Keep your words simple

Bigger is not necessarily better when it comes to word choice. Longer, formal-sounding words slow down the pace of your writing, making it clumsy and inelegant.

Sometimes, particularly when we are trying to sound professional or authoritarian, it is tempting to fill our text with big words. You know the ones I mean? The ones that impressed our teachers in school.

Unfortunately, the outcome often feels forced, as though the writer is trying too hard, and it can make your writing hard to understand.

In the English language, we are lucky to have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to word-choice. And often, it is possible to choose a short, punchy word that means the same as a longer, more formal, lofty or old-fashioned word.

By choosing words that are simple and straightforward, you will be able to create a clean elegance to your writing. Far from feeling juvenile or unprofessional, these words, when working together in a Plain English piece of writing, help your content to come across as purposeful, professional, and smart.

But by choosing simple, straightforward words brings a clean elegance to your writing, and makes your content purposeful, professional and smart. Try to use the most plain, ‘everyday’ word to say what you mean, rather than using lofty, formal or old-fashioned words.

Following are some examples of formal or old-fashioned words. Click to see the shorter, simpler alternatives that you could choose.

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    Begin

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    Choose

Homework

Go back through a recent piece of writing, and see if you can swap out any formal, lofty or overly-long words for shorter, punchier, simpler ones. (Ideally a piece of your own writing, but if you don’t have anything appropriate, simply copy down writing from elsewhere). Depending on the words, you may need to adjust your sentences a little to be sure they still work. Now re-read the piece, and see if it feels easier to read and understand.