Academic Writing

Course Description

Academic writing is both a tool and an art that grounds intellectual projects within texts to explore, develop, and communicate ideas. Effective writing, at its best, offers a powerful window into the complex ways individuals are entangled with social processes, and can direct, as relevant, attention to social injustice and imaginative alternatives. This course provides a constructive space where students develop the insight and skill of academic writing through critical readings and hands-on practices of in class and take-home assignments. Throughout the course of the semester, we will read exemplary academic writing, critiques of academic writing, critiques of the critiques, as well as practical writing advice and strategies. As well, students will work on a set of writing tasks and engage in a ¿peer review¿ process to provide careful comments and feedback to one another during each assignment. Among the issues we will discuss are learning the structure and argumentation of a scholarly paper, engaging the literature, writing up and analyzing data, developing proses with clarity and precision, learning to write through close reading, tools to shape the texts, ethical and reflexive engagement, among others. This class is appropriate for graduate students in education, anthropology, sociology, and related social science disciplines. The goal is for students to develop a potentially publishable manuscript that may serve a range of anticipated tasks. Students are advised to have a working draft as a prerequisite for enrollment; both quantitative and qualitative writing projects are welcome in this class.

Code

ELP 591

Credits

3

Subject

Educational Leadership and Policy