, Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun Microsystems, instituted his famous ban of PowerPoint, saying that PPT files were clogging up their network. “And do they communicate anything?” he asked. “No.” Edward Tufte implicated bad PowerPoint in the Columbia shuttle disaster. The accusations go on and on. (This Wikipedia article does a good job of summarizing the arguments against, and for, PowerPoint.)

I’m not going to say that you should not use PowerPoint when you give presentations, but I can’t emphasize strongly enough that you have to remember that, while it can and should enhance your presentation, a PowerPoint slide deck is NOT your presentation. You, standing up and communicating with your audience, is your presentation.

Presentation Zen offers this tidbit about another ban on PowerPoint (quoting Thomas Ricks, author of Fiasco):

 One of the things I admired most about Col. H.R. McMaster  — [one of the] smaller things, but it pleased me as a writer —  he banned PowerPoint in his command. If you wanted to talk [about] something, if you wanted to make a briefing, you were to write it out in plain, understandable English that had verbs and connective tissue inside it.

 Proving yet again that it comes down to the ability to write well. Not that you have to be a Hemingway, or a King, or [insert your favorite best-selling author here]. But you have to be able to use words well.

In last Sunday’s Parade magazine, Marilyn vos Savant said it’s time to push some spelling reform through:

This month marks the 100th anniversary of the attempt by Theodore Roosevelt—a poor speller himself—to reform English spelling. The President thought that spelling words such as “colour” with an extra letter (the u) was downright silly. So he issued a directive to the Government Printing Office to adopt 300 reformed spellings. Despite many notable proponents, Congress overturned the directive. With the exception of a few changes that already were creeping into use—“honour” became honor, and “centre” became center, for example—spelling reform flopped. A century has passed since then. Time to step up the pace! Let’s press on with thru, tho and altho, which I agree are excellent choices.

What do you think, dear readers? Should we let nature take its course—allowing the gradual forces of popular usage take care of things (bearing in mind that popular usage can also bring us abominations like irregardless—or should we have an organized campaign push for accelerated spelling reform?