Jargon vs. Speaking Plainly

"Communication is a two way enterprise, a shared responsibility" - David Crystal

The vocabulary and grammar of medicine, law and bureaucracy is often inaccessible to the average person (average being not a specialised in a given field)

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with the complex language utilised within these domains, as it is often prescribed by the complexity of the concepts being discussed. The issue at hand is the discrepancy between the specialist's level of knowledge and the general public's level of knowledge and how this is accounted for (or not accounted for) when communicating

There are divided opinions on whether keeping language inaccessible to the general public is intention or not, and there is evidence for both arguments. Firstly some people claim ignorance to the fact that the way in which they communicate to individuals outside of their specialist field is confusing them. More insidiously, complex language to the untrained ear can be a truth-concealing obfuscation that is designed to keep people out of the loop in order to emphasise concepts like social hierarchy, social distance and notions of authority and prestige. Given that in contemporary society the solidarity / intimacy function is outweighing its function to reinforce the aforementioned notions designed to segregate people, the employment of difficult language for intentional obfuscation is frowned upon and less common. 

The Plain English Movement accounts for both sides of the coin. It was a piece of social engineering that attempted to redress societal inequalities. The intended audience was the average person struggling with the complexities of law, government, banks and insurance jargons. It has been shown to benefit both the institutions by saving them time and money in avoiding the potential consequences of poor document writing and poor reception by the general public as well as the audience who now find themselves able to read their bank statements without a dictionary in hand. 

Timeline 

1978 - President Carter ordered that all regulations be written in Plain English, which lead to a huge revision of legislation and increased awareness 

1979 - The UK's Plain English campaign was launched by publicly denouncing gobbledegook (Language that is meaningless or is made unintelligible by excessive use of abstruse technical terms) in the shredding of confusing government forms in Parliament Square

1985 - By this time over 21,000 documents had been revised and a further 15,000 withdrawn

1990 - The Plain English Movement set forth a list of criterion comprising of elements which would ensure a document was written in adherence to Plain English Standards. These included

• 15-20 word sentence length
• Easy to read format 
• Active verbs
• Conciseness
• Intimate / personal pronouns
• Short average line length

The Plain English Movement is still active today in the annual Plain English Speaking Awards which celebrate concisely informative writing and vilify obfuscation and gobbledegook by giving out the "Golden Bull Award"

In the U.S the DoubleSpeak awards are presented by the National Council of Teachers of English to a public figure who uses language that is deceptive, evasive, euphemistic or otherwise obfuscating. 

It must be remembered that sometimes there is a need for evasive terminology. Using language that is face saving and sympathetic and euphemistic can avoid emotional pain or alleviate harsh news.