Plain English Skills for Lawyers (Course)
- Departamento: Departamento de Lengua y Derecho
Aspectos formales
Inicio: lunes 7 de agosto.
Carga horaria: 27 horas sincrónicas (9 clases de 3 horas cada una).
Día y horario: lunes de 17.30 a 20.30 (GMT –3).
Modalidad: online, vía streaming.
Joanna M. Richardson
With a B.A. in Spanish, Portuguese & Latin American Literature from King’s College London, in 1985, Joanna emigrated from the U.K. to Argentina. Originally working as an English teacher and translator, from 2001 to October, 2020 Joanna worked as a practitioner of plain English at Argentina’s leading law firm, Marval O’Farrell Mairal. Joanna has applied her specialization in clear communications to train non-native speakers of English in the skills they need to communicate clearly in English. She is currently training lawyers around the world in Plain English. Her courses, talks and individual coaching sessions are practical, dynamic and e ective. In recent years she has specialized in giving virtual coaching sessions in Executive Presence, helping senior professionals take their English to the next level. She also writes a regular column on clear communications in the BATimes.
Contents
What is plain English?
Clients today do not want to read any document more than once. Plain English is a way of writing so that the client can understand on first reading what a lawyer writes. This plain English course will show lawyers how to:
• Write clearly in short sentences.
• Keep to the point, avoiding unnecessary phrases.
• Use technical terms only where necessary, and then explain them.
• Write with your audience in mind.
With all these techniques and more a lawyer’s clients will find it easier to understand them work better together.
Target audience
This course is for Spanish-speaking corporate lawyers with an upper-intermediate level of English
who use the English language to communicate with their clients, whether native or non-native speakers of English.
Methodology
This course is entirely virtual with a combination of synchronous and asynchronous material.
Asynchronous material will include videos and talks by experts in the field. Synchronous material will be interactive and include theoretical explanations and examples followed up by exercises to reinforce the concepts learnt. Exercises will be a combination of individual and collaborative.
Topics Covered
This course will show lawyers how to communicate clearly with their clients, following these 10 principles:
1. Use short sentences.
2. Use the active voice.
3. Avoid abstract words.
4. Use personal pronouns.
5. Explain technical terms if you have to use them.
6. Avoid negatives.
7. Use logical structure and clear layout with plenty
of white space.
8. Use inclusive language.
9. Use punctuation for meaning.
10. Avoid false cognates.
The course will provide background on the history of and reasons for the growth of the plain language movement, where it is today, and its future. In addition, will look at the work of the greats of the plain language movement. As this course is aimed at Spanish-speaking lawyers it will also address their common grammatical errors and false cognates.
Cronograma
DATE PROFESSOR
8/7 Joanna Richardson/Mariano Vitetta
8/14 Joanna Richardson
8/28 Joanna Richardson
9/4 Joanna Richardson
9/11 Joanna Richardson
9/18 Joanna Richardson
9/25 Joanna Richardson
10/2 Joanna Richardson
10/9 Joanna Richardson