Writing for Academic Audiences

Refining Scholarly Writing Tactics

Of the numerous facets of scholarly writing that take on particular eminence, that which pertains to the construction of new arguments and ideas attributed to the scholar himself or herself has a particular degree of relevance. Moreover, doing so frequently requires scholars to identify and incorporate the usage of sources that are themselves credible to provide a part of the basis for those ideas. Thus, one of the aspects of the scholarly writing process which this author has not discussed at length is the verification of sources from an academic perspective. Quite simply, a true scholar must be able to quickly ascertain whether or not the sources he or she is utilizing is academic in nature and able to help provide a foundation for his or her ideas. When seeking to determine this information, there are so basic ways that one can seek to verify the worthiness of a particular source. One such way is to analyze the credentials of the author. Sources that are non-academic in nature typically do not list an author" credentials and if so, those credentials do not necessarily relate to one's academic background. Specifically, it is valuable to note the education accomplishments (undergraduate and graduate degrees) that a particular author has when hoping to identify the worthiness of his or her article as a potential source (Knoff, 2015). Similarly, it is necessary for one to identify the credentials of the entity that has published that work. It is possible to determine if these publications are peer-reviewed by conducting some basic research about them, as well as by identifying other key facets of the article itself. For instance, truly peer-reviewed sources typically include a plethora of sources that are cited in a consistent manner that is congruent with a particular citation style, such as that provided by the American Psychology Association.

Another critical aspect to determining whether or not a source is scholarly and worthy of use in one's own academic research process pertains indirectly to the other sources referenced it. Many scholarly articles that contain original, empirical-based research actually include a literary review in which they summarize current research to date about the topic that they are exploring or conducting original research about in their paper. Therefore, some form of a literature review is typically a good indication of a source that is peer-reviewed and which is credible enough to inform one's own research. There are even some scholarly articles that merely consist of a literature review and in which the authors of the article simply evaluate the data of other articles about a topic in order to come to new findings and conclusions about that. This process of observing what information already exists and analyzing it as a starting point or as an indication for drawing new conclusion, is central to scholarship and academic writing as a whole. As such, it is of immense importance to acknowledge other sources properly and evaluate them in a way so that they can inform one's own critical thinking and understanding of a particular subject matter.