Jargon

Jargon is the specialised vocabulary used by people in a particular profession, hobby, sport or field of study, such as the technical terms of medicine, computing or law. Among experts, jargon is efficient and precise, letting them communicate complex ideas quickly. To outsiders, however, jargon can be confusing or exclusive, making a text hard to follow.

Whether jargon is helpful or unhelpful depends entirely on the audience: appropriate for specialists, but a barrier for a general reader. Recognising jargon helps a writer judge when precise technical terms aid communication and when plain language serves better.

In writing tasks, judging when to use or avoid jargon shows real awareness of audience, and examiners reward it. Technical terms suit expert readers but confuse a general audience. In the reading paper, noticing jargon helps you identify a text's intended audience and purpose.

Recognising when jargon includes or excludes readers is a key part of understanding how language matches, or fails to match, the people it is written for.

A doctor writing for patients would replace jargon like myocardial infarction with heart attack, so the information actually reaches the people who need it.

Judge jargon by its audience. Keep precise technical terms for specialists, but use plain language for a general reader. In analysis, note how jargon reveals a text's intended audience or excludes outsiders.

In your own writing, define or avoid technical terms when your reader may not know them. This shows you have matched your language to your audience.

You may also find writing formats and annotated model responses useful. Next, visit our skills guides for IGCSE English to see terms like this used in real answers. Our IGCSE English tuition page explains how lessons run. When you are ready, the paid one-hour trial is the first step.