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Academic writing. Academic Russian writing

In the first part of the textbook, we will outline the range of concepts associated with academic writing, deal with how a scientific text differs from an artistic or journalistic one, and consider key principles on which the teaching of academic writing should be built.

Then we will get acquainted with how an academic text is built, find out how an essay differs from a summary, and consider a universal model that will help us not only see, but also build an academic text as an integral system.

Finally, we turn to how academic text is assessed and get acquainted with the 3D model of literacy by Australian scholar Bill Green. All these concepts, principles and models will allow us not only to work with the practical tasks of the next three parts of the textbook, but also to analyze mistakes and discuss our actions.

SCIENTIFIC TEXT AND ACADEMIC WRITING

Culture, structure and literature: the boundaries of scientific and non-scientific

IN different countries Ah, there are different traditions of writing, unspoken and vowel rules, preferences and models. So, for example, the Arabs like to repeat a thought in the text over and over again in various interpretations, the Japanese prefer not to formulate their thought openly, but to hint at it from different angles until the reader guesses, and the British believe that the thought should be expressed directly and immediately, and then developed by the text. All these traditions have the right to exist - at least until there is a need for mutual understanding between representatives of different cultures.

We, native speakers of the Russian language, often write verbosely and emotionally, especially in the humanitarian and socio-political spheres. We are prone to reasoning and digression, metaphors and generalizations. Even in purely scientific publications, you can find elements of such a letter that give them a journalistic tinge.

The desire to be objective and stay within the scientific tradition often leads to the other extreme, when the text is written in dry, deliberately scientific or formal language. Unfortunately, this manner does not in itself make the text any less verbose, or more organized, or more understandable to the reader.

Of course, in Russia there are both brilliant scientific works and witty scientists. There are books, articles and tutorials that are easy and interesting to read, despite the complexity of the subject matter. As a rule, no one specially taught these authors to write such texts, and it is generally accepted that they somehow learned themselves, or they initially had an "innate talent" for presenting thoughts in a clear and convincing language.

However, if we take a closer look at a scientific text, we will understand that it is not only the language and style that determine its quality. A book can be written in beautiful language, but if the reader needs to find the necessary information in it as soon as possible (namely, but this is the usual principle for working with scientific literature), then this may not be so easy. This is where it turns out that the main advantage of a book, text or article is its good organization,

a clear structure and brevity (more precisely, the absence of unnecessary words and unnecessary thoughts).

Is it possible to learn how to write a text so that it is not only clear and understandable, but also convenient for the reader? It is possible and necessary, and in this we can be helped by the theory and practice of academic writing, developed by Western experts, and, first of all, by English speakers (more precisely, "English writers"). Why is that?

Firstly, because it is the most clearly organized and well-developed system with almost half a century of experience in application, and secondly, because all international communication in science and education is carried out through this system. The principles of this system are also guided by the editors of leading international scientific journals, so every specialist needs to know them, and they should be mastered as early as possible. Therefore, instead of "reinventing the wheel" or looking for "your own special way" where thousands of researchers and teachers have already paved the way, it is more convenient to simply learn the rules of the road and follow the same path.

Speaking about the "English-speaking" world, it should be emphasized that not all developers of textbooks on academic writing in English are English, Americans, Australians or other "native" speakers of this language. The language of international communication exists in order to be able to communicate without borders and restrictions, without translators and "narrators", which is why textbooks are written by representatives of different countries in English. Nevertheless, the key roles in the development of the scientific and methodological base, organization of academic writing programs and its system belong to scientists from English-speaking countries.

On the other hand, we citizens of Russia (by the way, not all of us are ethnic Russians) speak and write in Russian, and it would be at least stupid to study academic writing in English when you live and work in your native country. Moreover, this is not necessary, since the disciplinary field of academic writing practically ends where the features of the national language begin. Grammar, morphology and specific rules for the use of words belong to another discipline, which is called the "culture of speech".

The difference between these disciplines is fundamentally important to understand right away, since academic writing for our education is a completely new discipline, although its problems are not new for us. The structure, logic and content of a scientific text have always been important, but a variety of specialists dealt with these issues - linguists, semiologists, sociopsychologists, specialists in information technology, specialists in Russian as a mother tongue and as a foreign language, as well as professors of various disciplines. courses and curricula we practically did not have academic writing, so teachers of the Russian language and culture of speech had to deal with the scientific text. Of course, academic writing and the culture of scientific speech are related

disciplines, but they should not replace each other. We do not doubt that a cardiologist, for example, should not replace an otolaryngologist, although both are doctors.

