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I think what the author is missing is the possibility that many academics are simply bad writers. Academic writing in many fields is extremely formulaic just so

I think what the author is missing is the possibility that many academics are simply bad writers. Academic writing in many fields is extremely formulaic just so that the relevant information can be communicated regardless of the writing skill of the author. Add to that the fact that many academics are writing in a language that is not their first, so even if they had considerable skill in their mother tongue, there is no guarantee that will translate to long-form, casual English prose. That said, I do agree with the article that it is an interesting time to be an academic, or at least to be observing the progress and development of academia. I highly doubt that populist writing in the vein of "Bad Astronomy" or (heaven forfend) the works of Dawkins will ever replace the dry, staid prose of the academic journal. What is happening is that new means of communicating information are forcing academics into media where the traditional formulae leave them in the lurch.

benbreen 12y ago
I've found that even academics who are actually quite good at writing for popular venues still fall into typically academic patterns (like the overuse of passive voice or jargon) in their journal articles. I blame it on peer review more than anything else - my experience with the peer review process (n=6) has been that unorthodox turns of phrase or narrative quirks are often the first things to get flagged. Peer review has a necessary and obvious function, but it also has a side effect of smoothing out prose style. The result is that journal articles (even in those in single-author fields) often sound like they were written by a hive mind rather than an individual. I was actually intending to do graduate work in archaeology but switched to history when I realized how dreary the prose style favored by archaeologists was. At least history has a few authors with an engaging and original style (for instance, Simon Schama, Fernand Braudel, and Natalie Zemon Davis). To be fair, archaeology has some interesting prose writers of its own (Colin Renfrew, Marija Gimbutas) but the ordinary journal article style tends to be a morass of passive voice and clichéd phrasing.
- roel_v 12y ago
  I had a student once who is British but worked for a Spanish university. He was (is) a very good writer, very clear, good structure etc. He had a paper reviewed once by someone who, probably because he saw the affiliation or the study area the paper was about (which was in Spain), assumed the author was Spanish, and put in his comments 'the author should consider having his writing reviewed by a native speaker to correct some of the obvious mistakes'. I LOL'ed that day.
puranjay 12y ago
The professor who taught me Derrida (translated by Gayatri Spivak, no less) told me that poor writing in philosophy dates back to Kant, who was a notoriously bad writer. But because Kant was also the father of all modern philosophy, a lot of future philosophers tried to emulate him and his often obtuse writing style. Over the years, this became convention. Convention became dogma. And this dogma is the reason why I've thrown more than a few books flying across the room in frustration

benbreen 12y ago

I've found that even academics who are actually quite good at writing for popular venues still fall into typically academic patterns (like the overuse of passive voice or jargon) in their journal articles. I blame it on peer review more than anything else - my experience with the peer review process (n=6) has been that unorthodox turns of phrase or narrative quirks are often the first things to get flagged. Peer review has a necessary and obvious function, but it also has a side effect of smoothing out prose style. The result is that journal articles (even in those in single-author fields) often sound like they were written by a hive mind rather than an individual. I was actually intending to do graduate work in archaeology but switched to history when I realized how dreary the prose style favored by archaeologists was. At least history has a few authors with an engaging and original style (for instance, Simon Schama, Fernand Braudel, and Natalie Zemon Davis). To be fair, archaeology has some interesting prose writers of its own (Colin Renfrew, Marija Gimbutas) but the ordinary journal article style tends to be a morass of passive voice and clichéd phrasing.

roel_v 12y ago
I had a student once who is British but worked for a Spanish university. He was (is) a very good writer, very clear, good structure etc. He had a paper reviewed once by someone who, probably because he saw the affiliation or the study area the paper was about (which was in Spain), assumed the author was Spanish, and put in his comments 'the author should consider having his writing reviewed by a native speaker to correct some of the obvious mistakes'. I LOL'ed that day.

puranjay 12y ago

The professor who taught me Derrida (translated by Gayatri Spivak, no less) told me that poor writing in philosophy dates back to Kant, who was a notoriously bad writer. But because Kant was also the father of all modern philosophy, a lot of future philosophers tried to emulate him and his often obtuse writing style. Over the years, this became convention. Convention became dogma. And this dogma is the reason why I've thrown more than a few books flying across the room in frustration