Comments on: How a Professional Writer Improved My Academic Writing

By: susanshepler

susanshepler — Thu, 26 Feb 2015 22:21:56 +0000

Wonderful! I feel like I’m always giving this feedback on student papers: “Is the subject of your sentence capable of performing the action that you’re attributing to it?”

By: Chad Nilep

Chad Nilep — Fri, 20 Feb 2015 08:19:27 +0000

I quite enjoyed this piece, and mostly agree with the advice. I differ with Claus, however, in cautioning against any particular set of words. At the risk of being labeled a positivist, I’ve compared the frequency of “insipid grammatical markers” in American Anthropologist, the Corpus of Contemporary American English, and the work of Joan Didion. American Anthropologist does seem to over-use ‘however’ and ‘nevertheless’, but Joan Didion seems quite fond of ‘when’ and ‘yet’. All the tiresome details at:
http://linguisticanthropology.org/blog/2015/02/20/however-anthropologists-do-over-use-some-words/

By: However, anthropologists do over-use some words

However, anthropologists do over-use some words — Fri, 20 Feb 2015 08:13:37 +0000

[…] an anthropologist who also teaches academic writing, I was excited to read Annie Claus’s essay, “How a professional writer improved my academic writing” at Savage Minds. Claus reflects on a writing course she took with a professor who had been a member […]

By: johnmccreery

johnmccreery — Wed, 18 Feb 2015 23:44:27 +0000

Yes, yes, a thousand times, yes. And John McPhee is also one of my favorites.

By: Announcing the Spring 2015 Writers’ Workshop Series | Savage Minds

Announcing the Spring 2015 Writers’ Workshop Series | Savage Minds — Mon, 16 Feb 2015 14:33:56 +0000

[…] February 16—Annie Claus, “How a Professional Writer Improved My Academic Writing” […]