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[psychle]

I was browsing around the American Psychological Association (APA) website and noticed that the following book was recently published:

How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing
by Paul J. Silva, PhD
(January 2007, APA Books)

According to the write-up on the website:

All students and professors need to write, and many struggle to finish their stalled dissertations, journal articles, book chapters, or grant proposals. Writing is hard work and can be difficult to wedge into a frenetic academic schedule.

In this practical, light-hearted, and encouraging book, Paul Silvia explains that writing productively does not require innate skills or special traits but specific tactics and actions. Drawing examples from his own field of psychology, he shows readers how to overcome motivational roadblocks and become prolific without sacrificing evenings, weekends, and vacations. After describing strategies for writing productively, the author gives detailed advice from the trenches on how to write, submit, revise, and resubmit articles, how to improve writing quality, and how to write and publish academic work.

Has anyone taken a look at this book yet? Based on some of the questions that crop up on these forums, it seems like it might come in handy for some forumites (myself included).

[plato]

Wow!  Thanks for the reference.  Will investigate.

Plato

[etandss]

I was browsing around the American Psychological Association (APA) website and noticed that the following book was recently published:

How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing
by Paul J. Silva, PhD
(January 2007, APA Books)

According to the write-up on the website:

All students and professors need to write, and many struggle to finish their stalled dissertations, journal articles, book chapters, or grant proposals. Writing is hard work and can be difficult to wedge into a frenetic academic schedule.

In this practical, light-hearted, and encouraging book, Paul Silvia explains that writing productively does not require innate skills or special traits but specific tactics and actions. Drawing examples from his own field of psychology, he shows readers how to overcome motivational roadblocks and become prolific without sacrificing evenings, weekends, and vacations. After describing strategies for writing productively, the author gives detailed advice from the trenches on how to write, submit, revise, and resubmit articles, how to improve writing quality, and how to write and publish academic work.

Has anyone taken a look at this book yet? Based on some of the questions that crop up on these forums, it seems like it might come in handy for some forumites (myself included).

This looks like something I need to read. Thanks for the link!

[gobelin]

Funnily enough, I had seen the same advert and my copy arrived today.  I haven't read it yet, but have learnt something just from flipping through - it had never occurred to me to use SPSS to keep a record of my writing but was quite interested to see his file.  Seems like a good idea to keep track in a more formal way than I have been doing!

[plato]

Forgot to ask earlier today.  Are there any standard books on writing for journals? 

Thanks,

Plato

[namazu]

Hi Plato,

You may be well aware of this, and if so, forgive me.  But, in case not...

Since each journal has a specific format (for page layout, types of papers accepted, standard length, references, how to submit, etc.), they tend to have a "Guide for Authors".  This is often on the journal's website, if it has one, and usually gives paper-preparation advice in great detail.

(I don't personally know of any general books that specifically focus on writing for journals, though you may have some luck with a general academic writing book, or one specific to your field, since these often exist.)

Forgot to ask earlier today.  Are there any standard books on writing for journals? 

[psychle]

Forgot to ask earlier today.  Are there any standard books on writing for journals? 

I don't know of any books, but here is a pretty good chapter:

Bem, D. J. (2003). Writing the empirical journal article. In Darley, Zanna, & Roediger (Eds.), The compleat academic: A practical guide for the beginning social scientist (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.

A copy of it can be downloaded from Bem's website.

[gobelin]

Okay, I've had time to read it now!
How to Write a Lot is an excellent book.  It's a slim volume, very easy to read, and full of straightforward advice.  It's based partly on research on writing but also has lots of personal anecdotes (and even a photo of the author's desk so you can see where he writes!).  It's friendly in tone and has lots of good ideas. It will also make you smile! I'll be recommending it to my grad students.

[aquamarine]

Gobelin (and anyone else who has read it), is this book discpline specific?  In other words, would someone in the humanities find it helpful as well? 

[gobelin]

It's aimed at psychologists, but I think it would be relevant to other disciplines too.  He refers to people having large backlogs of data to work through, which might relate to some disciplines more than others, but most of the advice is general.  There's a chapter on writing journal articles, and a chapter on books.  Most of it is general advice aimed at getting you to write more (and to just get on with it instead of making a fuss about it), and I think that's relevant to any discipline. 

[aquamarine]

Thanks, Gobelin!

[psychle]

Yes, thanks for your review, Gobelin. I think I will put in a request for my library to purchase the book, as I'm sure it would be a good resource for many grad students.

[untenured]

Can anyone offer some examples of the author's advice?  I curious if he dishes out truly useful advice or just generic chestnuts like "find a quiet place to work!"

Untenured

[gobelin]

Well, maybe some of it is the kind of thing that you'll find in the Paralysis Analysis thread.  But he's refreshingly realistic about the academic publication process, and it's easy to read.  And very pragmatic about the whole thing (he even says you can write in a bathroom!). Here's a quote from the beginning that will help you decide if it's for you or not:

"I take a practical, behavior-oriented approach to writing.  We won't talk about insecurities, feelings of avoidance and defensiveness, or inner mental blocks that hold people back.  We won't talk about developing new skills, either - you already have the basic skills needed to write productively, although you'll improve with practice.  And we won't talk about unleashing your inner anything: Put your 'inner writer' back on its leash and muzzle it.

Instead, we'll talk about your outer writer.  Writing productively is about actions that you aren't doing but could easily do: making a schedule, setting clear goals, keeping track of your work, rewarding yourself, and building good habits.  Productive writers don't have special gifts or special traits - they just spend more time writing and use this time more efficiently." (Silvia, 2007:3-4).

It's a cheerful book too so if nothing else it will make you feel happier about your attempts to write.

Incidentally, if you want to nurture your inner writer instead, I'd recommend The Artist's Way.

[athena1]

I take Ms. Mentor's advice -- daily goal of a minimum of 1 page (or 1 hour) of writing per day. Double spaced. By the end of the year, that's a lot of pages.