英语学术论文写作纲要

Course Title: Effective Academic Writing in English: an Essential Guide Course Numbers: 1800000106 Type of course: Major compulsory Hours per week: 1 Credit: 1 Duration: 18 hours Text and Materials:

Aimin cheng, Shouhua Qi, Effective Academic Writing in English：An Essential Guide, 2010,

Shanghai Foreign Education Press, ISBN: 9787810956819

Course description:

Academic Writing is one of the key courses for university students majoring in English in China. This course is designed to help students learn how to write a course paper and/or a BA thesis and to lay a foundation for writing more advanced academic papers in English for their future career. The course is an essential guide to effective academic writing in English, by that it does not to cover every single one of all the important issues that are related to academic writing. That would have been a much more ambitious project with a much more comprehensive approach than has been adopted by the book.

Course contents:

Part 1 General features of Academic Writing

Chapter 1 Academic Writing: An Introduction

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Academic writing: A definition

Characteristics of Good Academic Writing

Good writing calls for critical reading and critical thinking Good writing involves thoughtful revision Good writing is directed toward an audience Good writing achieves a clear purpose Good writing expresses ideas clearly Good writing pluses with creativity

Chapter 2 Kinds of Academic Writing

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Writing to summarize Writing to synthesize Writing to explain

Writing to inform

Writing to explain processes Writing to explain

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Writing to Argue The logical Appeal The Emotional Appeal The Ethical Appeal

Five Basic Components

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Writing to propose Writing to analyze Writing to evaluate

Chapter 3 The rhetorical context and characteristics of Academic Writing  The rhetorical contest

Topic or subject Audience Purpose and role

 Characteristics of Academic papers

Part ⅡProcess of Effective Academic Writing

Chapter 4 Finding a Topic  Process of Writing

 Assessing your Prior Interest and Knowledge  Narrowing the Topic-Creating a Good Title  Techniques for Inventing

Free writing

Brainstorming Branching Cubing

Questioning or Journalistic Formula

 Generating New Ideas by Critical Reading

Chapter 5 Researching the Topic

 Field research

Observing Interviewing

Using questionnaire

 Library research

Taking notes Internet research

 Keeping track of your research  A six-step Approach to Research Chapter 6 Outlining

 The structure of a paper

 Storing out your notes and other Materials  Outlining

Draft Outline

Formal Outline

Two Commonly Used patterns of Formal outlines

Formulating the thesis statement

Chapter 7 drafting, Revising, Editing and Proofreading

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Drafting Revising

Revising for content and Organization-Macro-revision Revising for detail-Micro-Revision 

Final Editing and Proofreading

Part III Strategies for Effective Academic Writing

Chapter 8 organizing the paper

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Five basic Organizational patterns

General to specific/ abstract to concrete Specific to general /concrete to abstract Order of Important Chronological Order Spatial Order

Other Organizational Patterns

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Introduction

Narrative Descriptive Preparatory Corrective Inquisitive

Stating a problem

Giving a surprising fact or statistics

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Using a striking quote Conclusion

Restating the Main Points

Referring back to the thesis and the introduction

Suggesting a solution further study or predicting an outcome Giving a humorous comment or unexpected twist Using a striking or Memorable Quote

Chapter 9 strategies for Development

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Definition

Sentence definition Extended definition Historical definition Stipulate definition

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Classification

Choosing the principle to classify Testing the effectiveness Explaining each subgroup

 Example

Relevant examples Specific examples Sufficient examples Comparison and contrast

Points for comparing and contrasting

Two ways for organizing comparison and contrast Transitional words and phrases Course and effect

Distinguishing between cause and Effect Necessity, sufficiently and mill’s methods Organizing cause and effect analysis

Transitional words and phrases for cause and effect analysis

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Generalization Visual elements

Chapter 10 Use of Sources and Documentation

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Importance of Using and Documenting Sources Three Ways to Use Sources Styles of Documentation MLA Style

In-text Citation Explanatory notes List of works cited APA style

In-text citation

Explanatory Notes

List of References or Bibliography

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