Undoubtedly, academic writing plays a vital role in learners' lives. But unfortunately, students struggle to develop academic writing skills.
Do you not know what academic writing is and how it is different from other writing standards?
Worry not!
In this post, you will learn about academic essentials and top-notch skills you need to grasp.
Without further delay, let's get started.
What is academic writing?
Unlike other types of writing, academic writing is formal. It is the central approach to academic communication.
When you split the basics of academic writing and analyze them one by one, you will notice there is no need to worry. However, there are some fundamentals you need to follow.
Characteristics of academic writing
In academic writing, you have to stick to a specific style. This is one of the key characteristics of this type of writing.
However, if you ignore sticking to that style guide, you will lose grades.
MLA and APA are two standard style guides in academic writing. However, each of these styles copes with a unique citing structure.
• Grammar
In academic writing, you have to stick to certain grammar rules.
The writing style guide also provides you with grammatical rules. Most significantly, you cannot break these rules in academic writing.
So, hook your readers with eye-grabbing words and communicate with them efficiently.
Plus, you can use exclamatory points, ellipses, and prepositions to build suspense. Remember, there is no space for conversational tone in this writing.
• Format
Many learners ignore formatting the papers as per professors' demands. What is formatting writing?
Formatting deals with the number of pages, what you have to incorporate in the header and footer, and how to organize the cover page, references, and citations.
Suppose you are writing an English Literature assignment; you have to write in MLA format.
• Conciseness
As stated earlier, academic writing deals with the use of formal language. As a student, you have to use non-colloquial language for communicating your points.
Furthermore, you should come up with literary devices like simile, metaphor, etc.
Your main goal should be to set clarity throughout the content.
• Critical
Academic writing deals with elaborating and explaining rather than describing. As a learner, you have to be very critical. Plus, you should analyze all the information systematically.
As a critical writer, you have to understand the topic and research properly truly.
• Objectiveness
Academic writing has a strong objective. It means that you have to focus on the arguments and topics.
This type of writing tends to use active voice, passive voice, nouns, and noun phrases.
Types of academic writing
In academic texts, you have to deal with more than one writing type. Each writing type has its own particular purpose and feature.
• Analytical writing
Most often, professors assign analytical papers to the students. In analytical writing, you have to reorganize all the crucial information and facts.
In order to make your writing analytical, you have to:
- Spend appropriate time in planning and shaping ideas
- Craft categories and relationships you come across
- Write each paragraph as per one analytical category
- Make the structure clear and concise
• Descriptive writing
In this writing, you have to paint the picture to the readers by describing an event, place, person, or thing. It stimulates you to use new words in writing.
While coping with descriptive writing, you have to:
- Incorporate vivid sensory details to appeal reader's senses
- Leverage precise language and use adjectives in content
- Make use of literary devices to form a solid image in readers' minds
- Organize the entire writing in chronological order
• Persuasive writing
This type of writing contains all the features of analytical writing, i.e., crucial information and organizing the information perfectly.
While writing essays and research papers, you have to give a persuasive touch to the content. In addition, you have to back up your stated points with credible data and shreds of evidence.
In persuasive writing, you have to:
- Present valid assumptions
- Develop argument coherently
- Provide evidence for all claims
• Critical writing
Researchers are quite familiar with critical writing. This type of writing requires you to come up with two points, including your own stance.
Journal articles and literature reviews are the best examples of critical writing.
Critical writing requires you to:
- Summarize all sections of the work
- Come up with solid opinions
- Provide the audience with solid evidence
Top three academic writing tips
• Avoid using contractions
You should not use contractions in your writing. What is a contraction in writing?
The combination of two or more words like isn't, shouldn't, can't, haven't, etc., are called contractions. These are contractions that make a difference between informal and formal writing.
• Always use an online notepad
You should use a reliable notepad for easy note-taking. Also, you can write anything you want. Using text note, rich text note, and note listing, you can do changes to the text.
Plus, you can lock your documents.
Using notepad helps you count the characters, words, and lines of any text. Therefore, it assists you in sticking to a particular word count as well.
• Actively use a plagiarism checker
You should not steal other writers' works. Additionally, you have to consciously stand your writing out from other writers.
Your piece of paper should shine as an original paper. Benefit from a credible and paid plagiarism checker.
Bottom line
An academic paper is different from crafting an email, website content, and blog post.
Whether it is an analytical essay, a research paper, a persuasive essay, or another type of academic writing, your copy should follow the strict style and formatting guidelines.
Avoid sending anything without proofreading and editing so that you strike the right tone. Best of luck!
