Passive vs. Active voice

Taller especializado de inglés científico para publicaciones

académicasD.F., México

25 d’agosto al 12 de septiembre de 2014

PRINCIPLES OF ENGLISH-LANGUAGE ACADEMIC PUBLICATION

Background and Basics in Academic Researching and Publishing

This course• We developed this course for UNAM-Canada• It was given as a pilot in the summer of 2011• We have improved and refined the course each time

we give it• We are interested in your ideas and experiences in

the course• Significant progress will depend on your starting

point and your level of English language knowledge• We wish to apply our instruction to your

manuscripts• Let us know what difficulties you are experiencing• It is a pleasure to meet you and learn about your

research

A different language, a different culture• Publishing in a different language is also publishing in a

different culture

• In giving this course, we have discovered cultural differences in the approach to an academic paper

• What are the features of English-language papers?▫ Clear▫ Concise▫ Focussed▫ Structured▫ Attribution:

What is the contribution of the authors? What is being cited from other authors?

A different language, a different culture• English-language academic writing: clear and

concise

• All statements must be very clear, without ambiguity or vagueness

• The relationship of one idea to the next idea must be clear (and, however, therefore)

• Paragraphs and sections must be concise; they must contain all of the information needed to understand the context, but no more

• Is any information unnecessary? Can it be stated more simply?

Overview of English-language publishing

• Content of a paper is focussed

• The paper has a hypothesis or objective, usually stated at the end of the Introduction

• All of the information needed to explore this objective is included in the paper

• But no extraneous information is included

Overview of English-language publishing

• For example: the Methods (if included) must be complete so that the reader can understand exactly what you did and be able to repeat it. Common laboratory procedures can be cited (“according to Dilman”)

• Results include only the results pertinent to the objective. Tables and graphs are a good way to present results when possible.

• Full data may be provided on the journal Web site, but is not part of the paper.

Overview of English-language publishing• The focus of a paper is different from the focus of a

PhD (doctoral) dissertation

• Dissertation is much broader, treating many aspects of a research area

• A paper has one objective (hypothesis) only

• See other papers in your area to see how other authors have defined their objective

• Choose the focus of your paper, and include only the background, methods, and results relevant to that objective

Overview of English-language publishing• English-language papers must be structured• Scientific papers generally follow Introduction, Methods,

Results, and Discussion (sometimes separate Conclusion or Interpretation) — IMRaD for short

• Different structure for review papers• Even if the paper does not use IMRaD, there must be a

structure that is clear to the editors and readers• The same structure is followed in the abstract• Literature review is usually in the Introduction, although

sometimes in the Discussion. It should be brief, containing only what you need to understand the objective. It answers the question, Why did you do this research?

Overview of English-language publishing• It is all about your contribution to the

field….▫What is the authors’ original, unique

contribution?▫What did you do that is novel and different?

Why?▫It should be clear what your contribution is:

“This paper contends that...” “We found that...” “Our team discovered...”

▫Acceptable to use the first person “I”, “we”, “our team” to make this clear

Overview of English-language publishing

▫Conversely, make it clear when you use another researcher’s ideas or data (attribution)

▫Cite all ideas taken from other papers ▫Personal communications or unpublished data can

be cited in the sentence “but a recent report has found the radioactivity to be

elevated at the site (P. Cormorant, unpublished data).”▫ Ideas that are not cited are assumed to be your

ideas▫Ensure it is clear where an idea comes from:

“To test the accuracy of the model, we used the approach of Hicks and Johnston (2003)”

“The behaviour of the shock wave has been described by Eberlee (2005) …...”

Objective/hypothesis•Unique contribution of your paper, as

expressed in the hypothesis or objective

Objective/hypothesis•Last paragraph of introduction

▫Follows from rest of introduction▫Results and discussion refer back to this

statement •Abstract

▫Contains all elements of the paper▫Includes a clear statement of the objective▫First part editors read – may make decision

based on abstract; only part most readers ever read

•Cover letter▫Assures editor that there are no ethical issues▫“Sells” editor on the value of your paper

Objective/hypothesis•Strength of claim•How does your paper fill a gap in the

research or literature? If you can make a claim for the originality

and uniqueness of your paper, it is more likely to be published

“This is the first paper to...” “We used a unique approach...” – originality

may be in the method “This has never before been studied in the

Pacific.”

Objective/hypothesis

•But make sure you can make that claim “To our knowledge...” “As far as we are aware...” “While other studies have covered ... , our

paper is the first to explore ...”