The boundary between academic writing and the culture of speech is most clearly expressed by the Greek root "meta" ("above, over"): the focus of academic writing is metalinguistic (or metalinguistic) skills and abilities. It doesn't matter what language you think in when you generate ideas and organize them in sequence, when you select the most persuasive arguments and accompany them with the corresponding factual support.

Even when specific words and sentences are in the focus of academic writing (and how could it be without them?), here, too, the interests will be different. Thus, we will not be interested in how the words "also", "secondly" or "due to" are written or used, but which of these words will most accurately and logically connect the ideas in a given text or paragraph; we will be interested not in the occupied before or after the participial turnover, but in the logic of using this turnover, i.e. where it is better to place it, whether to transfer it to another sentence, whether to remake it into an independent sentence, or to delete it altogether. Everything will depend on the information contained in the words, and not on the combination of words.

The culture of speech is an important and necessary discipline, the task of which is to preserve the norms and rules of the literary (in this case, established as a standard) language, including the scientific one. In preserving the tradition, the researcher's gaze is turned to the rules and details already established in the past. There are so many details in the language that it is not always possible to cover them within the framework of the school and even the university curriculum, so there are numerous dictionaries and reference books for philologists, journalists and editors. Even a very competent specialist, having handed over the manuscript to the publishing house, will receive it back to agree with a mass of minor amendments (for example, not "three times", but "three times", not "in this connection", but "in connection with this") and will agree with the editor on all such trifles, with the exception of those that distort his idea.

This is where the area of academic writing begins. The editor reads the text in no way as a proofreader, and between the author and the editor, as well as between the student and the supervisor or between the co-authors of the article, discussions may arise aimed at clarifying the true meaning of the written and the best way his expressions. This indicates that both the editor and the author need to master the methodology of academic writing in order to better understand each other. Discussion, as we will soon see, is the basis of scientific communication, and it is on it that the methodology of writing rests.

Unfortunately, metalinguistic writing skills, text construction technologies and the rules of international rhetoric are usually not taught to us either at school or at the university, but at the same time they want us to master them. Metalinguistic skills, unlike linguistic ones, are needed by representatives of all specialties, and, fortunately, the set of methods and technologies of academic writing is quite visible within the framework of one (but not the only) textbook. Attempts to write just such a textbook, of course, have been made, but the main specialty of the Russian language and culture of speech usually takes over and takes the author into the native element of language and style. Perhaps the most methodologically close to Western textbooks of academic writing in Russia is still tutorial Novosibirsk professor N. I. Kolesnikova "From abstract to dissertation", which has already gained well-deserved fame among Russian students and specialists. Interestingly, Natalia Ivanovna herself is a specialist in Russian as a foreign language and wrote her textbook without being closely familiar with English-language literature on academic writing. This ability of a scientist to think independently says a lot about the power of knowledge, which will be discussed below (Chapter 3). Let's hope that there will be more good textbooks on academic writing soon.

No matter how good the textbook is, it is possible to master these technologies perfectly only through long practice, because each text is new ideas, new goals and new tests. And, of course, new search necessary, precise, convincing word - the only true one.

Of course, the search for the "only true" word is carried out by the authors of not only scientific, but also artistic and journalistic texts, so right here, at the very beginning of the textbook, we should draw another important boundary - between a scientific text (including an academic one as an educational scientific one) and an artistic or journalistic text. Three key questions will help us do this: what, to whom And For what is written in these texts, i.e. content, addressee and purpose of the letter.

Let us compare these characteristics first in literary and scientific texts.

Firstly, the content of a literary text is not subject to verification by facts, it is based on fiction and subjective experiences, it does not require proof and does not contribute to the development of any science. The author's ideas can be anything, even absurd or outrageous - hence the emotionality, linguistic flamboyance, sophistication, or, on the contrary, the rudeness and assertiveness of the text.

Secondly, a literary text is written for a chosen reader (more precisely, a selector). Someone likes action-packed detective stories, someone likes romantic adventures, and someone likes philosophical reflections. Forcing us to read fiction that we do not like is pointless and useless, because we read it for the soul and of our own choice, and the choice is determined by today's mood, life experience and many other individual factors. Moreover, we can leave the book in the middle or, conversely, re-read it more than once. It is important that the literary text is read in its entirety, word by word, and look to the end to find out what all

over, means to spoil the pleasure of reading. Thus, fiction, so varied and vast, is written to satisfy the aesthetic needs of each of us at different moments in life.

