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Writing Well

Writing Well. AGED 3142. Types of Writing. Creative Writing Goals: to entertain, provoke thought, or express an idea artistically Audience: usually general, possibly targeted Meaning: abstract and open to interpretation

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Writing Well

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  1. Writing Well AGED 3142

  2. Types of Writing • Creative Writing • Goals: to entertain, provoke thought, or express an idea artistically • Audience: usually general, possibly targeted • Meaning: abstract and open to interpretation • Style and format: open to creative discretion (submitted works generally follow MLA style) • Examples • Poetry • Lyrics • Short stories • Novels • Play/Movie scripts

  3. Types of Writing • Journalistic Writing • Goals: to inform or persuade • Audience: usually general, possibly targeted • Meaning: concrete and not open to interpretation • Style and format: structured according to AP style and various publications’ in-house style manuals • Examples • News stories • Feature stories • News releases • Editorial columns • Advice columns

  4. Types of Writing • Academic Writing • Goals: to demonstrate understanding of complex topics, to explore new concepts • Audience: usually an instructor, but other experts if work is publishable • Meaning: concrete and not open to interpretation • Style and format: structured according to various academic style manuals (Chicago, APA, MLA, American Society of Agronomists, etc.) and instructor’s directions • Examples • Essays and subjective exams • Class research and other project papers • Position papers and literature reviews

  5. Types of Writing • Scientific Writing • Goal: to share results of scientific investigation with various audiences • Audience: possibly expert, but possibly lay • Meaning: concrete and not open to interpretation • Style and format: structured according to various professional, academic, and University style manuals • Examples • Journal articles • Research proposals, theses, and dissertations • Popular science articles • Conference papers • Theoretical pieces

  6. Types of Writing • Professional Writing • Goal: to facilitate in-house and external communications in business settings • Audience: experts, executives, technicians, operators, and laypersons • Meaning: concrete and not open to interpretation • Style and format: structured according to business conventions and in-house style manuals • Examples • Letters, e-mails, and memos • Résumés and vitae • Sales and marketing proposals • Project reports • Final reports

  7. Types of Writing • Technical Writing • Goal: to facilitate in-house and external communications in a business setting • Audience: possibly expert, but possibly lay • Meaning: concrete and not open to interpretation • Style and format: structured according to various professional and in-house style manuals • Examples • Solicited proposals for grants and technical contracts • In-house proposals for project plans • Progress reports • Auditing and evaluation reports • Final reports • Technical descriptions • Instructions and training manuals

  8. Regardless of the genre… All good writing has some of the same characteristics.

  9. Good Writing Is Always the Result of Hard Work • Writing is a process, and good writing usually evolves over time • Often, writing becomes “good writing” during the revision part of the process • During revision, you should ask yourself: “Does my writing have the qualities associated with ‘good writing’”? • If those qualities aren’t there, REVISE

  10. Qualities of Good Writing • Appropriate for audience and purpose • Organized with a recognizable structure • Introductions and overviews • Supporting paragraphs that focus on one topic or supporting idea • Consistent in style, tone, and form • Consistent spelling, grammar, punctuation • Either informal or formal tone • Consistent structure of info (headings)

  11. Qualities, cont’d. • Clear message • No contradictions • No beating around the bush • Concise sentences and paragraphs • For general audiences (and print media), the best average sentence length is about 17 words • However, good writers vary sentence length around this average

  12. Qualities, cont’d. • Make every word count • Example • Wordy: He is a man who procrastinates • Concise: He procrastinates • Concrete language • Definite, specific, descriptive words and sentences • Example: • Vague: A period of unfavorable weather set in • Concrete: It snowed for 12 hours yesterday

  13. Qualities, cont’d. • Smooth • If you stumble over your own words, it’s a sure bet that someone else will • Read your writing aloud to yourself or to someone else • Let someone else read a draft

  14. You don’t have to be William Shakespeare • In the journalistic, professional, and technical writing that is the focus of this class, creativity is nice, but functionality is the key (think audience and purpose) • Don’t shoot yourself in the foot trying to be creative

  15. One Type of Writing: Proposals • Proposals are detailed offers to do work and can sometimes serve as contracts • Proposals are always informative and persuasive • They inform an audience of a plan to solve a problem • They persuade the audience that the plan is logical, effective, and efficient • They persuade the audience that the proposing organization is likely to do a good job

  16. Proposals • Proposals usually contain these basic sections: • Title page • Table of contents • Abstract or executive summary • Introduction • Background and overview • Situation analysis • Strategic plan or plans for solution • Plans for evaluation • Budget • Conclusion • References • Appendices

  17. Proposals • Proposals are formatted according to industry conventions and according to the request for proposals (RFP) • All proposals should look professional • Quality printing and binding • Quality graphics and photos • Eloquent choices in fonts and leading • Sensible layout • Good use of white space

  18. Proposal Styles • The writing and formatting styles of proposals (and other academic, scientific, professional, and technical writing) may depend on a professional style manual • APA (social sciences) • MLA (languages and communication) • Chicago (biological and physical sciences) • Some organizations have their own style manuals, and some RFPs include stylistic guidelines

  19. APA Style and Formatting • The Publication Manual of the APA provided guidelines on how to… • Punctuate • Cite sources in text • Format references pages • Paginate • Using running headers and footers • Display appendices • Etc.

  20. Citations • Any information that was not the result of the writer’s own thought process should be cited in a proposal • Citations add credibility to a persuasive argument • Citations demonstrate that the proposers have done their homework on the topic • Citations give credit to researchers and experts for their work • Citations help avoid problems with plagiarism, academic misconduct, and academic dishonesty

  21. References • APA style uses parenthetical citations (Author, date) • References should be written so that others can easily locate the source • They should include (in general) • Authors’ names, year, title of article, title of publication, volume and issue numbers, and page numbers. • The APA manual specifically describes formats for many types of references.

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