Three ways to make academic writing more accessible to general readers
July 2, 2021 7:32 AM Subscribe
Joseph Reagle briefly makes three recommendations for writers of academic books "wishing to reach a wider audience and transcend common academic conventions and weaknesses": "balancing metadiscourse, pruning names, and sharpening theses".
They're all good amen corners, but my favorite corner is the point about "metadiscourse." In this chapter I will A, then B while showing how B interrelates with A, and then C, which I will more fully explore in the following chapter. In this following chapter I will blah blah blah.
It's always reminded me of realizing in high school that there was an art to bullshitting essays out, and that hitting assigned word counts was very easy with a bit of formal wheelspinning to amp up the verbiage. And then in college I realized: me, you've only reinvented the wheel. Academic writing has it tuned to a bone-crushing juggernaut.
posted by Drastic at 8:45 AM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
It's always reminded me of realizing in high school that there was an art to bullshitting essays out, and that hitting assigned word counts was very easy with a bit of formal wheelspinning to amp up the verbiage. And then in college I realized: me, you've only reinvented the wheel. Academic writing has it tuned to a bone-crushing juggernaut.
posted by Drastic at 8:45 AM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
I wasn’t sure what metadiscourse was, but now I can only think of Perd Hapley.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 8:47 AM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]
posted by Huffy Puffy at 8:47 AM on July 2, 2021 [9 favorites]
academic works feel they have to work in every person the subject ever met
My reading has been permanently warped by a casual assertion in a small history book that historians communicate with each other by which names they choose to omit. You have to be in the swim of a field to even notice that.
posted by clew at 8:50 AM on July 2, 2021 [16 favorites]
My reading has been permanently warped by a casual assertion in a small history book that historians communicate with each other by which names they choose to omit. You have to be in the swim of a field to even notice that.
posted by clew at 8:50 AM on July 2, 2021 [16 favorites]
Years ago Crooked Timber asked: "Which academic books are fit for human consumption? Or, to put it less polemically, which books written for academic purposes deserve, should find (or in some cases have found) a more general readership among intelligent people who are either (a) non-academics, or (b) aren’t academic specialists in the discipline that the book is written for." From those recommendations, I've read and enjoyed Aronson's The Social Animal and Cialdini's Influence and Linda Gordon's The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction and Natalie Zemon Davis's Return of Martin Guerre. That thread plus the 2007 Ask MetaFilter thread "What single book is the best introduction to your field (or specialization within your field) for laypeople?" gave me a lot of recommendations I've learned from. I should look back and see how those works compare to other academic stuff I've read on the three dimensions Reagle mentions.
jzb: What a shame! Do you remember what she said about what they are optimizing for?
Drastic: I'm not sure I understand you; are you saying that metadiscourse (laying out the plan of action before it starts) was BS/wheelspinning when you did it? I think at essay length it can be less necessary, but at book length it can become really useful for a reader to understand where things are going and set expectations.
posted by brainwane at 8:51 AM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
jzb: What a shame! Do you remember what she said about what they are optimizing for?
Drastic: I'm not sure I understand you; are you saying that metadiscourse (laying out the plan of action before it starts) was BS/wheelspinning when you did it? I think at essay length it can be less necessary, but at book length it can become really useful for a reader to understand where things are going and set expectations.
posted by brainwane at 8:51 AM on July 2, 2021 [13 favorites]
Ah yes and I also really enjoyed Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's A Midwife’s Tale.
posted by brainwane at 8:56 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by brainwane at 8:56 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
I am saying amen to what the article itself does.
