Strategic Writing

Professoinal Writing Workshop

HU Yue

School of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University

Overview

• How to write a paper in a week
• How to write a paper that is publishable
• How to read (books)*

Writing a Paper
in a Week

Ref. Carr (2016)

When should you use it

• Goal
  • An above-B+ paper for a course
  • A qualified piece in a good/professional shape

• Before the week
  • Read the syllabus or whatever requirements
  • Finished the literature review (in person and/or with Large Language Models, LLMs)

D1~2: Framework

• Opening a new document in Word, or take a blank sheet
• Writing down the “creative” point(s) of the paper
  • A.k.a. the one or two sentences that you want the readers to get after reading the piece
• Writing the outline
  1. Figures and tables
  2. Basic frame

• Introduction
• Literature Review*
• Theory
• Method and Data

• Analysis and Results
• Discussion and Conclusion
• Reference (leaving this to the bibliography manager)

D3~5: Drafting

1. Writing out the main points of each section
   • Bullet points
2. Finishing the “Method and Data” section
   • Setup the terminology
3. Finishing the “Analysis and Results” section
   • Setup the major findings
4. Finishing the “Conclusion” section
   • Summarize the findings
   • Talk to the (broad) literature
5. Finishing the “Introduction” section
6. Give a good title of the paper

D6~7: Polising

1. Check for grammar, spelling, phrasing errors (w. LLMs)
   • English: Claude > ChatGPT > others
   • Chinese: Deepseek/Qwen > others
2. Remove LLM traces
3. Check the format of references

Key points

No procrastinate!

No more readings!

No backward editing and correcting!

How to write readable sentences

Strunk (1999)

Williams and Bizup (2014)

Clarity

• Make main characters subjects.
• Make important actions verbs
  • reduce nominalization of verbs.
• When to use nominalization:
  • As a short subject refers to a previous sentence
  • As a motivation (“the fact that” sb. does sth).
  • As the object of the verb
  • A concept so familiar to your readers

• The nominalization as a short subject refers to a previous sentence (e.g., these arguments, this decision.)
• The nominalization refers to “the fact that” sb. does sth.
• A nominalization names what would be the OBJECT of the verb, the “what” or “whom” of the verb.
• A nominalization refers to a concept so familiar to your readers that to them, it is a virtual character

Coherence

• Underline the first five or six words in every sentence, and check if they constitute a relatively small set of related ideas and if they name the most important characters.
• Use the topic as the subject, and put them at the beginning of the sentences.
• Don’t vary the subjects of the sentences frequently
• Change a little only when the same words for the same topic were times used in the same positions of sentences.
• Don’t overuse “and, also, moreover, another, and so on”, words that simply “Here’s one more thing.”
• Don’t use “but, however, therefore, or consequently” too frequently.

Elegence

• Revise long sentence
  • Get to the subject of the main clause quickly
  • Get to the verb and object quickly
  • Avoid sprawls (which, that, who + is/was)
  • Drop “although” with a long clause
  • Drop “since” with a long clause
• Balance
  • with coordination (and, or, nor, but, and yet)
  • without coordination but with similarly structure in each clause.
• Climactic Emphasis: leave heavy words at the end
  • Heavy: n. > a./ad. > prep.

Wrap up

• Preparation
• D1~2: construct the framework
  • Bullet points
• D3~5: drafting
  • The writing order matters
• D6~7: polishing
  • USE LLMs

• Key points
  • No wait
  • No read
  • No backward

Writing
a Publishable Paper

Ref. McEnerney (2014)

Mindsets

• You write to help think
• Don’t wait until you are thinking everything through to start writing
• A published paper needs “to be written (at least) twice”
  • You need to use two “languages” to write:
    • a thinking language (for you) and a reading language (for readers)
• You need to have a sense of writing to whom before starting

• Your teachers do not always give the “right” comments and suggestions
  • Paid for reading
  • Understand the world Evaluate you

You create the text through the horizontal process, but it is the vertical process that decides whether it works.

1. Slowing down
2. reread over and over (only you have/are forced to read)
3. misunderstand
4. Stop

Never reach the understanding-the-world level: some instructors may say “no, students’ work are amazing.” Lier! You can asked them back: “do you publish them? how often do you read a student’s paper when you don’t have to”

What is worth to read

Being valuable for the readers

• What’s valuable
  • What do you do, when somebody says s/he doesn’t understand you?
  • Why do you write for an academic paper?
    • To convey your thoughts, to build up the knowledge?

When a PhD students come to my office, saying that this is important! I have to write about it! What journal do you want to submit then? Why it matters? It matters because value is the key! The readers are the key! This is the problem caused by the examination in school: they do not teach you there are difference among readers

• What’s valuable

Are you describing something ABOUT? Does your paper describe the “about”? Is that what professional academic papers do? No, you may say, they are making arguments, are they different? No difference. The correct answer: is to tell YOU the question YOU have, and the solution

• What do you do, when somebody says s/he doesn’t understand you?

You explain it…Don’t do that Because what you explain is to reveal what inside of your head—no one care what’s in your head Only teachers want to know what in your head: because they are paid for it

• to build up the knowledge

No, it is not. it’s to change your readers’ ideas. “why should I think that”

The “right” goal to write

• Help the readers to understand what they want to understand better.
• To move the conversation forward

Who Are the Readers?

Nothing would be accepted to be knowledge until it is challenged by who are competent to challenge.

