10 Ways To Enhance Academic Writing

Academic writing is very different from all other forms of writing and is often not taught in schools and colleges. Hence, people often tend to think that it is pretentious and boring, and hate writing papers and essays in college. But if you follow some simple rules, academic writing can be breezy and fun! Here are 10 ways to enhance academic writing. Ways by which you can swoon your professors or editors with the very best academic writing.

Research before you start writing, not while writing

A big mistake people make is writing and researching at the same time. This makes papers very cluttered because you may discover something important in your research that does not fit in with the current structure. Hence it’s best to complete your research, plan out your essay and then begin writing for a smoother writing process.

Avoid using personal pronouns

Personal pronouns are a big red light when it comes to academic writing unless you’re a famous and established academician. The best way to avoid using them is to use ‘this paper’ or ‘this essay’ instead of ‘I’ and ‘the reader’ or ‘the viewer’ instead of ‘you’.

Run multiple plagiarism checks

Plagiarism is the Original Sin of academia. It is an instant put off for readers (and especially professors) and has the potential to sabotage your academic career too. It’s important to be careful about not blindly copying and pasting information. Even when you paraphrase it, you need to reference it. And making sure to multiple

Cite accurately in your bibliography as well as in-text

As a continuation of the previous point, the best way to avoid plagiarism is to cite extensively. Using the format according to the kind of discipline or professor/editor requirement – MLA, APA, Harvard, Chicago or whatever is applicable. These formats also include formatting, in-text citations and other things to structure the essay.

Align your paper to a central thesis and do not deviate

No one likes reading disjointed essays. So the best way to engage a reader is to refrain from beating around the bush, making one central argument or thesis and sticking to it. This allows you to structure your essay in such a way that everything builds up to and supports this argument. Everything then should be relevant to it – streamlining is important.

Make sure there are no loose ends or contradictions

When defending or refuting an argument in the essay, it’s important to deal with it entirely before moving on to the next topic. Loose ends refer to grey areas where a conclusive comment is not presented, while contradictions mean two or more statements that are incompatible with each other. Avoid those.

Do not use informal styles and words

Academic writing is very different from usual writing, and it’s easy to slip away and use words that aren’t really formal. Going over your material again and again can help you catch those instances where you’ve used an informal writing style or words and correct them.

Make use of extensive quotations

One way to enhance the credibility of your paper is to use quotations. Especially if you have a primary text you are studying or analyzing, using quotations liberally from it to support your point is great. This makes your point more credible and allows the reader to connect with it rather than think of your point in abstract terms.

Structure paragraphs with care

Structuring is perhaps the most important part of academic writing apart from actually writing. No one understands and appreciates arguments that are jumbled and haphazard even if they are good. Preferably, use one para for one point.

Begin and end with an arresting note

Like any other piece of writing, the general appreciation of academic writing rests on how appealing the beginning and end is. Therefore, beginning with a quote, or jumping straight to the argument or conversely easing into it with something arresting is the way to go.

Also Read: How Reading One Good Book and implementing it in Life is better than Reading 100 Books