Metadiscourse is useful, but it needs to be used with care and not to compensate for other weaknesses. and authors sometimes lean too heavily on forward and backward references to other chapters. The failure state of metadiscourse is BS and wheelspinning, and there's strong reason it's the very first of the three broad points covered.
posted by Drastic at 8:57 AM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
Metadiscourse is useful, but it needs to be used with care and not to compensate for other weaknesses. and authors sometimes lean too heavily on forward and backward references to other chapters. The failure state of metadiscourse is BS and wheelspinning, and there's strong reason it's the very first of the three broad points covered.
posted by Drastic at 8:57 AM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
There must also be kinds of weird writing peculiar to disciplines. For example, people who do analytic philosophy tend to have to write papers that anticipate and meet every little possible objection, so that a paper advancing some small thesis has to balloon up to some kind of weird legal-document-like thing. Now people from this field have written some fine books for the general reader, but not by writing like that.
posted by thelonius at 9:10 AM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
posted by thelonius at 9:10 AM on July 2, 2021 [5 favorites]
I had a philosophy professor, and over beers one afternoon, we talked about “publish or perish.” He said that in a lot of cases, one individual’s area of research is of real interest only to maybe one other person. He had found it easy to get published. He said there were journals out there looking for papers. Publishing was actually a way for one researcher to communicate to another researcher and get credit for publishing. Could the obtuseness of academic writing be an effect of merely talking to a very limited audience where the jargon and references are already known?
For me, personally, if I see a potential academic book, I pick it up, open to a random page and start reading. If it reads as academic, e.g. postmodern, I put it down. Ain’t worth my time. I saw a zoom presentation a few months back, where the author of a new book on avant grade film makers, started his presentation by first apologizing for the heavy academic tone of his book. Prior to the talk, I had found access to the opening chapter on the publisher’s website. It failed my test. I was actually surprised and impressed by his immediate, spontaneous apology!
posted by njohnson23 at 9:22 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
For me, personally, if I see a potential academic book, I pick it up, open to a random page and start reading. If it reads as academic, e.g. postmodern, I put it down. Ain’t worth my time. I saw a zoom presentation a few months back, where the author of a new book on avant grade film makers, started his presentation by first apologizing for the heavy academic tone of his book. Prior to the talk, I had found access to the opening chapter on the publisher’s website. It failed my test. I was actually surprised and impressed by his immediate, spontaneous apology!
posted by njohnson23 at 9:22 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Going back to George Orwell's six rules for writing plain english is always a good idea. I'm particularly fond of number 6 because it encourages writers to trust their own ears in evaluating whether a sentence they've just written is either incomprehensible or just plain ugly.
posted by Paul Slade at 9:28 AM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
posted by Paul Slade at 9:28 AM on July 2, 2021 [7 favorites]
I'm... not clear what the problem is with metadiscourse in itself. The author says that it may be used in order to rectify problems of weak inherent structure, but we shouldn't forget that it is very possible for an academic work to still have the weak inherent structure without the rectification, which would be even worse. Conversely, if you have a strong inherent structure, there is still no downside to still having the metadiscourse.
Personally, as a lay reader, I actually find it useful and reassuring to find sentences like "the so-and-so aspect will be explored more fully in Chapter 8".
At least in my experience (engineering), most higher academic writing isn't trying to fluff up a word count. If anything, when there is a word count pressure at all, it is usually in the opposite direction; authors are conditioned by journal and proceeding publication demands to be brief. It may be different in the humanities, but I think one needs to substantiate claims that it's all about bullshitting because that sounds more like a reactionary take than a careful look.
posted by splitpeasoup at 9:30 AM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
Personally, as a lay reader, I actually find it useful and reassuring to find sentences like "the so-and-so aspect will be explored more fully in Chapter 8".
At least in my experience (engineering), most higher academic writing isn't trying to fluff up a word count. If anything, when there is a word count pressure at all, it is usually in the opposite direction; authors are conditioned by journal and proceeding publication demands to be brief. It may be different in the humanities, but I think one needs to substantiate claims that it's all about bullshitting because that sounds more like a reactionary take than a careful look.
posted by splitpeasoup at 9:30 AM on July 2, 2021 [14 favorites]
> "Could the obtuseness of academic writing be an effect of merely talking to a very limited audience where the jargon and references are already known?"
Well ... yes. That's why this is specifically for those academic writers "wishing to reach a wider audience". Most don't, and why should they? That's not their job -- it's the job of those who work in outreach, journalism, or popularization.
