Publishing English
Lesson 4
USTC School of Management
Spring 2017
Teacher: Dr. Murray Sherk
Course Website:
http://staff.ustc.edu.cn/~msherk
(Click on the “Publishing English” link.)
Lesson 4 Outline
•
•
•
•
•
Review of Lesson 3
Round 2 Workshops, sign-up during break
Proof-reading: Weasel words
More guidelines & rules for good writing
Preview of exam
– Exam June 2? May 19?
Lesson 3 Review:
Advice from Dean Yu Yugang
• Academic contributions are the most
important ingredient for publishing success
Interesting types of contributions:
• counterintuitive findings – where common
sense is misleading
• generalization – wider application to
different cases, including about limits of
where techniques work
Lesson 3 Review:
Advice from Dean Yu Yugang
• Theory is better than examples.
– Case studies, surveys, etc. are good but a
general theoretical proof is better
– Theorems are better than observations
Lesson 3 Review:
Advice from Dean Yu Yugang
• Highlight your contributions
• As you write your paper, make a research
question list, then choose the best
question for your next paper.
• Make friends with peers
– Discuss results, borrow ideas, get them to
assess the quality of your ideas
Lesson 3 Review:
Advice from Dean Yu Yugang
• “Referees are always correct” (!?!?)
– At least, their comments are always useful
• From their point of view, their comments
are true.
• If you think those comments are wrong,
that tells you that your presentation was
not good enough for an expert to
understand… Rewrite!
Lesson 3 Review: “Good” papers
• Significant differences exist between great
papers - No magic formula for success!
• What do people care about the most?
– Check target journal for basic requirements
– Editors can be very picky! What may seem
optional to you, may be vital to them.
• Three points of view about good papers
Lesson 3 Review: “Good” papers
Editors look for…
• relevance, significance, originality,
professionalism
Reviewers (referees) look for…
• correctness, clarity, originality, significance,
attention to details (reliability), difficulty
Readers look for…
• clarity, precision, readability, applicability,
reliability
Lesson 3 Review:
Guidelines & rules for good writing
Successful research writers need…
• perseverance (don’t get discouraged)
• tenacity (follow a plan to succeed)
• cogency (learn to communicate)
– clarity (in writing), logic, coherence, plainness,
simplicity, clear thought, precision
Lesson 3 Review:
Guidelines & rules for good writing
“Science is as much an act of persuasion as
it is an act of discovery. Once you've made a
discovery, you have to persuade experts that
you've made a legitimate, meaningful
contribution….
“You have to consciously minimize the
amount of time and cognitive pain it takes for
[readers] to realize you've made a [worthwhile]
discovery.”
Dr. Matthew Might
Lesson 3 Review:
Guidelines & rules for good writing
Rules from two expert sources:
• [SSW3] Place the person or thing whose "story"
a sentence is telling at the beginning of the
sentence, in the topic position.
• [SSW5] Articulate the action of every clause or
sentence in its verb.
• [BCG1] Make main characters subjects.
• [BCG2] Make important actions verbs.
We’ll look at other rules in Lesson 4.
Lesson 3 Review:
Guidelines & rules for good writing
“The outsourcing of high-tech work to Asia by
corporations means the loss of jobs for many
middle-class American workers.”
• Main characters? corporations, workers
• Actions? (Nouns that should be verbs?)
– outsourcing  outsource. Corporations outsource
– loss  lose. Workers lose
“Many middle-class American workers are losing
their jobs because corporations are outsourcing
their high-tech work to Asia.”
Lesson 3 Review: Software for writing
Tools of the trade: Software (and other stuff) that
helps us write well
• Mind mapping, Concept maps (cMapTools)
• MS Word (or similar word processor)
– Tools within MS Word: Spellcheck, grammar check,
thesaurus
• Grammarly
• EndNote
• Checklists
– Personalized (What do I often do wrong?)
– General (What are common weaknesses?)
A quick word about EndNote
• A useful reference/citation keeping system
• The system helpfully gives you access to
its huge library of references…
• …but you may have to edit the entries the
system gives you!
• Bad entries  improper citations
“We use ABC method (F. Jones, 2010) to…”
– (in-text citations should not have initials)
Lesson 4 Outline
•
•
•
•
•
Review of Lesson 3
Round 2 Workshops, sign-up during break
Proof-reading: Weasel words
More guidelines & rules for good writing
Preview of exam
– Exam June 2? May 19?
