Hello, nice to see you. Our course helps you become a more effective academic writer. It's called English Composition One. It's designed to offer you the expertise in writing that you need to become a more effective writer as you continue in your academic career. However, some of you might not be continuing in an academic career beyond this course, or some of you might have already had an academic career before this course, and that's fine, too. I wanted to take some time to think with you togehter about what is academic writing. Why we do it. What it might look like. What its purpose can be. And, and so you can have a clearer sense of, of what it is that we'll be focusing on this, on in this course and, and how it's going to help you in, in whatever your path may be. Academic writing is defined by certain features, and these certain features include that it engages with the work of others. So, it participates in an ongoing scholarly conversation that has happened before where you enter and then with that continues beyond, beyond you, right? So, the idea is that you're engaging with others and other's ideas. Academic writing, by and large, is produced by a scholar, and a scholar can be loosely defined. There are independent scholars. There are very well-heeled, well-positioned scholars so, but produced by a scholar. So, if you define yourself as a scholar, or even, actually, I would encourage you to define yourself as a scholar. You are a scholar. You're here taking a course, so you're a scholar. So produced by a scholar. Academic writing can be for more specialized readers, or for a broader public. It doesn't mean that it's only for very specialized academic readers, it can also be academic writing, can also reach broader publics. Finally, one of the features that defines academic writing is that it's, it's written from within a particular disciplinary context. Sometimes it's an interdisciplinary context. And sometimes it's from multiple disciplinary contexts. And sometimes, a scholar will deliberately choose to blend contexts. And that's fine, too. But academic writing reflects the way that knowledge in the academy is distributed according to certain kind of domains, right? That you have people who think about the humanities. And people who think about social sciences. And people who think about natural sciences. And people who think about education, law, medicine, those kinds of, all those different domains. And so, academic writing, I think, takes into account the relevance and importance of domains in creating knowledge. Why academic writing? The reason why I'm doing academic writing with you is because I am practiced, not as practiced as I hope I will be someday. But anyways, I'm practiced with academic writing so I know about academic writing. But beyond that, I think academic writing is so important. It's so important, even if you're not pursuing an academic career or a degree, or if you're not even going to write in academic spaces beyond this class. I think it's highly transferable. The work that you do in this class will help you in any writing occasion that you have in your life. It also, I really believe, has the potential to make a strong impact. Particularly, in a space like, in a class like this where you have other writers who are sharing ideas and thinking about things and responding to you from across the world, thousands of people. The impact is really, is really of high potential. And so, I really believe that academic writing does shape knowledge and can make things happen, can make change happen. So, I find it to be a very purposeful, important kind of writing. To share a little bit with you by example of the kinds of things that are, that constitute academic writing. This is what I have done thus far, so I write articles in peer-reviewed journals. Peer-reviewed journals is a specific term used to describe a particular process by which scholarship gets published. So, peer-reviewed means that if I have a, an article that I would like to submit to a journal, I send it to an editor. He or she has a team of people who are also experts in the field and they will read my article and they'll decide if it contributes new knowledge, or if it's well-researched, or if it's a valid argument, and they'll make recommendations about whether to publish it or not publish it, or publish it with revisions. That's peer-reviewed and that's in contrast to other kinds of writing which are more commercial in nature, right? Where someone is hired to do the writing. That happens some times in peer-review, too, but we'll talk more about that later in the semester. But anyways, my writing has included articles in peer-review journals. I'm working on a textbook right now, and that's a new kind of writing this year for me. But that is academic writing. I've also written a dissertation guide and that's in process right now, and that's a kind of academic writing. I've done blog posts and columns, columns on the academic hiring process, I've done conference presentations and posters. Academic writing often takes the form of a conference, presentation, or poster presentation. There are also conference proceedings. So, where you take a verbal presentation and turn it into a written article. And, and that's called conference proceedings. And then, finally, the act of peer-review itself where I read someone else's potential article and give feedback to someone about my recommendation about publishing or publishing it or not, that's a form of academic writing that we engage in. And then, I can even expand it because I think that there's an argument to made, of course, that my response to student writing is academic writing, and my syllabus creation, and memo's that I write as part of my, in part of my administrative job, that, that's academic writing, too. So, these are some examples of the kind of academic writing that I am familiar with based on my experience. Let's turn to the academic writing I'm going to ask of you within this course, which I'm really excited to read as much of as I can. I'm asking you to embark on, on the following kinds of academic writing, a critical review. This is where you read someone else's work and you write a critical review of it. It can be a positive critical review or a negative critical review, or a combination but it's thinking about what the potential uses and limits of a particular text are for. And that's helpful for other readers who might be considering reading something or who need that work to think about it in particular contexts. I'll also be inviting you to work on an explication of a visual image. This will further help you strengthen your critical reading and writing skills . The use of visuals is really increasingly important. And so I, I thought it was of key importance for you to spend time thinking about how you work with a visual image. And, and what it how you write about a visual image. I will also be asking you to do a case study. All of these major writing projects, the critical review, the explication of a visual image, the case study and the Op-Ed, those four top projects right there, those are all projects that you are going to do from thinking about a particular area of expertise. So, you'll choose something that you want to become more expert at. And then, you'll engage in this kind of academic writing about it. So, a case study is where you choose somebody or something that exemplifies an expert in that particular area. And you think about how and why they have become an expert, what it means to be an expert in that field. Case studies are very important for a number of different disciplines so it'll be giving you experience towards that, too. And then, finally, another kind of academic grading you'll be doing for your fourth major project will be an Op-Ed, which is opposite the editorial page. It stands for contributing an extended opinion, an extended and well-researched and well-reasoned opinion about, about a current matter for, for a larger kind of audience. And then, in addition to that, the other writing, probably the writing that will occupy your attention and energy even more than those other four, will be the self reflections about your own writing processes. And your own thinking about yourself as a writer that you're going to be doing with each project, and throughout the course. The discussion forums, where you're going to be engaging in, in debates and conversation and ideas, with, with each other. That's going to be the key. And then, offering peer response. I'll say this a number of times throughout the course. But reading other peoples work makes you a better writer. So, the peer response to one another's drafts is key for, for this course. And it will constitute part of your academic grade. So, I'm very excited to read your academic writing and think about academic writing with you, and maybe even come up with other examples and other definitions of academic writing as we move forward. Thanks.