Having to, for example, carefully define and explain all the jargon, references to other researchers, equipment used, terms of art, etc. is both pointless and a giant waste of time if the people intended to read your work already know it.
posted by kyrademon at 9:37 AM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
Well ... yes. That's why this is specifically for those academic writers "wishing to reach a wider audience". Most don't, and why should they? That's not their job -- it's the job of those who work in outreach, journalism, or popularization.
Having to, for example, carefully define and explain all the jargon, references to other researchers, equipment used, terms of art, etc. is both pointless and a giant waste of time if the people intended to read your work already know it.
posted by kyrademon at 9:37 AM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
Hmm, I'm kinda torn on the subject. While I agree with the premise that accessibility should be a much stronger consideration than it sometimes appears to be, the concept of lay reader and how the information is presented to them can be tricky to navigate well.
There's a difference, for example, between making a work easier to parse and "enjoyable" to read that can sometimes lead to problems. The last suggestion in the linked piece on weak theses and verbs being one example. It may well be more pleasing to read strong, unhedged, or unnuanced claims than weak ones, but that if that strength is found in overstatement or by downplaying limitations, then the understanding gained may be misleading or the whole may be easier to reject for being too broad.
Informing the lay reader requires some works that serve as introductions to the field and go through the fundamentals assuming little previous knowledge, but the more complex arguments in the field may require the lay reader to have some additional outside knowledge to fully engage with the arguments being presented, some of which, due to their complexity, may require a layered metadiscourse to properly connect each link in a chain of inferences or assumptions.
But none of that is to say that there isn't a need to make works more accessible to the readers, even informed ones, since there are a lot of really unnecessarily difficult to parse works out there. If that difficulty isn't central to the argument itself, as it may be in some philosophical works, then it can lead one to wonder if its there to conceal some internal flaw instead.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:37 AM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
There's a difference, for example, between making a work easier to parse and "enjoyable" to read that can sometimes lead to problems. The last suggestion in the linked piece on weak theses and verbs being one example. It may well be more pleasing to read strong, unhedged, or unnuanced claims than weak ones, but that if that strength is found in overstatement or by downplaying limitations, then the understanding gained may be misleading or the whole may be easier to reject for being too broad.
Informing the lay reader requires some works that serve as introductions to the field and go through the fundamentals assuming little previous knowledge, but the more complex arguments in the field may require the lay reader to have some additional outside knowledge to fully engage with the arguments being presented, some of which, due to their complexity, may require a layered metadiscourse to properly connect each link in a chain of inferences or assumptions.
But none of that is to say that there isn't a need to make works more accessible to the readers, even informed ones, since there are a lot of really unnecessarily difficult to parse works out there. If that difficulty isn't central to the argument itself, as it may be in some philosophical works, then it can lead one to wonder if its there to conceal some internal flaw instead.
posted by gusottertrout at 9:37 AM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
I was actually surprised and impressed ...
You've reminded me of a snippet from a PG Wodehouse book I recently read. A character had just returned from an excruciatingly boring literary lunch and summed up the experience like this: "The blasted woman spent 45 minutes telling us how she'd come to write her book when a simple apology would have sufficed."
posted by Paul Slade at 9:39 AM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
You've reminded me of a snippet from a PG Wodehouse book I recently read. A character had just returned from an excruciatingly boring literary lunch and summed up the experience like this: "The blasted woman spent 45 minutes telling us how she'd come to write her book when a simple apology would have sufficed."
posted by Paul Slade at 9:39 AM on July 2, 2021 [21 favorites]
"If it reads as academic, e.g. postmodern,"
What
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:42 AM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
What
posted by MisantropicPainforest at 9:42 AM on July 2, 2021 [10 favorites]
This list is good, but I would also like to see authors use more examples to approach a conclusion from multiple directions before moving on. It always frustrates me when an argument is just a highly optimized chain of "because X, we can conclude Y" statements that even though they're all logically cogent back to front, it presents a very narrow path to follow and makes it hard to understand generalities.
Having to, for example, carefully define and explain all the jargon, references to other researchers, equipment used, terms of art, etc. is both pointless and a giant waste of time if the people intended to read your work already know it.
