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The Handbook of Easy Languages in Europe describes what Easy Language is and how it is used in European countries. It demonstrates the great diversity of actors, instruments and outcomes related to Easy Language throughout Europe. All people, despite their limitations, have an equal right to information, inclusion, and social participation. This results in requirements for understandable language. The notion of Easy Language refers to modified forms of standard languages that aim to facilitate reading and language comprehension. This handbook describes the historical background, the principles and the practices of Easy Language in 21 European countries. Its topics include terminological definitions, legal status, stakeholders, target groups, guidelines, practical outcomes, education, research, and a reflection on future perspectives related to Easy Language in each country. Written in an academic yet interesting and understandable style, this Handbook of Easy Languages in Europe aims to find a wide audience.

Easy-to-Understand (E2U) text practices enable and facilitate accessible communication. E2U refers both to Plain and to Easy Language. These two powerful methods of language and content comprehension enhancement are illustrated through several examples in English, starting from the seminal role of the Anglophone world in promoting plain and lucid style. Originally implemented in written texts, today the employment of these simplified language varieties should infiltrate new communication services that are more complex and multifaceted. Thanks to the EASIT project, the integration of E2U strategies into a selection of audiovisual services is being successfully researched. After advancing simplification proposals in the area of subtitling and audio description, Elisa Perego reports on the results of a cross-country survey conducted during the initial stages of the EASIT project: She pinpoints the background, activity, and training experience of those who currently work in the sector of E2U in Europe, and identifies the skills and the competences of, as well as a training path and materials for, future hybrid professionals.

Accessible legal communication seems to be a contradiction in itself: Legal terminology places high demands on comprehension. Easy language, on the other hand, aims for maximum comprehensibility. Isabel Rink explores the options for successful accessible legal communication. She shows how it is possible to get the relevant types of texts accessible to all. She takes a look at a pilot project of the Lower Saxony Ministry of Justice: " Easy Language in the Lower Saxony Judiciary". The author demonstrates how texts of legal-administrative communication must be designed in order to be accessible, understandable, acceptable and actionable for people with perceptual and comprehension impairments, so that addressees who were previously excluded from the legal system also gain access to it. Isabel Rink is co-founder and managing director of the Research Centre for Easy Language, research assistant at the Institute for Translation Studies and Specialised Communication at the University of Hildesheim and junior research group leader of the doctoral group Barrier-free Medical Communication (BK Med) at the Research Centre for Easy Language. Together with Christiane Maaß, she edited the handbook Barrier-free Communication.