AcWriMo: types of feedback
How to ask for feedback, different kinds that you can ask for, common tricky feedback styles and more! This coaching call from my community is all about how and why you might want to ask for feedback, and best practices for getting what you want! get the transcript here!
5 things to try with a writing group: a March Madness post
i love writing groups - i love being in them, i love facilitating them, i love teaching people how to facilitate their own. and i also love breathing a little bit of fresh air into existing, or new, groups - especially as the work goes on, and the pandemic rages, and we all are hitting (or well exceeding) our capacity for on camera interaction.
most writing groups are structured around the sharing of works in progress - some specify the kinds of feedback wanted, and have a schedule and guidelines for who will share writing, how much, and when. i’ve written about some ways to think about structuring those activities here - but here are 5 new things to try with your writing group to shake things up a little bit!
writing co-working sessions! - sometimes, you just really need the coffee shop vibe. i’ve been really enjoying Gather, a virtual world where you can have a character and walk around to work with people - as a lower stakes, non zoom coworking option. sometimes, it just helps to work with people, and this is a good way to build some accountability around scheduled writing sessions.
summarize the main point - you never really know how your writing is landing until someone else summarizes it for you! this is a great activity to do with early drafts that you share - it’s less time intensive than giving line comments, but it’s useful and effective for the writer to see how their argument is landing.
interview the writer - an especially good activity for those who need some practice talking about their research, or who are in the early stages of working out an argument, having group members interview the writer (whether they ask questions based on a draft, or not) is great. you can imagine it like a conference presentation, or ask questions about the argument to get further clarification. this is an especially good kind of session to record - great practice for other interviews down the line.
make an outline - normally, this is an activity i recommend writers do with their own writing (reverse outlining, in that case!), but it can be really helpful to see how someone else interpreted the structure of your argument, and how the examples link up. it also can take less time than traditional line-specific feedback, so it’s great for early drafts and busy group members.
workshop a revision - got a revise and resubmit that has you spinning? really tough feedback from your chair that you need help deciphering? if you trust your writing group, you can bring that piece (and the feedback!) and work together to make a revision plan. this is particularly useful if you are feeling really sensitive about the feedback (who isn’t??) or if you are lost about where to start.
writing groups are so valuable - writing, after all, is taking thoughts that live in our brains and putting it into a form where they can be shared, and so inviting community into that process can only help you check the translation from inside to out.
explaining academic writing: a review of Dr. Jo VanEvery's Short Guides
i was completely unprepared to do academic writing of any kind.
i was MONTHS into my PhD before anyone even asked me what i was thinking of doing in terms of publishing. no one ever told me about how to scout journals, what to expect in a peer review, or how to decide what kinds of things to publish when.
i wish that i had Dr. Jo VanEvery’s short guides then. i’m so grateful you can have them now.
i first learned of Dr. VanEvery’s work when we crossed paths in a community for self-employed PhDs. she runs an amazing, generative salon of sorts for writers. like me, her work takes different forms, from coaching to community writing spaces, and her short guides are an outgrowth of that important work.
the four short guides are, well, short - but in a good way; you don’t have to take all day to read one and get something useful out of it. they’re practical and full of time-tested strategies and information to help demystify some of the most confusing and insider-only areas of academia. I can’t describe the topics any more elegantly than the author herself:
The Scholarly Writing Process
Scholarly writing involves both using writing to articulate your own ideas and get clarity on what contributions you could make, and writing things that will communicate those contributions to other scholars (and perhaps those beyond academe). Getting stuck is a normal part of the writing process, even for experienced writers. My aim in publishing this Short Guide is to help you generate new writing projects, keep your writing projects moving forward, and ensure that your writing process results in publications. Designed so you can refer to it whenever you get stuck, this Short Guide breaks down the scholarly writing process into stages and provides both a description of that stage and writing prompts to help you get unstuck.
Finding Time for Scholarly Writing
Finding Time for your Scholarly Writing addresses the problem of juggling writing alongside your other responsibilities. I identify three kinds of time: full days, longish sessions, and short snatches. In this Short Guide, I explain what kinds of writing you can do in each, and suggest ways of combining the three to ensure that you make the best use of the time available at different points in the academic year.
Scholarly Publishing
In Scholarly Publishing, I focus on the big picture of publishing for scholarly audiences. After discussing the purpose of publishing for scholarly readers and what is meant by making a contribution to the advancement of knowledge, I look in detail at the main types of scholarly publication: books, peer reviewed journal articles, and various types of work-in-progress publishing (conference papers, working papers, etc) to help you decide which type of publication will best suit your purposes. The concluding chapter discusses how you can improve discoverability of your publications. Each chapter has questions to help you apply the information to your own situation.
Peer Review
This Short Guide provides an overview of what peer review is and why it’s important, along with practical advice for both authors and reviewers. Guided by the principle that peer review supports academic writing, topics include the emotional work involved in writing and receiving reviews, and advice on finding time to review.
for grad students, i think the last two short guides, Scholarly Publishing and Peer Review, are particularly useful. especially if there are holes in what your department has or hasn’t given you training around, these guides are in some ways a replacement for the seminar or advisor taking you aside and letting you see how the wheels turn.
if you’ve ever wondered how and when to approach a publisher, how to vet a journal, the differences between publishing an article and a piece in an edited collection, well, there are answers here for you in Scholarly Publishing. the advice is broad enough to be useful for people in many different disciplines (although most pertinent to those in the humanities and social sciences, where there are more distinctions between types of publications) without being prescriptive. in addition to information to help demystify the process, there are really productive reflection questions sprinkled throughout to give you a framework to think about what ideas could or should live where.
my favorite part of the Peer Review short guide is that it begins from the premise that soliciting, receiving, and responding to criticism about your work is an emotional as well as intellectual process. like the other short guides, it contains a masterful balance of useful, clear explanations of terms and processes, and reflection spaces for you to unpack the process and support yourself. especially as more and more junior colleagues are being asked to participate in the peer review process, the view and how-tos from both author and editor are invaluable in understanding how the process works beyond just your comments, given or written.
all four of the short guides are also concluded with meticulous reference and further reading sections. i found myself bookmarking all kinds of sources for myself, and i do this professionally - so i can scarcely imagine how useful these resources will be to those just starting out on the journey of academic writing.
if you’re looking to learn more about the books, listen to a sample, or pick them up for yourself, you can do here - i recommend them highly to anyone who just wants to know how the process works, and how best to support themselves within it.
