1Paul Mundy and Bob Huggan www.mamud.com

Clutter…and simplicity

2

What is clutter?

Clutter is a disease that strangles language in unnecessary words, roundabout constructions, pompous decoration and meaningless jargon

It infects us with a tendency to inflate and sound important

The disease is usually worse in better educated, higher-ranking people

3

What the airline pilot said

“We are presently anticipating our trajectory passing through considerable atmospheric turbulence.”

What he meant “There’s a storm ahead and it may get

bumpy.”

4

What the university president said “We have been experiencing very

considerable potentially explosive expressions of dissatisfaction on issues only partially related to academics”

What he meant “The students have been hassling us about

various things.”

5

George Orwell’s rules for writing (1)

Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print

Never use a long word where a short one will do

If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out

6

George Orwell’s rules for writing (2)

Never use the passive where you can use the active

Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent

Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous

7

Strip every sentence to its cleanest components Cut every word that serves no function

Needless to say, it is necessary for us to reduce the deficit = …?

Turn long words into short words Interminable dialogue = …?

Cut adverbs that carry the same meaning as the verb He ran quickly to the bank = …?

Turn passive sentences into active sentences The trees were being fallen from by leaves = …?

8

to market your crops

Work together

9

Fighting clutter

Like fighting weeds– the writer is always slightly behind

New varieties sprout overnight “Now” used to be now Today, now = at this point in time

at the present timecurrently

10

More clutter

Up Head up a committee = Head a

committee Face up to problems = Face

problems Personal

My personal friend = My friend My personal assistant = My assistant To my personal advantage = To my

advantage

11

Spot the unneeded words

Lessons learned = Lessons Future plans = Plans Background information = Background

(or leave it out) Very unique = Unique First introduced = Introduced New innovation = Innovation Early beginnings = Start

12

13

Words to watch

Context In the Vietnamese context = In Vietnam

Level At the farm level = On the farm

Case In the case of sorghum, = Sorghum yields

yields rose by 10% rose by 10%

14

Words to watch

Respectively Yields of rice and maize rose by 3% and 12% respectively Rice yields rose 3%; maize yields went up 12%.

Work The NGO has worked to support The NGO has supported The organization worked to promote the sharing of

lessons… The organization shared lessons…

15

Yet more clutter

Experiencing Weather broadcast:

“At the present time we are experiencing precipitation” = It’s raining

Dentist: “Are you experiencing any pain?” = “Does it hurt?”

16

Things to avoid

Avoid sentences that begin with… I might add… It should be pointed out that… It is interesting to note that…

Avoid inflated prepositions and conjunctionsExamples With the possible exception of… Except For the reason that… Because He totally lacked the ability to… He couldn’t She was unable to give any

information beyond the fact that… She said

17

Things to avoid

More inflation With the aim of adapting… To adapt The objective of the project was to… The project

aimed to

18

Get rid of the unnecessary words To acknowledge these initiatives, to learn from them

and to prevent double work, the network has been active in supporting the documentation of a number of these.

To acknowledge these initiatives, to learn from them and to prevent double work, the network has been active in supporting the documentation of a number of these.

The network has documented some of these initiatives.

19

Checklist for avoiding clutter

Re-examine every sentence you write Is every word doing useful work? Can any thought be expressed more briefly? Does anything sound pompous or pretentious? Are you keeping any word only because you think

it’s beautiful? Tool for cutting clutter

Roget’s Thesaurus or any other good dictionary of synonyms.

20

Three rules for cutting clutter SIMPLIFY SIMPLIFY SIMPLIFY