About Workshops
Workshops will be on:
• March 24, 31, April 7, 14, 21 (Round 1)
– Each student was in one of these.
• May 5, 12, 19, 26 (Round 2)
– All students are welcome to be in one.
– Required to attend one: Adeel, Ahmed Ali,
Ahsan Ali, Alex, Ali Sial, Faisal, Hameed,
Ikram, Kashmala, Khusbu, Naeem, Salman,
Zahid
– As usual, those not in a workshop that week
must email a 200-word report of their activity.
What goes on in a Round 2 workshop?
• Taking turns with each student, I work
with you each individually.
– 2 students could request to have me work
with them together, combining their time
• I edit the paper and/or answer your
questions.
• No group work or discussion
• Each of x students gets 120/x minutes
Lesson 4 Outline
•
•
•
•
•
Review of Lesson 3
Round 2 Workshops, sign-up during break
Proof-reading: Weasel words
More guidelines & rules for good writing
Preview of exam
– Exam June 2? May 19?
Proof-reading and Editing
• Definitions of these terms are fuzzy
– proof-reading can be thought of as a type of
editing
This course views the terms as distinct ideas:
• Editing gets the English correct.
• Proof-reading makes the paper’s wording
elegant, logical, and stylish.
– Example: Get rid of weasel words!
What is a weasel?
• small, quick animal
• hard to catch,
slippery
• difficult to “pin down”
• “He’s a weasel” =
“He cannot be
trusted.”
Weasel words and bad writing
• Source:
– http://matt.might.net/articles/shell-scripts-for-passivevoice-weasel-words-duplicates/
• “Weasel words” = text that “sounds good”
without conveying much information
• Weasel words obscure precision!
– They make the meaning fuzzy, not clear!
– “Hard to catch”
Weasel words: Salt and pepper
• Salt and pepper words
– “seem” like technical words but convey nothing
• E.g.: various, a number of, fairly, quite
– “We used various methods to isolate four
samples.”
– “We isolated four samples.”
– Any difference in meaning? Multiple methods?
– “We used methods 1 and 2 to isolate four
samples.”
Weasel words: Salt and pepper words
• “It is quite difficult to find a solution.”
• “It is difficult to find a solution.”
– “difficult” is subjective, be careful…
– “quite difficult” is very subjective, a bad idea
– If you are talking about your own effort, “quite
difficult” is terrible! Do not whine or boast.
– Is it provably difficult (e.g. mathematical proof
of time required to run an analysis)? [OK]
– Is it just “hard for me to figure out”? [Bad]
Weasel words: Salt and pepper words
• “It is quite difficult to find a solution.”
• “It is difficult to find a solution.”
– Do not whine or boast.
– Distinguish between provably difficult (e.g.
mathematical proof of time required to run an
analysis) and “hard for me to do”
– An even better way for the sentence above?
• “All published methods require exponential
time to find a solution.” [Note the precision!]
Weasel words: Beholder words
• Beholder words
– imply that all readers should agree with your
judgment - “judgment calls”
– have different meaning for different readers
• E.g.: interestingly, surprisingly,
remarkably, clearly
• Subjective but often acceptable: difficult,
easy, facile, simple, high, low, efficient
– Ok if criteria/reasons are given
Weasel words: Beholder words
• Beholder words
– imply that all readers should trust you and agree
with your judgment – pure “judgment calls”
– have different meaning for different readers
• “False positives were surprisingly low.” (bad)
• “False positives were low.” (acceptable)
• “False positives were low (3%).” (good)
Weasel words: Beholder words
• Beholder words
– imply that all readers should agree with your
judgment - “judgment calls”
– have different meanings for different readers
• Peer reviewers do not like it when an author
forces a judgment on them.
– “My result is extremely valuable.”
Weasel words: Lazy words
• Lazy words avoid quantifying something, and
instead give a vague, qualitative idea.
• E.g. very, extremely, several, exceedingly,
many, most, few, vast
• “The adverbs ‘very’ and ‘extremely’ are never
excusable in technical writing. Never.”
– Matthew Might
Weasel words: Lazy words
• Lazy words avoid quantifying something,but
instead give a vague, qualitative idea.
• E.g. very, extremely, several, exceedingly,
many, most, few, vast
• “The results match very closely.”
• “The results match closely.”
– OK if you specify the criteria for “close” or its
meaning is generally understood in your area.
Weasel words: Adverbs
• “We present a completely new method.”