I think the problem with a lot of academic works is that authors don't really have a firm grasp on what someone else in their field even knows and because of that excuse a lot of unnecessarily obtuse things get published. As a reader, I don't think I've ever felt insulted or as if my time were being wasted to see things I already knew spelled out in a paper.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:50 AM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
Having to, for example, carefully define and explain all the jargon, references to other researchers, equipment used, terms of art, etc. is both pointless and a giant waste of time if the people intended to read your work already know it.
I think the problem with a lot of academic works is that authors don't really have a firm grasp on what someone else in their field even knows and because of that excuse a lot of unnecessarily obtuse things get published. As a reader, I don't think I've ever felt insulted or as if my time were being wasted to see things I already knew spelled out in a paper.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 9:50 AM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
I really liked this article - thanks for posting!
That said, metadiscourse helps me a lot as a reader - I appreciate getting to build scaffolding in my mind so I can keep track of where in the argument we currently are. This is even more important (maybe even crucial for me) in audio content; I basically have no chance of following along if there isn’t explicit metadiscourse to guide me. I don’t think metadiscourse is at odds with an exciting introduction or strong thesis, either.
Hard agree on the strong verbs and theses, though!
posted by chaiyai at 10:04 AM on July 2, 2021
That said, metadiscourse helps me a lot as a reader - I appreciate getting to build scaffolding in my mind so I can keep track of where in the argument we currently are. This is even more important (maybe even crucial for me) in audio content; I basically have no chance of following along if there isn’t explicit metadiscourse to guide me. I don’t think metadiscourse is at odds with an exciting introduction or strong thesis, either.
Hard agree on the strong verbs and theses, though!
posted by chaiyai at 10:04 AM on July 2, 2021
I almost didn’t rtfa because I thought it would be long and laden with passive voice. The latter being my pet peeve in academic writing. It makes sentences unwieldy and difficult to comprehend. Great article, and thanks for the upthread recommendations on “accessible” books.
posted by dbmcd at 10:48 AM on July 2, 2021
posted by dbmcd at 10:48 AM on July 2, 2021
Back in the day, say, Kant or Kierkegaard, it seems they spent 90% of their prose anticipating and heading off potential arguments that could be made against them. How about we just go to the 10% that is the actual point being made?
posted by StickyCarpet at 10:49 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by StickyCarpet at 10:49 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
You could throw all that stuff in the world’s longest appendix. It’d be even wilder than reading a Doris Kearns Goodwin book on Kindle where the book is over at 50% read and the rest is all endnotes and bibliography.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 11:15 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by Huffy Puffy at 11:15 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Sometimes, the work lacks an overall thesis, and each chapter is an independent piece on what could only be described as a theme.
That's where I start wondering, what is your point? What is the call to action? What should the reader do in response? Or are you just here to entertain us, and show off your ability to fill pages?
posted by StickyCarpet at 11:19 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
That's where I start wondering, what is your point? What is the call to action? What should the reader do in response? Or are you just here to entertain us, and show off your ability to fill pages?
posted by StickyCarpet at 11:19 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Tell a story and if you did the work write in the first person singular. (We is fine if there's a bunch of you). And don't get me started on the ridiculous, illegible formatting rules for many journals.
posted by bifurcated at 11:48 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by bifurcated at 11:48 AM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
I used to work with a guy who did Powerpoint presentations in a metadiscourse style. He'd start off with "This is a presentation that I often give to people to give them an introduction to..." and go on with "On this slide I usually talk about..." and "Now at this point in the presentation I like to take a moment to pause and point out that..." It was strange to me, but most people watching the presentations never noticed unless I called their attention to it. I'm not sure if was consciously adopted or just a habit.
posted by echo target at 11:51 AM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
posted by echo target at 11:51 AM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
I am not an academic. I make educational stuff (books, exhibits, etc) that are created for the broadest possible audience. For me, a big part of this was making my writing style more readable. It's pretty simple: use easier words and shorter sentences. I found that I had a lot of unnecessary stuff and needless complexity in my writing. Often, this stuff was there because I didn't have a clear point to make.