Unlike fiction, a scientific text is not read "for the soul", in its entirety or according to one's own preference. Its content is accurate and extremely informative, there is no place for superfluous words, emotions, digressions, ideological or religious beliefs. Everything in it is subordinated to the fact that the reader quickly finds the necessary information and is convinced of their authenticity and objectivity, and the reader is a specialist who needs this information for work, and not for pleasure.

The purpose of a scientific text is to provide this information. Accordingly, the less time the reader spends searching for the necessary information, the better the scientific text. For this, there are laws for the construction of an academic text. If the reader does not find what he needs in three minutes in a thick book (and different specialists in this book will need different information), he will either take another book or be forced to spend extra precious time. Remember how you searched for the answer to a specific question that interests you in a pile of sources unknown to you, and you will understand how no need write.

Here lies the difference between English and Russian scientific texts. In a scientific library with open access to English-language books ordered by discipline, no more than half an hour is enough to select a list of references from two dozen sources on any topic, indicating specific pages on which the necessary information is located. I will say more: in this way you can select a bibliography for an unfamiliar topic in someone else's specialty, and I myself have done this in the Shaninka library (MVShSEN). Unfortunately, it is impossible to do the same with Russian-language sources: you will have to spend more than one day.

The conclusion that follows from this does not mean at all that, knowing English, you will write a research paper faster and better. Not at all. You may write an abstract (which will be discussed below), but not an independent research paper that will be of interest to the reader. And the reader is not interested in the bibliography or references, but in your own ideas, and most likely he will not read your text in its entirety. He will just immediately look where you put these ideas. You must state them exactly where he will look for them, and then the goal of scientific communication, and with it scientific (at first academic) writing, will be achieved.

Thus, academic writing aims to teach you how to express and justify your own ideas through a concise, compelling, and conveniently organized scientific text. If you learn how to write exactly like this, then if you wish, you can publish your text in a foreign scientific journal, since translating it into English will be a matter of technique.

Before discussing further the characteristics of academic writing, it should be separated from another type of writing - journalism. The journalistic text, as its name implies, is intended for the public, because. it is much more focused on the mass reader than the literary text. In addition, a journalistic text usually contains facts, not fiction, it is devoted to pressing social, political or cultural problems and expresses the author's personal position in relation to these problems. All this, at first glance, makes a journalistic text related to a scientific one, but this is only at first glance.

In fact, it is precisely in journalism that the danger lurks for those who write scientific texts in social disciplines. The journalistic text is intended not for a personally or professionally interested, but for the mass reader. Its purpose is to sharpen the issue and draw public attention to it. But in what way? Focusing on the general reader, and not on specialists, the journalistic text expresses the position of the author in rather emotional terms, and the factual information is selected by the author arbitrarily, in order to support this position. Publicism is not a scientific, but a journalistic text. The profession of a journalist has its own specifics, but this specificity makes it related to fiction.

The main characteristic of journalism is its politicized or ideological nature. Such texts always express the position not so much of the author personally, but of a certain group of people with well-defined beliefs. Thus, for example, the death of people will always be presented by a journalist as an unequivocally criminal act of the government, certain political groups or armed formations. There is no place for a balanced, objective assessment and comprehensive analysis, there is no appropriate methodological and scientific base, no proof and no bibliography. The methods of investigative journalism are known, and the subjective experiences of people will be reflected in the press or TV show, often not only emotionally rich and biased, but also shocking. The purpose of such investigations is not so much to find the truth, but to attract people to someone's side.

There is no place in a scientific text for beliefs, subjective experiences, or beliefs. Each word here must be substantiated, weighed, supported by reliable information or verified experimentally. Each source of information must be presented in references, meet the requirements of reliability and objectivity. The author of a scientific text convinces not with slogans and appeals, but with the logic and consistency of the proof. Such text is unbiased, it provides the reader with the opportunity to critically evaluate and reflect on the information presented.

Of course, one cannot immediately learn how to write impartial and comprehensively substantiated scientific articles. As they say, every business must be learned. Therefore, you should start with educational (academic) scientific texts, which are called essays. These texts are addressed to a closer reader - teachers and group colleagues. Gradually complicating

task and gaining experience - both scientific research and academic writing - you will be able to write truly scientific texts.

