Academic Writing: Reviews of Literature

The format of a review of literature may vary from discipline to discipline and from assignment to assignment. A review may be a self-contained unit -- an end in itself -- or a preface to and rationale for engaging in primary research. A review is a required part of grant and research proposals and often a chapter in theses and dissertations. Generally, the purpose of a review is to analyze critically a segment of a published body of knowledge through summary, classification, and comparison of prior research studies, reviews of literature, and theoretical articles.

University of Wisconsin (2003). Academic>Writing>Style Guides

Advanced Professional Writing

English 515 is designed for undergraduates and graduates interested in professional writing for both print and electronic publication. Students learn to produce documents and coordinate writing projects, study and apply principles of document design and electronic publication using appropriate application software, and work in teams in computer-networked environments. Students will work both individually and collaboratively as they document, utilize and analyze writing practices, literacy tools, and research methodologies.

Salvo, Michael J. Purdue University (2004). Academic>Courses>Writing>Business Communication

Advice on Research and Writing

A collection of advice about how to do research and how to communicate effectively (primarily for computer scientists).

Leone, Mark. Carnegie Mellon University (1998). Academic>Writing>Research

An Approach for Applying Cultural Study Theory to Technical Writing Research      

When the idea of culture is expanded to include institutional relationships extending beyond the walls of one organization, technical writing researchers can address relationships between our power/knowledge system and multiculturalism, postmodernism, gender, conflict, and ethics within professional communication. This article contrasts ideas of culture in social constructionist and cultural study research designs, addressing how each type of design impacts issues that can be analyzed in research studies. Implications for objectivity and validity in speculative cultural study research are also explored. Finally, since articulation of a coherent theoretical foundation is crucial to limiting a cultural study, this article suggests how technical writing can be constituted as an object of study according to five (of many possible) poststructural concepts: the object of inquiry as discursive, the object as practice within a cultural context, the object as practice within a historical context, the object as ordered by language, and the object in relationship with the one who studies it.

Longo, Bernadette. Technical Communication Quarterly (1998). Academic>Research>Cultural Theory>Technical Writing

Avoiding Plagiarism

Academic writing in American institutions is filled with rules that writers often don’t know how to follow. A working knowledge of these rules, however, is critically important; inadvertent mistakes can lead to charges of plagiarism, or the unacknowledged use of somebody else’s words or ideas. While other cultures may not insist so heavily on documenting sources, American institutions do. A charge of plagiarism can have severe consequences, including expulsion from the university. This handout, which does not reflect any official university policy, is designed to help writers develop strategies for knowing how to avoid accidental plagiarism.

Purdue University (1997). Academic>Writing>Ethics>Plagiarism

Business Writing

This course is designed for students who expect to write in their future employment. Successful employees know how to communicate clearly and effectively, changing writing style and content for varying audiences and purposes. This class will focus on the difficult task of meeting readers' needs while simultaneously representing your best interests and those of your employer. To meet that end, the assignments will cover a variety of tasks produced under different circumstances, some done quickly during class and some polished and perfected over time. Students completing the semester's work should see a visible improvement in their writing, especially in terms of clarity and precision.

Roy, Debopriyo. Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (2005). Academic>Courses>Writing>Business Communication

Business Writing

This course provides an introduction to business writing, which includes business reports, memos, and letters; this course is particularly appropriate for students in business and related areas, although it is open to students from any major. The course requires critical thinking, problem solving, attention to detail, ingenuity, and a significant commitment of time to complete the writing assignments.

Clark, Dave. University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2003). Academic>Courses>Writing>Business Communication

Business Writing

ENGL 420 teaches students the rhetorical principles and writing practices necessary for producing effective business letters, memos, reports, and collaborative projects in professional contexts. The curriculum is informed by current research in rhetoric and professional writing and is guided by the needs of business, industry, and society at large, as well as by the needs of Purdue students and programs.

Clark, Tracy. Purdue University (2003). Academic>Courses>Writing>Business Communication

Computers and Writing

The goal of this course is to foster a sophisticated understanding of rhetorical situation, style and arrangement. Writing for the electronic medium with its specific demands should reveal by contrast material aspects of the practice of conventionalwriting that may have been taken for granted. Technologies encourage certain kinds of thinking and behavior and discourage others. Writing has always been one such technology. The World Wide Web is not the introduction of, but a shift in, technology. Students will analyze, conceptualize and create websites with HTML and graphics without the use of WYSIWYG helpers. WYSIWYG programs can make website development easy; however, we will stay close to the actual code in order to get a better understanding of the medium.

Levy, Matthew A. University of Texas. Academic>Courses>Computers and Writing>Web Design

Description-Writing Exercises

Linked to this page are 6 high-school-level exercises that teach (through worked and scaffolded examples) how to write good technical descriptions. Also included is a set of description-writing guidelines on which these exercises depend. The summary table below links to two versions of each exercise: * A plain version suitable for classroom use as is, and * An annotated version that: * spells out the goal of each exercise and the writing issues that it addresses, * compares the exercise with others in this set, * suggests effective, relevant teaching strategies, as well as extended activities, and * notes the specific 1998 California English-Language Arts content standard(s) that the exercise most strongly supports.