I think my writing became better. But I also really lost patience with a lot of academic writing. At times, I don't even know what is really being said, if anything. And I think a big problem is that it just isn't good writing. It is hard to write well, and maybe it isn't incentivized in academia.
It is fine if academia wants to produce impenetrable books. But it is kinda weird, because I assume books are made for a broader audience than journal articles. Also, often these books are given (comparatively) catchy names and enticing covers. University presses should stop doing this. Just make the title a 78-word run-on sentence like everything else in the book and put that on the cover in black and white.
posted by snofoam at 12:10 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
I think my writing became better. But I also really lost patience with a lot of academic writing. At times, I don't even know what is really being said, if anything. And I think a big problem is that it just isn't good writing. It is hard to write well, and maybe it isn't incentivized in academia.
It is fine if academia wants to produce impenetrable books. But it is kinda weird, because I assume books are made for a broader audience than journal articles. Also, often these books are given (comparatively) catchy names and enticing covers. University presses should stop doing this. Just make the title a 78-word run-on sentence like everything else in the book and put that on the cover in black and white.
posted by snofoam at 12:10 PM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]
None of the academics I know like the style they're forced to write in. It's not that they want it to be inaccessible. Their careers just require them to get published, and getting published requires them to prove their work is publishable.
Every academic article is written for an audience of exactly three: the journal editor, Anonymous Reviewer 1, and Anonymous Reviewer 2. And both of those anonymous reviewers are giving their unpaid labor to the journal editor, knowing their job is to act as gatekeepers. If you don't satisfy those two specific people in every exact way, your work doesn't get published and your career will suffer.
Or maybe I'm just cynical.
posted by meese at 12:48 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
Every academic article is written for an audience of exactly three: the journal editor, Anonymous Reviewer 1, and Anonymous Reviewer 2. And both of those anonymous reviewers are giving their unpaid labor to the journal editor, knowing their job is to act as gatekeepers. If you don't satisfy those two specific people in every exact way, your work doesn't get published and your career will suffer.
Or maybe I'm just cynical.
posted by meese at 12:48 PM on July 2, 2021 [6 favorites]
Also, often these books are given (comparatively) catchy names and enticing covers.
This reminds me of how I never got far enough into Gender Trouble to find out if Judith Butler ever talks about that intriguing cover photo of the boy and the girl in those frilly 19th century clown costumes. Tell me about the picture, Judith!
posted by theodolite at 1:06 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
This reminds me of how I never got far enough into Gender Trouble to find out if Judith Butler ever talks about that intriguing cover photo of the boy and the girl in those frilly 19th century clown costumes. Tell me about the picture, Judith!
posted by theodolite at 1:06 PM on July 2, 2021 [1 favorite]
Maybe not every book is intended for everybody.
And the best thing to get academic books to reach more people is to actually make them affordable first.
posted by MartinWisse at 1:17 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
And the best thing to get academic books to reach more people is to actually make them affordable first.
posted by MartinWisse at 1:17 PM on July 2, 2021 [8 favorites]
Maybe not every book is intended for everybody.
And the best thing to get academic books to reach more people is to actually make them affordable first.
Oh lord, yes. For all that we like to think academia is of great importance to a healthy society, we sure don't make finding out what is actually being discussed in the moment easy to do for anyone outside the university system. Finding the books and articles can be difficult enough, but the prices make access a complete joke in way to many cases. You'd think there'd be a public good in making sure everyone who wanted to learn what is being discussed in these vital public and private institutions so we could make use of the ideas to better our society, but I guess most of us just have to wait the 70 years to find out what was important today instead.
In the areas of the humanities I tend to read most, some of the most influential papers or books aren't exactly written for a general readership as they often are revising notions of influence within the discipline while offering a complex new conceptual approach to looking at a problem. Something like, say, Laura Mulvey's "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" uses a lot of psychoanalytic concepts modified to a feminist framework to communicate the ideas in the paper, which could be daunting or seen as gobbledygook to some readers, but the importance of the concepts sparked a vast amount of other writing, responding to, expanding on, challenging, and otherwise referencing the paper as a whole as well as a number of different individual segments of thought within it, which helped lead to other concepts and refinement within a range of disciplines.
