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-----------------------------�Fundamental rules of�Academic Writing�By�Ven. Ketumala (Ph.D)�17.10. 2022

�

Ph. D Myanmar Buddhist Scholars Association �Makutārāma Myanmar Temple

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Contents

What is free writing?
What is Academic writing?
What is Paraphrasing?
What is Summarizing?
How to write raw data to be Academic writing.
The meaning of Coherence and cohesion.
What is Hedging?

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Free Writing

No particular planning, argument, or evidence
No choosing the best words
No proving, questioning, or analyzing anything
No intended for any particular audience

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What is Academic Writing?

Academic writing is using specific rule and form for the purpose of pointing out the fact and making argument to promote the human’s intellect.
Academic Writing is (1) logical organization based on evidences and arguments. (2) Precise academic diction (3) Impersonal tone (4) for a pre-recognized audience.

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Why Academic writing is important for postgraduate research students.

Postgraduate research students are assessed through the production of written assignments/ short and long essays/ project reports/ research papers/thesis/dissertations.

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Good Habits

Be honest
Read, read and read actively and critically
Know your subject insight
Reference your sources
Use a corpus
Acknowledge earlier drafts and influential work
Keep on writing etc

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Hot to write a Paragraph

A paragraph is a group of Sentences writing one idea.
A Paragraph has about 5 sentences at least.

One Paragraph One Main Idea
General Statement or Topic Sentences
Evident or Supporting Sentences
Conclusion (expressing own idea or opinion)

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General Statement or Topic Sentence�

1. Not too narrow

Ex: A border of Canada is close to the United States

2. not too broad

Ex: Morality is a practice.

Studying is difficult.

3. Do not announce your general statement

Ex: I would like to discuss in this paragraph the growing concerning with air pollution in my city.

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A good General Statement or Topic Sentence

Cleary introduces the general statement

Making a point One Main Idea
Making a statement which is neither too narrow nor too broad

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A good General Statement

Canadian culture has been heavily influenced by its relationship with the United State.

2. morality (in Pali sīla) is the first step of the threefold training, known as sīla, samadhi and paññā.

Studying two languages at one can be a big challenging.

3. Ari pollution is growing in my city.

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Conclusion Sentence

Reminding of the general Statement
Repeating the main idea in the general Statement, but in different words
Not giving new details and ideal
Expression own idea
Exam.. Morality is the first state of threefold training.(general statement)..Jata sutta, and Gopakamoggalana sutta etc (evidents). Hence, Morality pay as a fundamental role in practicing mindfulness meditation.( conclusion sentence)

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Cohesion and Coherence

Cohesion means linking words from sentence to sentence and from paragraph to paragraph
Cohesion devices: linking words; conjunction, subordinating and adverbs, synonyms, pronouns.
Exam. I had along day. as a result, I was tired. Therefore, I went to bed. However, I could not sleep. In addition, I was suddenly hungry.

Coherence means logical understandable writing
All supporting sentences must relate to the main idea.
Smart Live Class Youtube

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Summarising

Summarising aims to reduce information to a suitable length

Summarising aims to allowing the writer to condense length source into a concise form.

To avoid the risk of plagiarism

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Stages of summarising

Read the original text carefully and check any new of difficult vocabulary.
Mark the key points by underlining or highlighting.
Make notes of the key points, paraphrasing where possible.
Write the summary from your notes, reorganizing the structure if needed.
Check the summary to ensure it is accurate and nothing important has been changed or lost.

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Paraphrasing

Paraphrasing means changing the word of a text so that it is significantly different from the original source, without changing the meaning.

To avoid the risk of plagiarism.

Paraphrasing attempts to restate the relevant information.

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What is Paraphrasing?

Has a different structure to the original
Has mainly different vocabulary
Retains the same meaning
Keeps some phrases from the original that are in common use (e.g. ‘ Industrial Revolution’ or eighteenth century’)
Example…
There has been much debate about the reasons for the Industrial Revolution happening in eighteenth- century Britain, rather than in France or Germany.
The Industrial Revolution occurred in Britain in the eighteen century, instead of on the continent, has been the subject of considerable discussion.

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Techniques for paraphrasing

Changing vocabulary by using synonyms

argues>claims/eighteenth century>1700s/ wages> labour costs/ economies> saving

Changing word class

Explanation (n)> explain(v)/ mechanical (adj)> mechanise (v)/ profitable (adj)> profitability (n)

Changing word order

…the best explanation for the British location of the Industrial Revolution is found by studying demand factors.

A focus on demand may help explain the Uk origin of the Industrial Revolution.

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Raw data to be Academic Writing

While making date collection concerning with the your research topic, you may have collected draw date to arrange under the academic writing. Hence, you should write them to be academic writing with the specie rules.

Raw date, we can learn that Nibbana is really happiness pointing out the happiness arising from sensual pleasure (kāmasuka).
The reality happiness of Nibbāna is defined as mental happiness by comparison with happiness arising from sensual pleasure (kāmasuka) in the Dhammapada. (Nibbānaṃ paramaṃ sukhaṃ)

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Hedging

To avoid impolite and absolute statements
Helps avoiding generalization and overstating

Verbs

Indicate, propose, assume, estimate,

suggest, appear, tend to, argue, seem,

Ex: it tends to be

Modal Verbs

must, will, would, should, may, can, could, might

Ex: only if we work together, can we solve the nation’s problems.

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Hedging

Adverbs

Often, almost, occasionally, sometimes, Perhaps, quite, usually, certainly, somewhat.

Abject

Probable, possible, apparent,

That Clause:

it could be assumed that..

It might be suggested that…

It (is) adj+ to infinitive

It may be possible to obtain..

It is important to develop…

It is useful to study….