academiblog

Did you know that you were a creative writer?   As an academic, you may be saying, "Nooooooo, I do research!"  And you certainly do.  You research, you write, you revise, and you publish, and all of those things require creativity.   Somehow along the way, we've made a false dichotomy.  We've made a distinction between creative and academic writers that really doesn't serve either. It especially doesn't serve us as academics.   In fact, by applying some of the tried and true techniques of creative writers, we can engage the reader from the opening sentence until the very last page.   If you can engage your reader like this, you are much more likely to GET PUBLISHED. 1) Find Your Research Arc   Screenwriters and novelists know that the easiest way to bore a reader is to take away the narrative drive of the story.  The same is true for your academic book or article.  If there is no clear hypothesis or argument near the beginning, readers will become u