**I received these books as review copies, but all my opinions here are my own and in no way compensated. I just think these are really help for grad students!!
AcWriMo2020: get feedback on purpose
I signed up for a writing group through the university writing center on a whim - I was cleaning out my inbox, a nearly obsessive form of procrastination for me, and saw the notice that groups were forming soon. It was the fall of my fourth year (of a five year program) and I needed some motivation. I had a draft of my prospectus that needed polishing, a schedule that was becoming more and more freeform as I advanced through the degree, and more and more pressure to research, write and publish as much as possible. Though it went through several permutations, my writing group was one of the most persistent, helpful, and supportive spaces through my candidacy. But most importantly, it taught me how to get feedback on purpose - and how to find the feedback I wasn’t necessarily getting from my advisor. Here are my best tips for finding, running, and tweaking a writing group!
If possible, let someone else do the organizing. Many universities, departments and student groups offer writing spaces. If you're nervous about putting your writing out there, joining a pre-formed group, or bigger, more established program can feel more comfortable that connecting with a close peer or colleague.
Interdisciplinary groups can be amazing! I was initially very skeptical that my group would be able to offer me anything, because the members were so far away from me in a disciplinary sense. But actually the insights of their Cultural Anthropology and Early Judaic studies trainings were incisive and thought-provoking. Because they weren't as familiar, if at all, with the literature and conversations I was referencing, they were relying on my writing to understand my topic. Any problems I was having concisely or clearly conveying my ideas were much more apparent to their fresh eyes. Colleagues can often read between the lines and fill in details or context that you have not included, leaving you thinking that your argument was clearer than it actually was. My writing group challenged me to be more judicious with my secondary literature (do you really need this to support your argument, or are you just name dropping?) and more forthright with my own contributions, and my work was stronger for it.
Different writing groups can serve different purposes. During some summers, my writing group was just people with whom I gathered to write, never sharing drafts or talking through our work. I also had incredibly focused writing workshops with graduate students in my department, where I had to articulate how and why this fit into the larger field. I often showed rough drafts to my interdisciplinary group, as they weren't close colleagues and I could feel more comfortable sharing less polished work, and full chapters with my graduate student colleagues before they went to faculty members. Having multiple spaces pays off.
Be clear about what you need. When sending my drafts to my writing group, I took care in the email to explain what I needed my writing group to do. Sometimes I needed help understanding if the sections flowed together, after putting together a month's worth of free writing. Other times, it was more helpful to ask if the argument was clear and well supported. I most of the time instructed that they ignore copy-editing tasks, unless the errors were glaring and felt so inclined - I had other places and resources for that, and I wanted feedback on the ideas. But nothing is more frustrating that spending time carefully rearranging sentences for flow and style only to find out that this was a very rough draft and the writer wanted feedback on structure. Clarity can make sure that you're getting what you need, and respecting your group members' time.
If possible, record your sessions and the conversations. I am a person who needs to "talk it out." I loved seminar spaces and the chance I got to explain my thinking, as I am often much more concise and compelling in person than I am in writing. I got in the habit of recording (with permission, of course!) my writing groups, where we discussed my ideas and writing. I usually didn't transcribe those conversations, but would play the back as I was editing or going through and processing their feedback, because often there were important phrases I said that I wanted to steal from myself. Capturing that verbal processing was essential to making the best use of those meetings.
Ask others to restate your argument. After a sprawling conversation where my group helped me to hash out the main points of a chapter's argument, my group member had the foresight to take a few minutes after the meeting and write down her version of my argument. This was incredibly useful for me, as it gave me a chance to see the space between the argument in my head and how it was communicated. Even if it is just verbally, or in the margin notes, this can be a useful tool for writing in the early stages.
And here is a fun set of questions to use with your writing group, writing partner, or even with yourself to guide the kind of feedback you’re looking for!
Questions to ask your feedback partners (or yourself) to pay attention to!
Argument:
Is my argument clear? Can you follow it?
What do you wish you knew more about? Less?
What parts of my writing are most compelling? Least?
Is my intervention clear?
If you had to summarize my argument in two or three sentences, what would you say?
Field:
Do you understand how my research builds on our field?
Is it clear how I’m using field-specific terminology?
Is my intellectual lineage (who influences my thinking) clear?
Do I make my intervention clear without being cruel or overly accommodating to other scholars?
Am I missing any key citations or movements in our field?
Do I explain each secondary source or concept in relationship to my argument?
Copy:
Are the sentences clear and easy to read?
Are there any words that don’t seem to mean what I think they do?
Is my tense consistent?
Are my citations formatted in a consistent way?
The more you can specify WHAT kind of feedback you’re after, the more useful the feedback (hopefully) will be! Knowing what you need to help you see your writing clearly can be a hard skill to master, but once you do, it’ll serve you for a long, long time.