• “We present a new method.”
• “new” is reasonably objective
– (But is a 2-year-old result “new”?)
• “completely” is subjective and debatable
– How “new” does something have to be to be
called “completely new”? Nobody knows!
Weasel words: Adverbs
• “I’d even go so far as to say that the
removal of all adverbs from any technical
writing would be a positive for my newest
graduate students. (That is, new graduate
students weaken a sentence when they
insert adverbs more frequently than they
strengthen it.)” - Matthew Might
• But good writers DO use adverbs
effectively – Use them wisely
Matthew Might’s list of weasel words
•
•
•
•
•
few, several, many, tiny, huge, vast,
excellent, various
are a number [of], is a number [of]
very, quite, extremely
clearly, completely, fairly, exceedingly,
interestingly, largely, mostly, relatively,
remarkably, significantly, substantially,
surprisingly
Murray’s list of weasel terms
• “in order to”, “so as to”
– Just use “to”. “To analyze the data, we used…”
• “various”, “a variety of”
– Just specify how many, even approximately
• “in Table 3 below”, “in the following Table 3”
– Just use “Table 3” if it immediately follows
• “such as x, y, and z, etc.”
– redundant. Use “such as” or “etc.”, not both
Guidelines about weasel words
• Be as objective and precise as possible.
– When you intend to give a subjective opinion,
give the criteria for judgment.
• Replace/delete words that add vagueness
instead of precision.
– You really are just guessing? Admit it with
appropriate wording
• Ask yourself if a shorter version of the text
can convey the same information.
BUT…………!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• Experts agree that good writing is not a
matter of following “rules”!
• Good writers often “break the rules” to get
certain effects.
• The guidelines tell us where there MIGHT
be problems or room for improvement.
• Disobey the guidelines only if you know
what you’re doing and intend to do so.
Guideline Checklists
• Remind us what to look for or to do
Example checklist items:
• Are my adverbs useful and precise?
• Search for “is” / “are” sentences. Can they
be changed to put more info in verbs?
General checklist vs. Personal checklist
• Personal is customized for your benefit
Lesson 4 Outline
•
•
•
•
•
Review of Lesson 3
Round 2 Workshops, sign-up during break
Proof-reading: Weasel words
More guidelines & rules for good writing
Preview of exam
– Exam June 2? May 19?
Passive voice and active voice
Passive: We don’t know who/what did it.
• “The survey was distributed in May 2015.”
• “The results were analyzed.”
• “It is known that the problem is intractable.”
Active: The agent (“doer”) is specified.
• “We analyzed the results.”
• “Cook (1983) proved the problem is intractable.”
Passive voice or active voice?
Which is better?
Standard advice for general writing:
• “Use active voice” for more interest
Old standard advice for academic writing
• “Use passive voice because who did it doesn’t
usually matter.”
Passive voice or active voice?
Standard advice for general writing:
• “Use active voice” for more interest
Old standard advice for academic writing:
• “Use passive voice because who did it doesn’t
usually matter. If the agent matters, specify it
with ‘by <agent>’.”
Modern standard for academic writing:
• “The passive voice is bad when it hides relevant
or explanatory information.”
Passive, “by”, and active
“Termination is guaranteed on any input.”
• Relevant information is missing
“Termination on any input is guaranteed by the
finite state-space.”
• We know what does the guaranteeing
“The finite state-space guarantees termination on
any input.”
Which do you like best?
Passive, “by”, and active
“Termination is guaranteed on any input.”
• Relevant information is missing
“Termination on any input is guaranteed by the
finite state-space.”
• We know what does the guaranteeing
“The finite state-space guarantees termination on
any input.”
• This version feels best – concise, clear.
Which do you like best?
Passive, “by”, and active
“The survey was distributed in June 2016.”
• We don’t know who distributed it, or how.
“The survey was distributed in June 2016 by
email.”
• Here “by” specifies how it was distributed, but
not who distributed it. (different use of “by”)
“We distributed the survey by email in June 2016.”
• Does it help to specify that it was “we”?
Which do you like best?
Passive is good when the agent really
does not matter!
Guidelines:
1. Is the agent relevant but unclear?
2. Does the text read better with the
sentence in active voice?
• 2=yes & 3=yes?  Use active.
• 2=yes & 3=no?  Specify agent with “by”
Passive is good when the agent really
does not matter!
Guidelines:
1. Is the agent relevant but unclear?
2. Does the text read better with the
sentence in active voice?
