Maman Poulet | Clucking away crookedly through media, politics and life

Cutting through the bull

February 10th, 2011 · 2 Comments · Elections, General Election 2011, Irish Politics

So much political jargon describing the performance and practice of politics and the conduct of a campaign and an election about at the moment and a lot of it is inaccessible.

The National Adult Literacy Agency has produced a Plain English Guide to Political terms which cuts through the rubbish and provides definitions to 400 political terms. It was originally produced in 2006 and has been reissued. Add to this the Plain English Guide to Financial Terms that was published two years ago and you might make it through Tonight with Vincent Browne or Prime Time (Though they may need to issue a guide to life under the IMF to get us through the bondholders and substantiation)

Both publications are free to download and I recommend all candidates and pundits to read them and realise that much of their language is inaccessible and people feel excluded from the process and less likely to vote if they don’t understand.

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