Much of this textbook is devoted to what an essay is and how to write it, but since this concept is inextricably linked with academic writing, it should be noted right away that it is often interpreted incorrectly or inaccurately. Unfortunately, in Russian education, many concepts and terms of the Western educational system are borrowed either without definitions at all, or, even more dangerously, in an arbitrary or incorrect interpretation. For this reason, one may come across such definitions of an essay as "a prose essay of small volume and free composition on a private topic, interpreted subjectively."

It is easy to see that this is the definition of a literary, artistic essay, and it cannot be attributed to those essays that are written at the university, since these are not "compositions", not "free composition" and not on a "private topic", which is "interpreted subjectively". Everything is exactly the opposite: a university essay is an academic text, which means that it is a scientific text, objective and structured according to the rules accepted in science, only educational. As for the "small volume", 15-20 pages of a scientific text is equally sufficient for both a freshman's essay and an article by a scientist in a scientific journal. The point is not the volume, but the content.

Cm.: Kolesnikov II. AND. From abstract to dissertation. M.: Flinta. 2004.

Keywords

ACADEMIC LETTER / RHETORIC AND COMPOSITION / RESEARCH COMPETENCES / TRAINING OF SCIENTIFIC STAFF / Rhetorical and Publication Conventions / INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH/ ACADEMIC WRITING / RHETORIC AND COMPOSITION / RHETORICAL AND PUBLISHING CONVENTIONS/INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH/ ENGLISH FOR RESEARCH PUBLICATION PURPOSES

annotation scientific article on linguistics and literary criticism, author of scientific work - Korotkina Irina Borisovna

Topic Discussion academic writing, which has been on the pages of the journal for seven years, began with an analysis of the problem of the quality of researcher training, but then the focus shifted towards teaching academic English, which narrowed the range of issues discussed. academic writing a vast area of research aimed at solving the problems of education and science in general, so they cannot be limited to applied tasks, and even more so language programs. Analysis of publications allows us to conclude that the discussion should return to the mainstream of interdisciplinary discussion, which, in turn, requires the Russian academic community to realize the importance of academic writing as an independent discipline and new for the Russian, but not for the international academic community, the branch of scientific and pedagogical research. The article analyzes the problems that hinder this awareness, due to historical and socio-cultural factors. Based on the results of the study, the author concludes that it is necessary to create theoretical and methodological foundations academic writing development of writing programs and mechanisms for the phased introduction of these programs into Russian higher education, which requires comprehensive interdisciplinary research and consolidation of the Russian academic community.

The text of the scientific work on the topic "Academic writing: the need for interdisciplinary research"

ACADEMIC WRITING

Academic Writing: The Need for Interdisciplinary Research

Korotkina Irina Borisovna - Ph.D. ped. sciences, associate professor. Email: [email protected] Russian Academy National economy And public service under the President of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia

Address: 119571, Moscow, Vernadsky Avenue, 82, building 1

Moscow graduate School social and economic sciences, Moscow, Russia

Address: 119571, Moscow, Vernadsky Avenue, 82, bldg. 2

Annotation. The discussion of the topic of academic writing, which has been going on in the journal for seven years, began with an analysis of the problem of the quality of researcher training, but then the focus shifted towards teaching academic English, which narrowed the range of issues discussed. Academic writing is a vast area of research aimed at solving the problems of education and science in general, so they cannot be limited to applied tasks, and even more so to language programs. An analysis of the publications allows us to conclude that the discussion should return to the mainstream of an interdisciplinary discussion, which, in turn, requires the Russian academic community to realize the importance of academic writing as an independent discipline and a new branch of scientific and pedagogical research for the Russian, but not for the international academic community. The article analyzes the problems that hinder this awareness, due to historical and socio-cultural factors. Based on the results of the study, the author concludes that it is necessary to create theoretical and methodological foundations for academic writing, develop writing programs and mechanisms for the phased introduction of these programs into Russian higher education, which requires comprehensive interdisciplinary research and consolidation of the Russian academic community.