It appears it is often both easier to summarize an important work for a general audience than it is to write it initially for them and some of the very things which make it difficult for the general audience may well be the things that spark the greatest interest within the community it is written for. Most academic works won't generate that much interest of course and it should be up to the writer to decide how best to communicate what they want to say rather than demanding adherence to any given form, but the responsibility of the academic author is or should be as much or more to bettering the knowledge in their chosen field of scholarship than to ease of reading for those outside that field. Translating that knowledge to the lay reader is often done better by those looking at the effect on the discipline as a whole for having some distance from the arguments.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
And the best thing to get academic books to reach more people is to actually make them affordable first.
Oh lord, yes. For all that we like to think academia is of great importance to a healthy society, we sure don't make finding out what is actually being discussed in the moment easy to do for anyone outside the university system. Finding the books and articles can be difficult enough, but the prices make access a complete joke in way to many cases. You'd think there'd be a public good in making sure everyone who wanted to learn what is being discussed in these vital public and private institutions so we could make use of the ideas to better our society, but I guess most of us just have to wait the 70 years to find out what was important today instead.
In the areas of the humanities I tend to read most, some of the most influential papers or books aren't exactly written for a general readership as they often are revising notions of influence within the discipline while offering a complex new conceptual approach to looking at a problem. Something like, say, Laura Mulvey's "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema" uses a lot of psychoanalytic concepts modified to a feminist framework to communicate the ideas in the paper, which could be daunting or seen as gobbledygook to some readers, but the importance of the concepts sparked a vast amount of other writing, responding to, expanding on, challenging, and otherwise referencing the paper as a whole as well as a number of different individual segments of thought within it, which helped lead to other concepts and refinement within a range of disciplines.
It appears it is often both easier to summarize an important work for a general audience than it is to write it initially for them and some of the very things which make it difficult for the general audience may well be the things that spark the greatest interest within the community it is written for. Most academic works won't generate that much interest of course and it should be up to the writer to decide how best to communicate what they want to say rather than demanding adherence to any given form, but the responsibility of the academic author is or should be as much or more to bettering the knowledge in their chosen field of scholarship than to ease of reading for those outside that field. Translating that knowledge to the lay reader is often done better by those looking at the effect on the discipline as a whole for having some distance from the arguments.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:57 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
"If it reads as academic, e.g. postmodern,"
What
Well, yeah.
Academic-style writing is leaden & jargon-laden because it's not popular-style writing. Many Postmodernists leaned into math-envy density for reasons of critique-defensibility and an aura of authority (the old philosophers lead the way, as mentioned above). Hey, I don't hate Postmodernism in itself, it's just a thing.
posted by ovvl at 7:01 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
What
Well, yeah.
Academic-style writing is leaden & jargon-laden because it's not popular-style writing. Many Postmodernists leaned into math-envy density for reasons of critique-defensibility and an aura of authority (the old philosophers lead the way, as mentioned above). Hey, I don't hate Postmodernism in itself, it's just a thing.
posted by ovvl at 7:01 PM on July 2, 2021 [2 favorites]
“Maybe not every book is intended for everybody.”
I am not a mathematician, so I would not be upset to pick up a volume in the Lecture Notes in Mathematics and find I don’t understand a word of it, but I would imagine it has value to mathematicians because it likely has something new to say about whatever it’s about. Same for books on specialized areas of classics or philosophy or plenty of disciplines.
But I tear my hair out when I see a slim book on a topic that sounds interesting and it’s priced at $150. That’s how to make academic work inaccessible, even to disciplinary specialists. Libraries can’t afford those prices, let alone individuals. A scholar might as well spend several years moving a pile of rocks from one place to another and back again, except that’s not a fruitless activity that counts toward tenure.
posted by zenzenobia at 8:36 PM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
I am not a mathematician, so I would not be upset to pick up a volume in the Lecture Notes in Mathematics and find I don’t understand a word of it, but I would imagine it has value to mathematicians because it likely has something new to say about whatever it’s about. Same for books on specialized areas of classics or philosophy or plenty of disciplines.
