writing&editing
20 February2006
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HowSimpleIs
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falltheattemptstocontrolor modifytheoftenbewildering English language, the most popular is Simplified Tech-nicalEnglish,orSTE.STEis acontrolledformofthelanguagethat uses a carefully limited and uniform subsetofEnglish.AdvocatesofSTEsay thatithasthefollowingeffects:•Shortensreadingtime •Eliminatesvagueness
•Makestranslationquickerandcheaper •Makes reading easier for non-native
Englishspeakers
•Streamlinesautomatedtranslation
Both native and non-native speakers can have difficulty reading English be-causeofoftenpuzzlingsyntaxrules,the numberofwordsthatcanbeusedboth as verbs and nouns, and the unique problemofallthosesynonymsandhom-onyms.ThesearetheproblemsSTEwas createdtosolve,butdoesitreallywork? Inansweringthisquestion,I’lldescribe someofthefeatures,benefits,anddis-advantages of STE, share my personal experiencewithSTE,anddiscussstrate-giesforimplementation.
TheBasics
STE comes from a long line of con-trolled and modified versions of Eng- lish,includingBasicEnglish,astripped-down version created by linguists as both a communication enhancement andastrategyforteachingEnglish,and SpecialEnglish,aColdWar-eralinguis-ticrelicstillusedforVoiceofAmerica radio broadcasts. STE was developed specificallyforaerospaceindustrydocu- mentationinthe1970sunderthemoni-kerSimplifiedEnglishandisnowusedby technical writers in several industries. Even technical writers who don’t use STE already follow many of its basic principles,suchasthefollowing: that it encourages the use of hyphens
writing&editing
to prevent perplexing noun strings or clusters,evenwhendoingsoresultsin awkward constructions such as second-valve-outboard-window-lever .Ifyou’rewrit-ingSTE,youacceptsuchawkwardness asthepriceyoupaytoavoidconfusing readersabouttherelationshipsamong wordsinanounstring.
Another feature of STE is that each word has only one meaning. Consider the following STE-approved sentence: “Put the set in the empty place.” STE doesn’tallow“Placethesetintheempty place”becauseplacecanbeusedonlyas anoun.
Similarly,“Emptytheset”isnotanap-provedusagesinceemptycanbeonlyan adjectiveinSTE.Thewordclosecanbe used as a verb but not as an adjective. You can’t tell your users to “Loop the wire around the central unit” because
loopcanbeusedonlyasanoun.
RestrictionsonverbusageinSTEare minimal.Themostimportantruleisto avoid the present progressive and ger-undforms—inotherwords,don’t“-ing” yourverbs.Wordsthatendin“-ing”are confusingtonon-nativespeakersbecause theycanfillmanydifferentgrammatical roles in English. Gerunds, for instance, can function as nouns and occupy the same position as nouns in a sentence (subject, direct object, subject comple-ment,orobjectofapreposition).
One final distinguishing feature of STEisthatitlimitssentencelengthto twenty words, although an average of onesentenceintencanbeuptotwenty-fivewordslong.
Technical communicators in a wide varietyofindustriesmodifytheexisting STE standards to fit their needs, and youcandothesame.Youdon’thaveto beanSTEliteralist.Infact,STEislikely
moreusedinmodifiedformsthaninits officialform.
Benefits
Whether or not your writing gets translated, STE has clear advantages overstandardEnglishwhenyou’rewrit- ingforaglobalaudience.Bothtransla-torsandnon-nativereadersareadversely affectedbypoorreadability;translation canbeespeciallychallengingwhenthe translator is not familiar with the tech-nicalaspectsoftheproduct.STEhelps translators by minimizing inconsistent and overly specialized language. Ad-heringtoSTE’srulescanoftenleadto simpler and clearer documents, mak-ingtranslationeasier,morecorrect,and moreeconomical.AndbecauseSTEuses fewer words, it helps shrink the size of yourdocuments,whichcutstranslation, printing,andotherproductioncosts.
