The Writing Resource Center at CWRU

Twitter Writing Tips Round-Up, 2/2-2/6

Aim your papers at someone who took a similar class at another college a year ago and found your paper laying on the street.

Don't write "I believe" in academic papers. Our job is to convince our reader, not to make professions. Use "I argue" instead.

The bibliographies of the books and articles you read are a better research tool than Google. Use them to find more resources.

Don't use dictionaries to define words in papers. Definitions are contested: papers argue how to best understand and use a word.

Intros should make clear the conversation the paper engages, as well as the key people/texts and concepts you will discuss.

Our first workshop of the semester, "Continuing Your Writing Progress," happens today 12:35. Join consultants Will Rogers and Megan Weber as we discuss strategies to make your writing even stronger!

Twitter Tips Digest (1/26-1/30):

Pay attention to transitions between paragraphs. Papers that lack strong ones read more like listicles than essays.

Scare quotes are best reserved for "ghost" stories told ironically around a microwave. Avoid them in your prose.

Everything you write is written to someone else. Clarify who that is and write to them (even if it's just your future self).

Writing well requires a willingness to fail. Perfection in writing doesn't exist and trying to reach it can hold you back.

You punctuated how?! Though it's the best named type of punctuation, don't use the interrobang in academic writing.

Join us this Friday for the 2014 Celebration of Student Writing. See presentations from SAGES and English classes, and find out what we've been writing about at CWRU! 12-2:45pm on the second floor of the Tinkham Veale Center.

Sources have you spooked? Join us on Halloween as Dr. Megan Jewell and Dr. Matthew Feinberg lead the workshop "Considering the Source: How to Select and Use Evidence." Bellflower Hall, 12:35-1:35.

Could never find the spell-check function on these things.

Gabrielle Parkin and Melissa Pompili lead us "Beyond the Paragraph Essay" today in Bellflower Hall from 12:45-1:30. Consider it a free inoculation against high school writing!

FREE PIZZA! Join us for the Writing Resource Center Open House, today from 3:30-4:00 in Bellflower Hall.

Go WRC!