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> On the web, where each individual piece of writing is not meant to last as long, the writing style has become more casual. Consider the difference between you
by jamesrcole 6y ago
> On the web, where each individual piece of writing is not meant to last as long, the writing style has become more casual. Consider the difference between your average Medium article versus your average academic research paper.
I would argue that academic writing tends to be pretty poor.
- hc-taway 6y ago> I would argue that academic writing tends to be pretty poor. The above-namedropped David Foster Wallace certainly thought so. Among people who spend their days thinking about language I'm pretty sure academese is considered more of an elaborate, extended shibboleth than an effective communication tool, going beyond merely being sprinkled with jargon and fake-fancy clichés (like, say, business language) so that it serves as an effective gatekeeping tool. Hard(er than it needs to be) to read, hard to correctly write.