3. Look for passive voice.
– What further information could be given if
you used active voice?
– Can the writing be more concise with active?
How do we find passive voice?
Look for:
am, are, were, being, is, been, was, be
followed by a verb
(often a verb ending in “en”)
E.g. “is taken”, “are eaten”, “were mixed”, “is
split”
Formal vs. informal
Too informal:
• “a lot of”
– Use “many” (?) or a more accurate number
• “nowadays”
– Use “currently”
• Contractions: don’t, isn’t, can’t, it’s, we’ll…
– Use the words: do not, is not, cannot, it is, we
will…
– Possessives are ok: consumer’s, consumers’
Formal vs. informal
Usually considered too formal and “stuffy”
• “heretofore”
• “hereafter”
(Makes you sound like you’re trying too hard)
Use verbs that are more interesting
than “is” and “are”
• (Workshop 1.3 supplementary assignment)
• Find and change sentences of form “x is y”
and “x are y”.
– is/are: uninteresting verbs and sometimes part
of weasel word phrases
– Can the sentence be rewritten so the verb has
more information?
Why is the second version better?
• “Recent results which contradict previous
published papers and claim to change the
current paradigm that has worked so well for
the past 20 years should be evaluated
carefully.”
• “Some recent results contradict previous
published papers and claim to change the
current paradigm. Such results should be
evaluated carefully because the paradigm
has worked very well for the past 20 years.”
Why is the second version better?
• “Recent results which contradict previous published papers and
claim to change the current paradigm that has worked so well for the
past 20 years should be evaluated carefully.”
• “Some recent results contradict previous published papers and
claim to change the current paradigm. Such results should be
evaluated carefully because the paradigm has worked very well for
the past 20 years.”
•
•
•
•
More info in verbs. Main verb(s) closer to front
Avoids long noun phrase as subject of sentence
Gets to the point faster
Breaks the information into more manageable
chunks and clarifies reasoning (“because”).
Avoid overly long noun phrases
• (Workshop 1.5 supplementary assignment)
• Look for sentences where the grammatical
subject or object is a noun phrase of more
than 5 words.
• up to 10 words in noun phrase: usually OK
• 11-15 words: questionable
• >15 words: No. Rephrase the sentence,
maybe making it two sentences.
What is wrong with this sentence?
• “In order to verify that the survey did not
suffer from common method bias, an
analysis using Harman’s single factor test
was performed.”
Put verbs near the front of the sentence
• (Usually this is worst when there are long noun
phrases but it can happen in other ways too.)
• “In order to verify that the survey did not suffer
from common method bias, an analysis using
Harman’s single factor test was performed.”
• “We performed a Harman’s single factor test to
verify that the survey did not suffer from
common method bias.” [uses “we”- ok]
• “Analysis by Harman’s single factor test verified
that the survey did not suffer from common
method bias.” [avoids “we”, better focus]
Avoid vague pronouns
• Use pronouns like “it”, “they”, “that”, and
“which” only when there will be no doubt in
the reader's mind what things they refer to.
When in doubt, name the thing specifically.
• What you mean may be clear to you but
not to your readers.
• “John likes golf and football. It is
challenging.”
– Specifically, what is challenging?
Specify the nouns instead of using
vague pronouns
• “John likes golf and football. It is
challenging.”
• “John likes golf and football. Golf is
challenging to him.”
• “John likes golf and football. He finds
football to be challenging.”
• “The fact that John likes both golf and
football is challenging.”
Avoid vague pronouns
• Use pronouns like “it”, “they”, “that”, and “which” only
when there will be no doubt in the reader's mind what
things they refer to. When in doubt, name the thing
specifically.
• “We used interpolation and recursion in
the analysis, which reduced the difficulty.”
• “We used interpolation and recursion in
the analysis, a combination which reduced
the difficulty.”
Do not try to eliminate all ambiguity
• Only rarely can we write something that avoids
all possible confusion.
• Trying to be perfectly precise (e.g. eliminating all
pronouns) results in clunky, inelegant writing.
• Just be reasonably clear, remembering that your
readers are not as familiar with this are you are.
– A meaning that is “obviously nonsense” to you may
look ok to them.
– They may see more possibilities than you do!
• Clever use of plural/singular can clarify meaning
Blindly specifying all nouns results in
clunky writing
• “John likes golf and football. Liking golf
and liking football is challenging to him.”
