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Language Used in Academic Text from Various Disciplines

Writing is one of the Four Macro Skills that a student should possess. It is one of
the media of communication in order for us to pass information to people. One of
these writings that a student should know is Academic Writing. In this module you as a
student will learn Academic Writing and the language that should be used in writing
academic text.
Let us define key terms you will meet in this discussion.
Academic Writing - is a kind of writing that can be used in academia or school.
1. Subject – pertains to the topic of the text.
2. Tone – pertains to the attitude of the writer about the text. It can be
distinguished through the words used by the author.
3. Purpose – is information that an author wants to imply to the reader.
4. Language – are the words used by the author in writing an academic text.
Academic writing requires formal language.
5. Audience –pertains to the reader in writing.
6. Point of View – refers to how the writer tells the information in the reading text.
An academic text is always in the third person point of view.
7. Style – refers to how the author arranges his or her writing.
8. Knowledge – is the amount of information that an author knows about his or
her topic. The reader is the one who can distinguish how much knowledge an
author has in the topic he or she is writing.
9. Explicit – means that the information should be precise and clear.

Academic Writing
Academic Writing is a kind of writing that can be used in academia or school. It
has a process that starts with posing a question, conceptualizing a problem,
evaluating an opinion and ends in answering a question posed, clarifying a problem or
arguing for a stand. The specific purposes of academic writing are to inform, to
persuade and to argue that address specific audience or the teacher. To inform means
supplementing a lot of information about the topic. To persuade means having the
credibility to make your audience or readers believe in you. To argue means making
your readers or audience respond on the information you are telling them.

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Academic writing also requires formal language or word that does not contain
colloquial or jargon words. It usually uses layman’s term or the term that is easy to
understand. It avoids the use of hifalutin words or words that have deep meaning.
Academic writing is all about thinking:

 It follows certain rules and standards.

 Language to be used in writing academic text should be formal.
 Audience should be first taken into consideration.

All the information included in this kind of text should be backed up by valid
evidences.

Four Features of Language

1. Formality reflects your dignified stance in writing as a member of an academic

community. This means that in your writing, you should avoid colloquial words and
expressions.
The language use requires precision to make it a legitimate piece of writing.

Formality can be achieved through the following ways:

• Choosing expanded modal forms over contracted forms, such as using cannot
instead of can’t, do not instead of don’t.
• Choosing one verb form over two-word verbs, such as damage instead of mess
up.
• Choosing expanded terms over their abbreviated equivalents, such as as soon as
possible instead of ASAP.
• Avoiding colloquial/idiomatic expressions, such as kind of like, as a matter of fact,
sort of.

Other examples of one verb over two-word verbs:

• Calculate - James added up the number of attendees in his party.

• Purchase (someone’s assets) - The large company bought out the smaller ones.
• Cancel - The teacher was to call off the noisy students immediately.
• Continue - The meeting will carry on even without your presence.
• Discover - The purpose of this meeting is to find out what would be your idea
about our new project.

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2. Objectivity means that the focus of the information is on the topic rather on the
writer itself. Written language should not be personal but rather in general objective.

It can be achieved by:

a. Avoiding the use of personal pronouns such as you, I, my, and we.
Poor example: You need to follow instructions.
Improved version: The researchers need to follow instructions.

b. Avoiding rhetorical questions because academic writing should not assume that
the readers know the answer in the statement and the author should express the
information strongly and clearly.
Poor example: How can these problems be solved?
Improved version: Certain procedures must be discovered to solve problems.

c. Avoiding emotive language that shows biases. Giving an overly favorable opinion
of someone can eliminate objectivity.
Poor example: The police investigators were shocked to see the outcome of the
tests.
Improved version: The police investigators did not expect the results.

3. Explicitness in academic writing demands the use of signposts that allow readers to
trace the relationships in the parts of the study. If you intend to show a change in your line
of argument, make it clear by using however.

Example:
It is apparent that the school institutions hope to provide quality education to the
learners. However, having this COVID-19 pandemic requires a lot of effort to reach
out students.

The following phrases may be useful in making ideas explicit:

1. This is due to the…
A number of MERALCO consumers trooped to the City Hall to claim a P500 cash
incentive. This is due to the Supreme Court ruling that overcharges must be returned to
the end users whose electric consumption for the April-May period was below 100kw/hr.
2. This resulted in…
With the Supreme Court ordering MERALCO to return overcharges to the end users,
government offices have been tapped to operate as claim centers. This resulted in a

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number of MERALCO consumers trooping to the City Hall to claim the P500 cash
incentive.
• When two ideas seem the same, express each one clearly.
The study showed that eighty percent of the 200 participants involved in the study were
dissatisfied with the operations of MERALCO. Similarly, the data revealed that majority of
the participants were not aware of the charges imposed on them by MERALCO.
• If you intend to give extra information in your sentence, make it clear by
writing “In addition...”
MERALCO has been operating as a business conglomerate involving foreign
stakeholders and independent power producer or IPP. In addition, MERALCO owns major
IPPs operating in the region.
• If you are giving examples, do so explicitly by writing “For example…”
The MERALCO issue has led to disputes between opposition and administration
senators. For example, those who have been labeled as against the president considered
the issue as the administration/s way of avoiding the NBN-ZTE scandal.

4. Caution in academic writing requires care since knowledge is built on proven theories
and concepts. Caution is needed to avoid sweeping generalizations.

Government officials are corrupt.

The statement is not completely true and the rhetorical impact of the statement may
be misleading. The statement can be improved through the use of devices such as modal
verbs, adverbs, or verbs.

Improved versions:
Some government officials may be corrupt.
Corruption is commonly linked to some key government officials.

Types of Writing Styles

There are four main types of writing: expository, descriptive, persuasive and narrative.
Each of these writing styles is used for a specific purpose. A single text may include more
than one writing styles.

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Expository
This means that the author is trying to
explain a concept, imparting information to the
audience. It is not subjective but rather focuses
on facts that are supported by evidence.

Examples of Expository Writing:

• textbooks
• articles
• recipes
• news stories (not editorials or op-eds)
• business, technical or scientific writing

Descriptive Writing
Descriptive style means painting a picture of a person, place, or thing through words.
It is often found in fiction, though it can make an appearance to non-fiction as well Memoirs,
first-hand accounts, and events or travel guides are examples of descriptive writing. The
author might employ metaphor or other literary devices in order to describe the author’s
impressions using their five senses.

Persuasive Writing
It is the main style of writing you will use in academic papers. When an author writes in a
persuasive style, he/she is trying to convince the audience of a position or belief. Persuasive
writing contains the author’s opinions and biases, as well as justifications or reasons given
by the author as evidence of the correctness of their position. Any “argumentative” essay
you write in school should be in the persuasive style of writing. The examples of persuasive
writing include cover letters, op-eds and editorial newspaper articles, reviews of items,
letters of complaint, advertisements, and letters of recommendation.

Narrative Writing
Narrative writing is used in almost every longer piece of writing, whether fiction or
non-fiction. When an author writes in a narrative style, he/she is not just trying to convey
information, rather tries to construct and communicate a story, complete with characters,
conflict and settings. The examples of narrative writing include oral histories,
novels/novellas, poetry (specifically, epic sagas or poems), short stories, and anecdotes.

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