⇓

Peer-Review System

⇓

Readers who have the professional function to challenge a.k.a., editors and reviewers

Be aware

These readers DON’T trust you; they assume you are WASTING their time.

Myth of value

• Original is valuable
  • New knowledge is pretty easy to create
• Knowledge is valuable

• New knowledge

how many people in this room? Nobody else in the world knows—but they don’t care either.

• Knowledge

Ideally, knowledge is cumulative, the old stuff is always there like the left; but no, it is actually only a bunch of people deciding

In the western world, too male, too pale, too stale. (it’s changing, way too long, way too small, way to slow, but changing; but except for that this is the real world)

The boundary of the knowledge is permeable (things coming in and out)

Every community has its own codes

Version A:

About democratic regimes and public support, there are two possible relationships. One is that high levels of public support ensure democracies remain strong. The other is that experience with democratic governance generates robust public support. Some research find that countries with greater democratic support have been found to become stronger and more stable democracies and just the opposite. The others found that more experience with democracy yields more democratic support or instead that long-established democracies are suffering from democratic fatigue.

Version B:

It has long been argued that democratic regimes and public support for them are mutually reinforcing: that high levels of public support ensure democracies remain strong, and that experience with democratic governance generates robust public support. But the evidence for either part of this claim has been decidedly mixed. Countries with greater democratic support have been found to become stronger and more stable democracies and just the opposite. Similarly, studies have alternately found that more experience with democracy yields more democratic support or instead that long-established democracies are suffering from democratic fatigue.

Going through every article and circling every word in the writing that creating value to the readers. 15 min

What make the paragraph sound valuable

It has long been argued that democratic regimes and public support for them are mutually reinforcing: that high levels of public support ensure democracies remain strong, and that experience with democratic governance generates robust public support. But the evidence for either part of this claim has been decidedly mixed. Countries with greater democratic support have been found to become stronger and more stable democracies and just the opposite. Similarly, studies have alternately found that more experience with democracy yields more democratic support or instead that long-established democracies are suffering from democratic fatigue.

Tip

Codes of instability Codes of community

• Instability

Attention, challenge, contradiction, redflag

Not only grammarly flow/transition words but showing the tensions

• Community

“Making things organized”? No, showing there is a community. I have read your stuff, and I have something to say

Why saying some readers are wrong can get published? With the entering code: wow, you are smart, you are fabulous, you are contributive, but there is a little stuff

Risky, though: Saying you are great, but I have something new—why should I care about you?

A framework that journals want to publish

What you were taught

Background
⇓
Definition
⇓
What has been done
⇓
Your ideas
⇓
You make a contribution

A model of stability & continuity 👎

What you should write

Problem
⇓
Solution
⇓
Instability
+
Cost/benefit👍

Starting with a bad, serious problem—people love reading bad things (thinking about newspapers and movies)

• Using codes to show instability has a cost on them
• If it solves, there’s a benefit

A good literature review (LR)

LR for a course assignment: To show you are aware and understand

LR for a publishable piece:

Ego massaging;

+

Credibility;

+

Enrich the problem;

+

Showing the tension/gap
“Not only they are wrong, but also we are wrong if we use their ideas😱”

Knowledge contribution

If the knowledge is infinite,
then filling a gap means nothing!

Wrap Up

• Write twice
• Reader oriented
• Demonstrate values
• Use (community) codes

Next class

How exactly to organize sentences, paragraphs, and the document.

Thanks

  sammo3182

  yuehu@tsinghua.edu.cn

  https://www.drhuyue.site

Reference

Carr, Pete, dir. 2016. How to Write a Paper in a Weekend.

Christen, Kimberly. 2010. “How to ‘Gut a Book’ or the Best Advice My Grad School Advisor Ever Gave Me….” Personal blog. Digital cultures digital divide. September 13, 2010.

McEnerney, Larry, dir. 2014. The Craft of Writing Effectively.

Strunk, William Jr. 1999. The Elements of Style. 4th edition. Boston: Pearson.

Williams, Joseph, and Joseph Bizup. 2014. Style: The Basics of Clarity and Grace. 5th edition. Boston: Pearson.

How to read books

As a graduate-level reader (ref. Christen (2010))

You should read

The more you read, the better you can write

• Knowing the literature
• Reading has stronger influence on writing than writing does on reading
  • Reading something well before writing
• Impossible mission: reading everything word for word, line-by-line, taking diligent notes

Plan your reading

1. Read the Table of Contents
   • To get a map and where you should stop.
   • Learn (and write) descriptive chapter titles
2. Read the Index
   • Index sometimes works bettern than TOC or the introduction
   • It’s more “objective”
   • Take a note of the subjects you should pay attention to

Now you can make your reading plan: where to scan and where to scrutinize.

Reading the most important

1. Read the introduction
   • What to look for:
     1. Primary thesis
     2. Sub arguments
   • Pay attention to the “first-person” pronouns.
2. Read each chapter
   • What to look for:
     • The first few paragraphs/pages
     • Subheadings
     • The last few paragraphs/pages
     • If there are examples, read one or two to get a sense and skip the rest
   • Pay attention to the relations of them with the thesis

3. Read the conclusion closely
   • Review the links between the thesis and subarguments on your reading notes with that is described in the conclusion
     • If they have inconsistency, go back to the relevant chapters.
4. Final attention
   • Footnotes/endnotes
     • Scanning for words or arguments related to your work
   • Bibliography
     • Old names, repeated names, good sources

Wrap up

• Reading is more important than you think
• You should have a reading plan
• Strategically allocate your time of reading