Keywords: academic writing, rhetoric and composition, research competencies, training of scientific personnel, rhetorical and publishing conventions, interdisciplinary research

For citation: Korotkina I.B. Academic writing: the need for interdisciplinary research // Higher education in Russia. 2018. V. 27. No. 10. S. 64-74. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31992/0869-3617-2018-27-10-64-74

Introduction

The column “Academic Writing and Research Competences” was born on the pages of the journal in 2011 as a result of the publication of materials from round tables at the Russian State University for the Humanities and Higher School of Economics in 2011. In the first year, the discussion gathered a lot of publications from teachers from various universities representing various fields of knowledge. However, with the involvement of teachers of academic writing in English and

rectors of university writing centers, its focus has shifted towards applied problems. As a result, the discussion has lost its theoretical significance and, most importantly, the interdisciplinarity and multidimensionality of the discussion.

Meanwhile, methodological research in the field of academic writing does not stand still. The study of the theoretical foundations of academic writing, the history of its formation and development in the West, before

only in the United States, provides an opportunity to take a fresh look at the work published at the beginning of the discussion, and understand why the problems of the quality of texts written by students and applicants, which certainly concern university teachers, educational leaders and scientists, are not now discussed in the mainstream of academic writing as hotly as they were seven years ago. The research conducted by the author suggests that the problem is rooted in the insufficient awareness of the Russian academic community about academic writing as an independent branch of knowledge and a discipline that has well-developed theoretical and methodological foundations. Unfortunately, the formation of this discipline took place outside of Russia during the Soviet period and therefore remained outside the field of view of domestic pedagogical science. As a result, many teachers and scholars mistakenly associate academic writing with philology rather than rhetoric and believe that one can learn to write a scientific text on their own, through practice and talent. Such ideas result in a gap in the quality of scientific texts between Russian authors and authors from countries where academic writing has become part of the university curriculum.

This article will give short review the history of the development and formation of academic writing and its conceptual foundations, and it is shown that the key to understanding academic writing as a discipline should be sought primarily in what goals it sets, on what grounds it relies, and how it interacts with other disciplines.

interdisciplinary discussion

The journal "Higher Education in Russia" became the first public platform for discussing the problem of academic writing in Russia. The first authors represented various universities and disciplines and interpreted the concept of "academic writing" in different ways,

trying to formulate his attitude towards him in terms of his scientific worldview. Nevertheless, they all unanimously recognized the existence of a problem and the importance of its solution.

Due to its novelty, the very term "academic writing" was subjected to critical evaluation. So, A.S. Robotova expressed her rejection of the term, seeing the use of the word “academic” as contradicting the semantics of the Russian language, and, only for the purpose of discussion, conditionally agreeing with it, expressed doubts about the effectiveness of short specialized courses in academic writing, explaining that the development of written competencies requires many years of systematic training. V.P. Shestak and N.V. Shestak saw a solution to the problem in improving the quality of professional training of students within the framework of existing disciplines within the Federal State Educational Standards by increasing the share of independent work of students, developing methodological support for this work and teaching faculty in the methods of forming research competencies of students and graduate students. Similar views were expressed by V.S. Senashenko.

Such recommendations seem reasonable, but raise two questions: who and by what methods will teach professors the indicated methods and techniques (in fact, methods of teaching academic writing), and how can one learn to write independently using propaedeutic manuals in disciplines that do not provide for direct extensive practice of writing and repeated checking of texts? In this regard, articles describing real pedagogical experience served as a valuable contribution to the discussion. Based on the experience of teaching the philosophy of science and the methodology of scientific research, N.I. Martishina emphasized the logic of the text, the ability to formulate a hypothesis, correctly and accurately draw a line of argument through her text

and do it in a logical, persuasive, and academic way. G.A. Orlova, a teacher of discourse analysis, put the development of students' analytical skills at the forefront, emphasizing the social orientation of analytical (in international terminology - academic) discourse. And finally, A.V. Kupriyanov, describing an experiment in teaching students academic writing at the Faculty of Sociology of the Higher School of Economics, pointed out that in the absence of specially developed, practice-oriented methods and an understanding of what should be the content of the discipline, such courses are untenable.