ChallengesandQuestions
DespitethebenefitsofSTE,questions about its effectiveness remain. While STEdoesreininsomeofthewildways of English, there is no guarantee that non-nativespeakerswillfindSTEeasier to read than standard English. Given that an excellent command of English isnotexactlyrare,isSTEcorrectinas-suming that most non-native speakers haven’talreadymasteredthechallenges of English? And do non-native readers reallyfinditthatchallengingtodistin-it sometimes makes writing sound dry and lifeless—characteristics that many technicalwritersstruggleagainst.Inits zeal to simplify, STE can take the hu-manityoutofwrittencommunication.
Given these criticisms, managers shouldconsiderthefollowingchallenges before directing their technical writing stafftouseSTE:
•Writers and editors must be trained inSTE.
•In-housedictionariesandstyleguides must be developed and reviewed. If
yourcompanyhasstrictrulesaboutad-February2006 21
STE has clear
advantages over
standard English
when you’re
22 February2006
writing&editing
heringtoanin-housestyleguidethat conflicts with STE’s standards, then STEprobablyisn’tagoodchoice. •For some writers, conforming to a
newsetofwritingrulescaninterrupt thenormalandautomaticflowofthe writingprocess.
•Rewriting to conform to new stan-dardsistime-consuming. apply STE to my editing/rewrite pro-cess.Theresultsweremixed.Sometimes non-STE-approved sentences as effec-tivelyasapprovedones.
Learning STE is much easier than learning a foreign language, but you might have to create a cheat sheet to remember some new writing rules and styles. You might also find that the STE-approved word list doesn’t always fit your needs. Luckily, STE encourages writers to build their own uniquewordlists.Forinformationon how to obtain the official list of STE rules and approved words, visit the
word list are available atwww.userlab. com/Downloads/SE.pdf.
Toensureconsistentuseoftheright words, you need to create your own company- or department-specific dic-tionaryofcustomterms.Thisdictionary shouldbecarefullyproducedandthen double-checked for completeness and accuracy.
You might also consider purchasing anSTEcheckertool,whichcheckstext forcomplianceagainsttherulesofSTE andcanbeintegratedwithyourin-house list of approved words. Some industry-specificandconfigurablecheckertools are available at the Web sites listed in thesidebar.
AHelpfulModel
Simplified Technical English clearly offers benefits to technical writers in-terestedinimprovingthereadabilityof
Since experienced technical writers already apply the basic rules of STE when writing procedures, STE may be more useful when writing explanatory sectionsorhighlytechnicaldocuments like applications specifications or soft-ware requirements documents. STE mightalsoworkbestfornewwritersor technicalprofessionalswhoaren’tusual-lywriters.Butevenexperiencedwriters canbenefitfromusingSTEasamodel for ensuring consistency and clarity in theirwriting.
SUGGESTEDREADING
Thomas, Margaret, Gloria Jaffe, J. Peter Kincaid, and Yvette Stees. “Learning to Use Simplified English: A Preliminary Study.”TechnicalCommunication,February 1992. (This article is available for pur-chaseanddownloadfromAmazon.com.)
David A. Fonseca is a technical writer at IndyMac Bank Home Lending. He for-merlyworkedasatechnicalwriteratOracle Corporationandasacontentmanager/edi-torforIntraware.Hecanbereachedatdave_ [email protected].
Resources for
Learning and
Using STE
I
fyouwanttolearnmoreabout STE, the Aerospace and De-fence Simplified Technical English Maintenance Group (ASDSTEMG)isprobablythe best place to start. You can find a hugeamountofinformationabout the official specification, training, software, and other useful infor-mation on the ASD STEMG site (www.simplifiedenglish-aecma.org). Although intended mainly for the aerospaceindustry,thesitehasalot ofinformationhelpfulforallindus-tries.Informationonhowtoobtain theofficialSTErulesandapproved wordlistislocatedatwww.simplified english-aecma.org/Simplified_English. htm#se_guide.Boeinghasagreatsitethatexplains STE and the STE checker:www. boeing.com/phantom/sechecker/se.html.
Download a compilation of the basicrulesandapprovedwordlists, andviewlinkstootherSTEresourc- es,atUserlabIncorporated’sSimpli-fiedEnglishpage,www.userlab.com/ SE.html.
SmartCommunicationsalsohasa lotofinformationandresourcesfor implementing STE: www.smartny. com/simplifiedenglish.htm.
