Academic Writing

Writing is the key qualification in academia. The focus is usually on what to write, but how is often neglected.

In our academic writing workshops, we teach you how to shape your ideas in a way that is both academically sound and stylistically appropriate: how to construct sentences and texts so that they are logical, clear and precise; how to create clarity and coherence by structuring and organizing your work; how to maintain a clear and cohesive thread and narrative tension while writing. In short: how to make writing itself and the final product enjoyable for you – and reading enjoyable for your readers.

You can choose from the following areas of focus, for which we can prepare an individual offer:

The focus of this workshop is on the stylistic and formal foundations of academic writing. The course works with examples and handy tips that stick in your mind. The exercises are based directly on the participants’ needs: practice takes place preferably in small groups and using participants’ own sample texts. The topics are taught in a practical, entertaining and as straightforward a way as possible – without unnecessarily overwhelming participants with theory.

Trainers: Barbara Budrich, Christine Ehlers

In this workshop, the focus is on the writing process itself. The Escriva writing-flow technique developed by Barbara Budrich is covered, as is overcoming writer’s block. Important formal requirements are of course also addressed.

Participants are asked in advance to submit their own texts, which (anonymized) are used as examples in the text work. Each author receives a brief written assessment of their own text. The workshop starts from the participants’ current needs, is shaped by decades of publishing experience with texts, and is packed with practical tips that can be applied immediately.

Trainer: Barbara Budrich

This workshop for non-native English speakers, is aimed at post-graduate students and academics of all levels who wish to improve the quality of their English language scholarly writing. It focuses on academic texts for publication in book or journal form. The course offers a step-by-step guide how to make scholarly texts more accessible, intelligible and well-structured. Including many real life examples and practical exercises, the course provides a useful set of tools and guidelines, making your text more likely to achieve publication.

Trainers: Jakob Horstmann, Barbara Budrich

Academic writing can be a very lonely business. For this reason, researchers sometimes join forces to co-author an article or even an entire book. Or, for example following a conference, the desire may arise to publish an edited volume. In this case, the individual texts are not necessarily written in a (small) group, but the project rests on several shoulders. In both cases, the hope is: more publications, less work.

In “real life”, this calculation unfortunately often does not work out. For co-authorship as well as for work in an editorial role, clear agreements are very important. And if there are no agreements, then each person fills the resulting gaps differently: from style and tone to formal issues, text length and schedule – many things need to be agreed in advance to avoid ending up with many people involved but few feeling responsible.

Writing together is a skill that can be learned. We show what matters and how to make it work.

Trainer: Barbara Budrich