The largest study written outside the journal, but directly in the wake of this discussion and in its mainstream, are two monographs by V.N. Bazylev: "Academic "writing" (theoretical aspect)" and "Academic "writing" (methodological aspect)". Unlike A.S. Robotova, the author puts in quotation marks not the word “academic”, but the word “writing”, in such a strange way trying to define it as a “fragment of academic discourse”. Despite the similar terminological secondary importance attached to writing by him, the author agrees with the participants in the discussion regarding the importance of developing the skills of independent research writing, although he also does not see prospects for their development within the framework of courses called “academic writing” due to the limited academic hours allotted for them and the lack of a systematic methodological approach. Unfortunately and contrary to expectations, neither the theoretical nor the methodical monograph by V.N. Bazylev are not related to teaching academic writing, remaining completely within the framework of the Russian disciplines of discourse analysis and culture of speech, and do not even contain sufficient references to the literature on the methodology and philosophy of science, not to mention the almost complete absence

foreign sources on academic writing, where this discipline is represented more than widely. It should be noted that if the author simply followed international scientific research in the field of academic discourse and read them in the original language, then the only two really relevant, although focused on academic discourse sources (out of 172 in his theoretical monograph), written by the famous British scientist C. Highland, would lead him to many publications on academic writing, both by C. Highland himself and other researchers of academic writing.

Summing up the first results of the discussion, its initiators A.M. Perlov and B.E. Stepanov make a fair conclusion that "for the Russian university context, the teaching of academic writing is still a new educational practice, where there are no established methods, didactic infrastructure, and differentiation of teaching levels" .

An analysis of a larger array of texts that I conducted in the course of my research shows that the problems of discussing academic writing in Russia are primarily related to the lack of awareness about it as a branch of knowledge. The reasons why academic writing has so far remained out of sight of Russian pedagogical science and the academic community are objective and due to a number of the following interrelated factors.

1. The formation of the conceptual field of academic writing and academic literacy took place in the English-speaking countries of the West in the 20th century, i.e. in the Soviet period, with a significant isolation of domestic pedagogical research.

2. Interest in academic writing and academic literacy in the post-Soviet period did not arise due to the fact that similar studies were not conducted in Russia and they remained outside the field of view of Russian scientists.

3. International studies and developments in academic writing have been published in English and have not been translated into Russian, which, combined with the traditionally small number of specialists fluent in this language and the weak interest in interdisciplinary connections, has not attracted attention from related disciplines.

4. Academic writing first became known in Russia to English language teachers at the practice level (teaching aids, tests and international exams), so its distribution has so far hardly affected scientific, theoretical and methodological studies of academic writing.

5. Currently, academic writing is associated in the opinion of the Russian academic community with the English language in which and for which it was originally developed, as a result of which it is associated with the practice of teaching English, which is traditionally given a secondary place in Russian non-linguistic universities.

6. The sharply increased interest in the quality of scientific texts and increased publication activity in international publications under institutional and political pressure makes one turn for help to related disciplines with which this quality has traditionally been associated in Russia: the Russian language and the culture of scientific speech, English as a foreign language, discursive analysis and research methodology.

It should be recognized that these disciplines can provide some help, but this help is limited by the scope of the content and methodology of these disciplines, while the teaching of academic writing in Western universities (and today in other universities of the world, including Chinese and South Korean universities, which have achieved a significant increase in international publications in connection with this) is focused directly

to create a scientific text. The lack of systematic training in academic writing thus creates inequalities among scholars and discourages the publication of authors from countries such as Russia where such training is lacking.

In the light of these factors, the key role in the conclusion of A.M. Perlova and B.E. Stepanov play the words “for the Russian university context”, therefore it is especially important to look at academic writing from the standpoint of those scientific studies that were carried out outside of Russia and, by coincidence, almost completely remained outside the field of view of the Russian academic community.

Academic writing as rhetoric and composition

Obviously, the extensive experience of foreign universities in the field of theory and practice of academic writing is worthy of comprehensive study and comprehension from the point of view of using this experience in Russian pedagogical science and educational practice. At the same time, academic writing, for obvious reasons, cannot be limited to the English language (as happens, for example, in Northern Europe and the Netherlands). The adaptation of learning models requires serious analysis, which is beyond the scope of this article, but has been covered in other publications.

Traditionally, the ability to write a text is associated with philology and fiction, and hence two illusions arise. The first is that you can learn how to write scientific texts on your own, by imitating texts in your professional field - that is, you do not need to learn writing, and the difference in the quality of scientific writing depends on some innate ability or literary talent. The second illusion is that for a scientific text, especially in areas far from philology, it is not the language that matters, but the content, therefore the quality of the text, its

syntax or persuasive syllable is of secondary importance, and, therefore, "sinking" to the polishing of the language of the text is below the dignity of a scientist engaged in genuine science.