But I tear my hair out when I see a slim book on a topic that sounds interesting and it’s priced at $150. That’s how to make academic work inaccessible, even to disciplinary specialists. Libraries can’t afford those prices, let alone individuals. A scholar might as well spend several years moving a pile of rocks from one place to another and back again, except that’s not a fruitless activity that counts toward tenure.
posted by zenzenobia at 8:36 PM on July 2, 2021 [3 favorites]
I blame the publishers for a lot of this shit, and lazy academics. I just spend 3 weeks working stupidly long hours just formatting a book (with a broken leg) to meet the publishers' guidelines that often disagreed with each other, sometimes in the same document. The authors, who wrote their chapters without seeing each others' work supplied their chapters in a format (different fonts, obvious cut & pastes from different sources, no checking of their references) and I sort of understood their lack of effort because each author is getting a total of 40 euros for their work which will be used for them to have copies because they weren't being different copies. Then I had arguments with the authors advising them that they weren't meeting the publishers' requirements on using other academic work, because the authors said their work meet legal requirements (they did but the publishers have "higher standards" than legality).
And on top of that, these publishers (in the top 10 of academic publishers) invented their own referencing system that doesn't match up with any of the standard referencing systems that you can use software to monitor. The authors also don't understand about the need for a certain resolution for photos or diagrams (yes, a lot of the photos originally supplied were embedded in a Word document, and when you ask for something bigger, no matter how you word it, they just increase the size by increasing it the word document). Nobody seems to know you need en dashes between number ranges, and that with APA 7th anyway, you use em dashes without spaces between words.
I cost more to the editors preparing the book, sorting permissions, formatting, spell-checking, reference-checking etc than the publisher will pay for the entire book.
But the academics I work for need to have published a number of chapters, books & articles in a year for them to maintain their position at work. And they are supposed to research, teach and provide a certain amount of service to the community as well (workshops with relevant stakeholders, research in community groups etc). There is no way anyone can do all that in 40 hours a week, so I'll always be needed to make their writing look professional (even though they will argue with me (wasting both our time) about whether they should be using double or single quotes or italics. And I very very rarely suggest improving their writing style, even if it's ambiguous because they think they know best.
Whew, this is my first full week-end in 3 weeks and I just want to sleep. And then I'd like to write a stern email to the publishers who do have a template but it's 11 years old and Word won't work with it, plus the academics, who are very knowledgeable about their fields have no hope of applying a .dot template to their computers. And those damn contradictory guidelines, and I'm not permitted to deal directly with the publishers.
My boss bought me flowers after this particular job. I like my boss.
posted by b33j at 1:15 AM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
And on top of that, these publishers (in the top 10 of academic publishers) invented their own referencing system that doesn't match up with any of the standard referencing systems that you can use software to monitor. The authors also don't understand about the need for a certain resolution for photos or diagrams (yes, a lot of the photos originally supplied were embedded in a Word document, and when you ask for something bigger, no matter how you word it, they just increase the size by increasing it the word document). Nobody seems to know you need en dashes between number ranges, and that with APA 7th anyway, you use em dashes without spaces between words.
I cost more to the editors preparing the book, sorting permissions, formatting, spell-checking, reference-checking etc than the publisher will pay for the entire book.
But the academics I work for need to have published a number of chapters, books & articles in a year for them to maintain their position at work. And they are supposed to research, teach and provide a certain amount of service to the community as well (workshops with relevant stakeholders, research in community groups etc). There is no way anyone can do all that in 40 hours a week, so I'll always be needed to make their writing look professional (even though they will argue with me (wasting both our time) about whether they should be using double or single quotes or italics. And I very very rarely suggest improving their writing style, even if it's ambiguous because they think they know best.
Whew, this is my first full week-end in 3 weeks and I just want to sleep. And then I'd like to write a stern email to the publishers who do have a template but it's 11 years old and Word won't work with it, plus the academics, who are very knowledgeable about their fields have no hope of applying a .dot template to their computers. And those damn contradictory guidelines, and I'm not permitted to deal directly with the publishers.
