Effective and clear communication is the goal of academics and non-academics alike. I used to have a mentality that as long as I had something to say and my writing was at all intelligible than that was sufficient for communication. It is not. The goal of communication is the transmission of an idea to be understood by a reader. The resources below have been collected as references for writers.

Academic writing

Ten simple rules for structuring papers by Brett Mensh and Konrad Kording[1] is a set of clear rules that help guide the construction of academic articles. I found this article particularly useful to help define and focus my own work. This paper discusses practical steps to improve the readability of papers.

Creating a Research Space (C.A.R.S.) by John Swales[2] is a commonly referenced model for writing introductions and can also be a useful tool for focusing a research project. Swales suggested the method after an analysis of journal articles from physics and pyschology. The empirical nature of the methods derivation might be partly resposible for it’s adoption in a wide range of disciplines including the ‘harder’ sciences. The method is described in the book Academic Writing for Graduate Students by John Swales and Christine Feak. Many university websites also give quick concise summaries of the method.

How to write Mathematrics by Paul Halmos[3] is somewhat specific to mathematics but contains good advice. Of particular interest is the spiral method (section 7) as a technique to ensure writing is cohesive and logical.

Writing Technical Papers or Reports by Andrew Ehernherg[4] is an example of a clear and concise report on clear and concise reports. The four page paper oulines five rules; Start at the end; Be prepared to revise; Cut down on long words; Be brief; Think of the reader.

A portion of the resources mentioned here come from the online course profile of Biostatistics / Statistics 572 run by Patrick Heagerty. The course can be found here. I found the slides on how to write by Ken Rice particularly useful and full of provoking examples.

General writing

The Elements of Style by Strunk and White is a classic text on writing that includes a series of instructions to avoid common mistakes in writing. The instructions are not limited to academic writing and is a valuable reference for general structure and form.

A few pieces of advice seem to recur in each resource:

• Have a central idea/claim that needs to be made. If you have something to say, know what it is and say it. If you don’t have something to say, or don’t know what is is, don’t say it.
• Communicate your idea/claim with reader understanding as a top priority. Don’t write to impress with complexity or length, write to convey your idea/claim as clearly and concisely as possible and let it do the impressing.
• Writing is all about rewriting. No text is perfect on the first attempt, to effectively write you will need to rewrite, possibly many times.
• Plan and organise the structure. The reader will (likely) be following your text in linear order, an idea must only be stated after those on which it depends.

Perhaps the most concise piece of text about writing in general comes from Halmos[3]:

“The basic problem in writing mathematics is the same as in writing biology, writing a novel, or writing directions for assembling a harpsichord: the problem is to communicate an idea. To do so, and to do it clearly, you must have something to say, and you must have someone to say it to, you must organize what you want to say, and you must arrange it in the order you want it said in, you must write it, rewrite it, and re-rewrite it several times, and you must be willing to think hard about and work hard on mechanical details such as diction, notation, and punctuation. That’s all there is to it.”

[1] Mensh B, Kording K. Ten simple rules for structuring papers. PLoS computational biology. 2017 Sep;13(9).
[2] Swales J. Genre analysis: English in academic and research settings. Cambridge University Press; 1990 Nov 8.
[3] Halmos PR. How to write mathematics. Enseign. Math. 1970;16(2):123-52.
[4] Ehrenberg AS. Writing technical papers or reports. The American Statistician. 1982 Nov 1;36(4):326-9.