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Academic Writing

© Brenda Townsend Hall

Last summer I spent 5 weeks teaching EAP in a British university. What struck me about the problems students faced in writing was not so much their deficiencies in language structure (although they were serious enough) as their almost total lack of awareness about what constituents go into an academic paper. For the next few articles I shall give some examples of the elements that are usually part of the academic writing process with some hints on how to help students handle them. Let me start by making some general points and by listing some links that students might find helpful.

1. Key points about academic writing
Academic writing must be firmly grounded in demonstrable fact; sources must therefore be given to prove the authenticity of the facts. Sources should also be cited in order to avoid any suggestion of plagiarism. Students need to learn how to cite these references. The academic essay is not the platform for personal opinion but for reasoned argument. If the student has a point to make, it must be made only as a considered conclusion that follows logical argument after consideration of the available evidence.

2. The elements of academic writing
The academic essay will usually comprise some of the following elements:

• description
• narrative
• summary
• exposition
• argument
• classification
• enumeration
• illustration
• comparison/contrast
• cause-effect/problem-solution
• definition
• analysis
  

  Each of these elements has typical language structures that students can learn.

  3. Connecting the elements
  For the essay to be coherent, students have to be able to link the various sections with clear signposts. The use of connecting devices is often a real problem for English language learners and is one of the main features of academic writing for them to practice.

  4. Style
  Style should be objective with precise use of language. Many students have difficulty in sorting out opinion from fact, generalisation from detail, vagueness from precision. For example, they might use a phrase such 'it is well known that...' or 'research has shown that...' to introduce a point. I brainstorm examples like this with them and ask them to point out why they are unacceptable and what could replace them, e.g. 'studies undertaken over the past 10 years by X,Y or Z revealed that...'. They might talk about 'the majority of people...' when they have no evidence about the majority or they may use passive forms to convey a general consensus when none exists:' it is widely believed that...'. Vague terminology is also endemic: 'several studies', 'a number of experiments'. Of course, there are times when it is not possible to be precise, but students must be encouraged to be accurate wherever possible.