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Cristina Hartmann, I string words together and hope for the best. 57 upvotes by Shishene Jing, Kaicheng Liang, Achilleas Vortselas, (more) As someone who has written numerous research papers, I’ve become too familiar with the pains of academic writing. (These 80-page theses and 30-plus-page legal memos were downright Sisyphusian at times.)
I don’t want to repeat others’ suggestions, especially the excellent tips from Kaicheng Liang. So, I’ll focus on the more nitty-gritty details. (Note: some of my suggestions are good practices for any kind of writing.)
I assume that you’re done with your research by the time you start writing. You should have an idea of what you want your paper to say. An academic paper must have a clear and cogent position on an issue. Otherwise, you’re not contributing to the knowledge trove. (This is particularly essential for the social sciences and humanities, but also important for the hard sciences.) If you don’t have a thesis before you start writing, you vacilliate and waffle. Quite bad qualities for a focused academic paper. You end up with a paper with a lot of facts, but doesn’t really say anything. These are B or C papers, no matter how artfully written.
With a thesis in mind, you can pick the perfect examples and insightful details as you write. Knowing your thesis isn’t enough. You must remind the reader of the thesis throughout the paper. Consistent thesis boomeranging makes your paper more cohesive and understandable. This is crucial in long papers (10+ pages) because the reader may forget the paper’s point as he or she reads.
Ok, now that you’ve figured out what to say, you need to construct an outline. Sounds easy, right? Nope. This was always the hardest part for me – the big-picture organization.
An outline forces you to think about progression. What issues and facts are essential foundation for your argument? What are the major themes? These are hard questions to answer, but your paper will be better for it. Don’t be afraid to try out a few different outlines. It’ll clarify your thinking.
This is where your outline will become an invaluable tool. If you have a longer paper, you should add descriptive headings. (Almost like chapter titles.) Generally speaking, headings are brief descriptions of the section’s general topic, such as “Interracial Men and Women in Antebellum South.” Headings make it easier for readers to parse your paper. A readable academic paper is a good paper. (I’ve slogged through too many of the unreadable kind…)
Oh, you thought that since you formulated a thesis and an outline, the introduction would be easy-peasy? It’s not. In all likelihood, you’ll have to rewrite the whole thing at the end anyway. Save yourself the time and energy and proceed directly to the first section.
No matter how much thought and effort I put into my theses and outlines, I always adjust my ideas as I write. It’s just the nature o things (unless the paper is simplisitic). That’s okay. Fine-tuning means that you’re thinking as you write (always a good thing). Also, some things that may seem logical and obvious in our minds end up seeming random and ridiculous on the page.
By the time you write the conclusion, you will know the topic like the back of your hand. You’ll be able to state your ideas and essential facts in a straightforward and concise manner. It may feel a bit strange to leave that spot on the top of the document blank, but it’ll save you the time and effort of totally redoing your introduction.
Unless you’ve made a brand-new scientific discovery (if so, congratulations!), there will be other ideas and theories out there. A through paper must acknowledge and respond to these other ideas.
It can be as simple as “Professor X says this, but evidence shows that Y is a more accurate interpretation.” This approach shows that you know the field, a must in academia. (Responses are particularly important in legal academic writing.) You can also use this technique to strengthen your argument by showing how correct your argument is.
A qualifier. Responses may be relatively unimportant for undergraduate papers. At that level, you’re not expected to be an expert in the field quite yet. For graduate-level work, however, this technique is necessary.
I learned this trick the hard way, so I don’t want you to suffer as I did. As I mentioned in #4, your thesis and ideas will change as you write. At worst, you’ll reorganize the entire paper; at best, you’ll reorder a few paragraphs and sentences. This can skew the citations.
As you enter the spelling-grammar phase of revision (I’ll get to that), all of your reorganizations are complete. You can insert the long-form citations wherever appropriate. It’s really not fun searching for that long-form citation that I moved from page 5 to 13. (I shudder at the thought.)
Academic writing is quite formal. Yes, you can have a bit of fun with it, but within reason.
A few quick-and-dirty guidelines: no contractions - always use cannot instead of can’t. Use do not instead of don’t.
Recently, I wrote a 15-page legal article for an agency. You know when I completed the first draft? 2 months before the due date. Yep, you read that right. I spent 2 months revising a 8-page article that metamorphosed into a 15-page paper.
Of course, you may be more sane than me and spend less time revising a relatively short article. That being said, you will spend more time revising than you think. Murphy’s law in action!
I found a step-by-step revision system that’s pretty effective for me:
Okay, my answer mutated into a mini-dissertation. If anyone has managed to get to this sentence, I applaud your persistence and determination.
Academic writing, like any other form of writing, isn’t easy. It takes a lot of practice and focus to become a good academic writer. Add a bit of determination and reflection, you may even become great.
. Prepare your figures and tables before anything else. Decide how many you need, and what material or data you could use to produce powerful graphics. If you don’t yet have intriguing, thought-provoking figures and persuasive tables of your best data, then you are not ready to write a paper. Like any human being, reviewers and experienced readers look at the pictures first, and they can quickly determine the value of your work by your figures without reading even a single word.
2. Keep your abstract short, and write it after everything else. You want somebody to skim your abstract in less than 15 seconds, say ‘hmm that’s interesting’ and then start on the Introduction proper (or at least download your paper for later). An effective abstract can win readers from the start. I’ve seen some monster-sized abstracts that simply defeat the purpose of this mini-section; it’s meant to be a hook, not a firehose. 200 words is a reasonable limit. Anything longer comes off clunky and long-winded. Writing the abstract after the rest of the paper is complete will help you crystallize the work better without gushing/rambling.
3. A detailed and abundantly-cited Introduction only makes your work look better. Some writers are miserly with cited literature and descriptions of previously published work, for fear of cheapening the perceived impact of their own findings. But a detailed account of the current state of the art will illustrate the breadth and depth of efforts in tackling the problem by the scientific community at large, and by that indirectly emphasize the significance and reach of your conclusions.
4. Avoid the first-person, avoid superlatives, avoid vague language.Generally speaking, ‘I’, ‘we’, and ‘our group’ are unprofessional language; the passive voice is almost always preferred. And despite how ground-breaking and dumbfoundingly epic you think your work is, stay clear of phrases like ‘tremendous impact’, ‘possibilities are endless’ or even ‘important discovery’. As a wise man once said, Show, Not Tell. Focus on fully and accurately describing your findings and the quality of the work will be evident. And always be as complete and unambiguous as possible, especially with your materials and methods. Even if you intend to patent your ultra-fast ultra-accurate algorithms, give at least a complete and clear description of the general framework, and provide some sample code or protocols as a taster. Overly secretive and confusing descriptions will earn yourself derision and a bad rep.
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