Considerations in academic writing

Diane Pecorari
School of Education,
Culture & Communication
28 April 2009

In producing academic texts, a number of factors need to be considered; these are represented
in Figure 1.

AUDIENCE

PURPOSE

ORGANIZATION

STYLE

FLOW

PRESENTATION

Figure 1. From Swales, J. & Feak, C. (2004). Academic writing for graduate students:
Essential tasks and skills. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

Audience. The question of whom you are writing for shapes a number of choices, including
those related to register. Whether to use more or less formal language is largely a
function of who your reader will be.

Purpose. Although all academic writing has the transmission of information as an important
purpose, there is some difference among genres. For example, in theses and dissertations,
the knowledge display function is enhanced, while it is less salient in the research article.

Organization. A number of organizational patterns commonly occur in academic texts. The

SPSE (situation-problem-solution-evaluation) structure is common in reports; academic
research articles are often written in a some version of the IMRD (introduction-methods-
results-discussion) structure.

Style. The style in which you write is closely related to the questions bounding it, i.e.,
organization and flow.
Flow. Flow is what keeps the reader moving forward in a text. This is not an entirely
rhetorical consideration; the connecting words and phrases that ensure flow also show
the relationship between the ideas in a text.

Presentation. Under his heading fall questions of language and stylistic accuracy.

Positioning. All of the factors above not only help to create a successful academic text, they
help to position the writer within his/her discourse community.

Things to include in your academic writing 'toolkit'

1. A good learner dictionary. Learner dictionaries are different from translation dictionaries
(e.g., English to Swedish) and monolingual dictionaries written for native speakers. They
give easy-to-understand definitions as well as information about the pronunciation and
grammar of each word. All of the five listed below are excellent, but make sure you get a
version with CD-ROM.
Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary.
Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary.
MacMillan English Dictionary.
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English.
Collins COBUILD Advanced Learners Dictionary.

2. A reference grammar. There are many; an excellent one is Swan, M. (2005) (3rd ed.).
Practical English usage. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

3. A practice grammar. Again, there are very many. A great one is Hewings, M. (2005).
Advanced grammar in use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

4. A collection of academic writing from your field. Gather 5-10 research articles or other
academic texts that you consider to be good examples of writing. When you find yourself
wondering 'how should I do this?' you can see how other authors have solved the same
problem.

5. An academic writing manual. A very good one is Swales, J. & Feak, C. B. (2004) (2nd
ed.) Academic writing for research students: Essential tasks and skills. Ann Arbor:
University of Michigan Press.