These delusions are more dangerous than it seems at first glance. They do not just give rise to an artificial confrontation between "physicists" and "lyricists", but also at the level high school divide students, and not only ideologically, but also quite realistically, when the so-called "humanitarian", "economic" or "mathematical" classes are formed. This approach subsequently results in illiterate and poorly readable texts, from which scientific journals suffer, and the natural sciences suffer from a formalized, faceless and primitive language, and the humanities suffer from verbosity, emotionality and lack of logic.

These misconceptions were equally characteristic of Western scholars before academic writing took shape and took its place among other disciplines as a central (fundamental) set of competencies in relation to all university education. Thus, one of the textbook authors of the IMRaD format adopted in experimental studies of the natural sciences, R. Day, writes that as a result of imitation of the texts of their predecessors, many generations of Western scientists at one time consolidated and legitimized the system of errors; however, today they are already a thing of the past thanks to systematic training. Unfortunately, in Russia such imitative writing is still “reinforced and legalized”, so it is very difficult to fight it. The methodologist of academic writing A. Yang notes that, imitating scientists and not yet being such, a student gets used to writing in an alien, artificial and “abstruse” language, instead of learning to convey to the reader, if not yet completely scientific, but his own idea. This same

the idea is reflected in the above-mentioned article by A.V. Kupriyanov.

The first step towards a correct understanding of academic writing is the recognition that its epistemological basis is not philology, but rhetoric, i.e. methods of scientific persuasion. The continuity of academic writing from classical rhetoric is emphasized by American researchers with the term rhetoric and composition, which has been adopted to refer to this discipline as applied to higher education since the second half of the 20th century. S. Lynn defines rhetoric and composition as a rapidly developing branch of knowledge and discipline that helps teachers of other disciplines teach students communication and argumentation. The very name of the discipline combines two terms - "rhetoric" as the art of persuasion and "composition" as the process of writing.

The combination in rhetoric of two principles - language and scientific thought (with a certain degree of metaphorization, one can say, “words” and “deeds”) forms an inseparable unity, however, the development of science sometimes depended on which way the scales leaned in different eras. The first such deviation was the substitution of scientific argumentation for oratory in the Middle Ages, and the second was the linking of teaching writing with fiction in the 19th century.

The original five-term model of classical rhetoric includes five stages: invention (invention), disposition (arrangement), style (style), memorization (memory) and presentation (delivery). Data in brackets English terms are more transparent and form part of the terminology of academic writing today. The first two stages correspond to the development of a hypothesis and the organization of the argument from thesis to the conclusion, i.e. logical organization of the text in accordance with the idea of the author. Rejection of these two essential cognitive components

rhetoric, under the pressure of church dogmas in the Middle Ages, and then under the influence of ramism - an ideology formed by the followers of the philosopher Peter Ramus, who separated invention and disposition from rhetoric - elevated the memorization of quotations from canonized texts and the ability to beautifully integrate them into one's speech to the rank of scientific proof. This practice led to the fact that rhetoric remained within the narrow framework of linguistic stylistics until the 18th century.

The same thing happened when writing was linked with fiction, as a result of which the familiar “lists of obligatory literature” were formed for all of us with the canonized texts of the classics, about which it was necessary to write not what you yourself think, but what is prescribed by the requirements. Writings on literature were very convenient for the Soviet ideology, but even today the authority of canonized authors can be shaken, as happened in the United States at the beginning of the 20th century. thanks to the considerable efforts of academic writing researchers, it has not yet been possible to return teaching writing to the mainstream of sound scientific evidence in our conditions. It should be borne in mind that not only the classics of Marxism-Leninism, references to which played the same role as once references to the pillars of the church, were canonized, but also scientists in every scientific field. The authority of the canons is especially difficult to overcome in humanitarian, social and pedagogical research, where it is “fixed and legitimized” scientific schools. The strength of this tradition is so great that the fall of the Soviet ideology created a certain vacuum in the content of education, which today they are trying to fill with the introduction of the foundations of religion or the search for new ideological guidelines. It is impossible to quickly switch to critical thinking, analytics and substantiation of one's own position, being in this vacuum: neither the system, nor the teachers, nor the leadership of education are ready. Postulation of democratic values or their declaration

in the new editions of the Federal State Educational Standards cannot change the situation overnight. Directive prescriptions lead to their customary formal execution. Hence the failure of the so-called essay on Russian and foreign languages in the USE format in the context of developing independent writing skills and the ability to justify one's position based on facts and logic (as is customary in international practice). As a result, we have a drop in the level of research competencies of university applicants even lower than what was in the compositions.