– awkward, repeats words too often
• “John likes golf and football. Liking both is
challenging to him.”
• “John likes golf and football. His devotion
to those challenges his parents.”
– “both” and “those” refer to plural, therefore
give a specific meaning
Does the basic idea of the sentence
make sense and need saying?
• “For example, pollution of the environment
increases in the process of economic growth,
which indicates economic growth quality is
harmful to the environment.”
– Basic idea of first half: pollution is increased by
economic growth (= growth causes pollution)
– Basic idea of second half: economic growth hurts
environment (= growth hurts environment)
– Same idea? Is it worth pointing out that something
can “indicate” itself? Does that make sense?
Does the basic idea of the sentence
make sense and need saying?
•
•
•
•
“His high age indicates that he is old.”
“high age” = “old”
Do we really need to say both?
Is connecting “old” with “high age” worth the
space to write it?
• “He is old.” (ok, but is 50 old? 60? subjective!)
• “He is over 80 years old.” (much more specific)
List of Guidelines
• From 3 sources
– Article “The Science of Scientific Writing” that
you read for Lesson 2
– Book “Style: The Basics of Clarity and Grace”
– Others like Matthew Might and me
• Includes some I didn’t cover in class!
• On course website, look for link:
“Principles for Good Writing”
Lesson 4 Outline
•
•
•
•
•
Review of Lesson 3
Round 2 Workshops, sign-up during break
Weasel words
More guidelines & rules for good writing
Preview of exam
– Exam June 2? May 19?
Exam overview
• [Big part] Fix/improve this sentence
– Apply the guidelines
• [Big part] Explain why this text is bad
– Explain briefly (e.g. guideline, vagueness, or
logic problem)
• [<10] Short-answer questions
• [1 question] 200-word content question
– Write about your opinion or experience using
an academic journal style of formality
(Example) Fix/improve this sentence.
• “Last week, as the teaching of a lesson
was taking place on the part of Murray, a
lack of internet access occurred, causing
an implementation of alternative activity
execution.”
• “Last week, Murray was teaching a lesson
when internet access failed, so he did the
activities differently.”
(Example) Fix/improve this sentence.
•
•
•
•
•
•
“The return rate was remarkably good.”
Delete the weasel word “remarkably”.
Give criteria for “good”
“The return rate was good, almost 87%.”
“The return rate was almost 87%.”
(Even “The return rate was remarkably
good, almost 87%.” might be OK since the
number defines “remarkably”.)
(Example) Explain why this text is bad.
• “The survey was distributed in an email
message followed up by a telephone call.
It is a good method for getting results.”
• “It” is vague - could refer to the survey, the
message, the call, or the whole process of
an email followed by a call
(Examples) Short answer question
• “Name two writing tools that are NOT part
of Microsoft Word.”
• “Why is it bad to use the term ‘a lot of’ in
academic writing?”
(Examples) 200-word content question
• “Is it a good idea to schedule a time for
writing every day? Why or why not?”
• “What are the advantages and
disadvantages of the Microsoft Word spell
checking function?”
• Marking:
– Half for the accuracy of your answer
– Half for the writing quality of your answer
(including size 180-220 words)
When should we have our exam?
Options:
• Friday, May 19 in the morning
– 9:00am to 11:00am?
– 9:30am to 11:30am?
– (Note: We will still have a round 2 workshop
on May 19 in the afternoon.)
• Friday, June 2 in the afternoon
– 1:00pm to 3:00pm?
– 3:15pm to 5:15pm?
Homework
• Write a personalized editing checklist
– One page long.
– See more detailed explanation on website
– Email your checklist to [email protected]
before May 15
• Working on this counts as working on your
writing project and can be reported.
A final comment
• Why should you care so much about
writing well?
• Why does it have to be so hard?
• Why are journals so picky?
A few words on marketing your
research (from Matthew Might)
“A grad student's first impulse is to assume
that, as long as she tells the whole truth and
nothing but the truth, everything she writes
has to be accepted for publication.
But, there are a lot of true things.
Given the volume of submissions to top
peer-reviewed venues, there will always be
more than enough technically correct papers
to fill the venue.
A few words on marketing your
research (from Matthew Might)
The function of peer review has become to
decide which true things are worth knowing.
In that sense, peer reviewers are the
guardians of the scientific community's most
limited resource: our collective attention
span.
To market a paper, the author must make a
compelling case for why her idea deserves
access to that resource.”