Girill, T.R. STC East Bay (1999). Academic>Course Materials>Writing

Developing an Outline

An outline is: a logical, general description; aschematic summary; an organizational pattern; a visual and conceptual design of your writing. An outline reflects logical thinking and clear classification.

Purdue University (1997). Academic>Writing

Effective Business Writing  

An intensive training session on how to write clear, crisp, persuasive copy for letters, memos, proposals, reports, and other business documents.

Bly, Robert W. Bly.com. Academic>Course Materials>Writing>Business Communication

Effective Technical Writing

An intensive training session on how to write clear, crisp, technically accurate copy for letters, memos, proposals, reports, articles, papers, and other technical documents.

Bly, Robert W. Bly.com. Academic>Course Materials>Writing

Electronic Documents and Publications

English 413 presents principles of Web-based document design, creation, layout, editing, and posting to the Internet and on corporate intranets.

Jablonski, Jeffrey. UNLV. Academic>Courses>Undergraduate>Technical Writing

English 3301: Principles of Professional and Report Writing

The main objective of this class is to help you gain the skills needed to think through writing tasks, analyze the audience(s) involved, secure various types of resources, generate documents, and present those documents in an effective manner.

Garza, Susan Loudermilk. Texas A and M University (2007). Academic>Courses>Writing>Reports

English 515: Advanced Professional Writing

This course is designed for undergraduates and graduates interested in the professional writing and publishing of both print based and electronic documents. Through a variety of projects, we will cover advanced theories of document design, web-based publishing, educational media, information delivery, and multimedia production. The course is designed so that students will have opportunities to work on both electronic and print based projects.

Bay, Jennifer. Purdue University (2003). Academic>Courses>Writing>Business Communication

Ethics in Technical Writing  

Because the role of the modern technical writer and communicator is expanding rapidly and will continue to do so, the ethical scope of the technical writer's responsibility is comparably expanded too. The technical writer is now seen as an information developer in the formative stages of creating technical information, as a communicator in disseminating information, as an interpreter in explaining information, and as a usability expert in guiding the application of information. As a result, ethics becomes in involved in technical writing in many ways both traditional and new, obvious and non-obvious. In this course we will study the role of ethics in technical writing and communication at various levels. Ethics is the study of what is right and good, whether as abstract theories or as concrete actions, usually involving deciding a course of action in a dilemma offering several possibilities. Ethics here is understood broadly as encompassing both conventional theories of ethics and values and value systems.

Dombrowski, Paul M. SUNY Institute of Technology (2002). Academic>Courses>Ethics>Technical Writing

Explaining Processes  

Process explanations have become an important part of the workplace. However, professionals don’t create process explanations only for auditors. Process explanations are used to communicate sequential activities to a variety of audiences and for many different reasons. As Technical Communication, 5e illustrates in Chapter 12 (“Creating Process Explanations”), several forms of process explanations exist, though they have some common characteristics that you should be familiar with. In this exercise you will revise a set of detailed instructions into a process explanation. You have to decide what type of information is most appropriate for your audience and the purpose of your document.

Burnett, Rebecca E. Thomson (2001). Academic>Course Materials>Writing

The Extension of Technical Writing into Performance Consulting  

Perhaps the trouble for academic programs that teach workplace writing begins with the term 'technical communications.' Perhaps the trouble grows with those programs’ focus on the teaching of writing rather than on the development of professionals who bring complex, strategic writing/thinking processes into work communities.

Hile, Julie. CPTSC Proceedings (2000). Academic>Education>Writing>Technical Writing

Inquiry into Advanced Academic Writing

This course is designed to meet two objectives. First, it offers an opportunity for students to conduct a collective inquiry into the theory and practice of academic writing. Second, it allows students to practise, explore, and experiment with various strategies for enriching their own writing.

Artemeva, Natasha. Carleton University (2002). Academic>Courses>Writing

Introducción a la Escritura Técnica y Científica

Este curso presenta algunas estrategias generales básicas para la redacción de informes técnicos, tesis, comunicaciones a conferencias y artículos en revistas científicas. El curso está destinado a investigadores en ciencias básicas y aplicadas, estudiantes en las mismas áreas, e ingenieros y otros profesionales de orientación técnica.

Braslavsky, Julio H. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. (Spanish) Academic>Courses>Scientific Communication>Technical Writing

Introduction to Professional Writing

This course is designed to be an introduction to professional/technical communication as a profession and academic discipline. We will examine current issues, theories and practices, career opportunities, professional development, significant tools, and UNI's curriculum.

Williamson, William J. University of Northern Iowa (2003). Academic>Courses>Writing>Professional Writing

Introduction to Technical Communication

English 2309-Technical Communication-is an introductory course to the kinds of documents produced and used in business, industry, and technology. The assignments and the way they are evaluated reflect different audiences and purposes than those normally addressed in English 1301 & 1302. However, you should be reasonably proficient in the writing skills normally acquired in these two courses. We are a community of writers from various disciplines sharing our work and insights about writing with one another. This course is designed to create an environment in which you can develop and exhibit professional work habits. These habits include meeting deadlines, satisfying all assignment criteria, and attending class on a regular basis.

Chandler, John and Dean Fontenot. Texas Tech University (1995). Academic>Courses>Undergraduate>Technical Writing