Chapters 9 & 11“Academic Writing Doesn’t Mean Setting aside Your Own Voice” “Entering Class Discussions”

“Ain’t So/Is Not”:Academic Writing Doesn’t Always Mean Setting Aside Your Own Voice

Many students believe papers should be packed with big words, long sentences, complex sentence structures

Apt words, mix of long and short sentences, complex sentence structure only when requiredClarity always trumps complexity

“[A]cademic writing can—and in our view should—be relaxed, easy to follow, and even a little bit fun” (121).Should use academic terms, but also incorporate more casual turns of phrase

Intellectual ≠ Stilted, Deadly Dull

Mix academic and colloquial styles“Frequency of Formal Errors in Current College Writing, or Ma and Pa Kettle Do Research”

Don’t be afraid of imagery and creative language “Doing it [correcting formal errors] represents the Bad Old Days. Ms. Fidditch and Mr. Flutesnoot with sharpened red pencils, spilling innocent blood across the page (122)”

More common in humanities, but do find elsewhere

Physicists especially prone to (Big Bang theory)

Recipe for Mixing High and LowFirst make your point in the professional language of your field and THEN make it again in everyday language.“As Merill Skaggs has put it, ‘She is neurotically controlling and self-conscious about her work, but she know at all points what she is doing. Above all else, she is self-conscious.’

Without question, Cather was a control freak.” (Fetterly, qtd. 124)

When is it safe to mix styles?

Consider audience and purposeUsually not a good idea in a grant proposalIf for a journal or other publication, look at previous issuesIf for a course, consider professorAlmost always safe in the humanities

Always remember, colloquial language enlivens academic discourse but does not replace it

Provides spice, not substance

Take Home Message:“To succeed as a writer in college, then, you need not always limit your language to the strictly formal” (128).

“I Take Your Point”:Entering Class Discussions

Frame comments as a response to something that has already been said.

Name the person AND position you’re responding to

To change the subject, indicate that you are doing so EXPLICITLY.Be even more explicit and focused than in writing.

Usually good idea to make only one point at a timeUSE METACOMMENTARY TO HIGHLIGHT POINT YOU ARE MAKING

In other words, what I’m trying to get at her is…My point is this:

Review of Three Ways of Responding

1. Disagree—but explain why2. Agree—but with a difference

1. Add something new to the conversation, like pointing out supporting evidence the author hasn’t noticed, applying the thesis to a new situation, or bringing in a personal experience that supports it

3. Agree and disagree simultaneously (be specific!)In all cases, make sure you briefly summarize what

“they say”