My boss bought me flowers after this particular job. I like my boss.
posted by b33j at 1:15 AM on July 3, 2021 [7 favorites]
I can't offer useful advice on writing better to fellow academics but I would say, if you can volunteer to control the library budget it will pay dividends to you.
posted by biffa at 3:32 AM on July 3, 2021
posted by biffa at 3:32 AM on July 3, 2021
There are three main ways to make academic writing more accessible, and none of them are the tips in this article. They are
1. Actually give academics the time to learn to write, and then to write
2. Reward them for writing for multiple audiences rather than just the one
3. Dismantle academic publishing and stop relying on free academic labour to make a profit
posted by AFII at 3:50 AM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
1. Actually give academics the time to learn to write, and then to write
2. Reward them for writing for multiple audiences rather than just the one
3. Dismantle academic publishing and stop relying on free academic labour to make a profit
posted by AFII at 3:50 AM on July 3, 2021 [8 favorites]
Btw, I have the broken leg, not the book.
posted by b33j at 5:58 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by b33j at 5:58 PM on July 3, 2021 [1 favorite]
I am not a mathematician, so I would not be upset to pick up a volume in the Lecture Notes in Mathematics and find I don’t understand a word of it, but I would imagine it has value to mathematicians because it likely has something new to say about whatever it’s about.
I am a mathematician. A lot of math journal articles and books aimed at specialists are poorly written, and would be a heck of a lot more valuable to other specialists if they were written better. The causes do seem to primarily be the reasons AFII mentions, as well as general lack of training in communication (technical or popular).
(Math, in particular, is a very international discipline, though, so a lot of mathematicians are not writing in their native language. I think it is reasonable to put more responsibility on the reader in that context, so as to encourage global collaboration and not throw up extra hurdles to folks whose language didn't happen to become one of the dominant ones for such technical communication. There's some very well-written mathematics by folks who are writing in a second, third, or fourth language, but people with average language skills also deserve to participate in the creation of new knowledge in our discipline.)
posted by eviemath at 6:48 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
I am a mathematician. A lot of math journal articles and books aimed at specialists are poorly written, and would be a heck of a lot more valuable to other specialists if they were written better. The causes do seem to primarily be the reasons AFII mentions, as well as general lack of training in communication (technical or popular).
(Math, in particular, is a very international discipline, though, so a lot of mathematicians are not writing in their native language. I think it is reasonable to put more responsibility on the reader in that context, so as to encourage global collaboration and not throw up extra hurdles to folks whose language didn't happen to become one of the dominant ones for such technical communication. There's some very well-written mathematics by folks who are writing in a second, third, or fourth language, but people with average language skills also deserve to participate in the creation of new knowledge in our discipline.)
posted by eviemath at 6:48 AM on July 4, 2021 [3 favorites]
I would add to AFFI’s list: stop relying on publishers to vet academics for REF, tenure & promotion, etc.
posted by zenzenobia at 8:56 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by zenzenobia at 8:56 AM on July 4, 2021 [1 favorite]
Totally irrelevant: I once did some work for a mathematician or two amd they were terribly frustrated that I had to work in Word and not Latex (which means more errors) AND one of them, you can see his hands in the picture of paella on wikipedia (or at least you used to). I designed a birthday cake for Turing for Monash, and he used it in one of his Powerpoints
posted by b33j at 4:52 AM on July 6, 2021
posted by b33j at 4:52 AM on July 6, 2021
Oh, the silly things you can delight in when you come from the lower class and accidentally find yourself working with world-class scientists/paella cooks.
posted by b33j at 4:53 AM on July 6, 2021
posted by b33j at 4:53 AM on July 6, 2021
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I feel this so hard. I have the worst memory for character/person names in prose anyway, but I've found more academic works feel they have to work in every person the subject ever met.
Had a conversation a few years ago at a party with someone who worked in academic publishing and the topic of readability in academic books came up. Short version, she made it clear that was not a concern. At all. It's sad so much valuable research and human knowledge is buried under impenetrable prose.
posted by jzb at 8:31 AM on July 2, 2021 [4 favorites]