Thus, in order to start teaching independent writing, it is necessary not only to rebuild the entire vertical of education, but also retrain teachers, rebuild the consciousness of all participants educational process- and this is not an easy task. Nevertheless, it was solved in a number of Western countries, primarily in the United States, where this process was by no means easier, especially considering that American scientists have traveled this path as pioneers.

Formation

academic writing as a discipline

The formation of the discipline "academic writing" (more precisely, "rhetoric and composition") did not happen by chance in the United States. The basis of university education here as early as the 18th century. the idea of conducting scientific evidence based on a complete model of rhetoric, restored and developed in the works of Scottish scientists H. Blair and A. Bain, was put forward (having been published in 1783, Professor H. Blair's lectures were included in the program of Yale University two years later) . In 1806, the first society of teachers of rhetoric and composition, the Boylston Professorship of Rhetoric and Oratory, was established at Harvard. However, at the end of the XIX century. Here, too, there was a link between writing and fiction, associated with the desire to increase the “humanity” and persuasiveness of scientific writing. This bundle came from Germany along with the Humboldt-

a school model that quickly spread to the United States at the instigation of Harvard, along with censored lists of great classical literature and introductory essays.

The struggle for the separation of academic writing from literature began in the United States quite soon: already in 1911, the NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English) was founded - the National Council of Teachers of English under the leadership of F.N. Scott, who previously served as acting president of the MLA (Modern Language Association), an association familiar to us from the MLA citation format, as well as from the scientific journal MLA Journal, which publishes the most relevant debatable research on the theory and methodology of academic writing. Scott began to actively pursue a policy of returning rhetoric to university practice and to defend social entity letters, and soon the teachers of oral literature left the NCTE, creating their own association. Today, NCTE is the worldwide information and consolidating body for teachers of writing and academic English.

The modern science of academic writing dates back to the 1930s. from the birth of the so-called new criticism (new criticism), which finally supplanted philological criticism and entailed a radical revision of writing courses outside of literature. In 1949, the first conference on composition and communication in higher education, the Conference of College Composition and Communication (CCCC), was held. The conference and the journal College Composition and Communication (level Q1) published since that time represent the most authoritative body of academic writing. In July 2018, the leaders of four writing centers from Russia spoke at one of the conference venues in Denver: E.L. Squires (NES, Moscow), N.A. Gunin (TSTU,

Tambov), V.M. Evdash (TSU, Tyumen) and I.B. Korotkina (RANEPA, Moscow).

The most important characteristic of academic writing, which determines its goals and content, is the social function (“deed” is primary in relation to “word”). Therefore, the theoretical foundations of the discipline are three scientific directions related to the sociology of knowledge: studies in literacy, social constructivism and academic discourse. Starting with J. Dewey, the interpretation of writing as a social practice is the foundation of the method of teaching writing in collaboration (collaborative writing). As you can see, linguistics and philology are not included in the list of theoretical foundations of writing, but this does not mean that language is not important: it is certainly a means of achieving the goal of communication, but it is a means of conveying content, and not the dominant factor in scientific argumentation. Hence the importance of brevity, accuracy and organization of the text for the addressee, the reader. A significant part of the content of academic writing is precisely metalinguistic competencies, which cover three aspects of rhetoric and composition: focus, organization and mechanics. Only at the level of mechanics (syntactic relations, modality, vocabulary) does academic writing come into contact with language, but even here logic prevails. A simple example: the lessons of the language and culture of speech teach how to put commas correctly, but they do not teach how many commas and for what purpose can be used in one sentence. Learning to write does not proceed from the finished text, as in discursive analysis, but from the author's hypothesis through the construction of the whole text to its final writing and “polishing”. Academic discourse focuses on the cultural component (conditionally: reading, perception), functional linguistics and culture of speech - on the operational (conditionally: compliance with language norms), while academic writing is aimed at critical

The logical component is the formation of a set of competencies aimed at producing a new text from putting forward a hypothesis to its completion in accordance with the requirements of discourse and language.

It is the social function that determines the repeated proofreading of the text by the author. In this case, the goal is logical organization (parts of the text and individual sentences are rearranged, clarified and linked within paragraphs and large parts) and brevity (reduction of paragraphs, sentences and individual words). So, when writing an abstract (usually 300 words in international journals), the main task of the author is to formulate the results of the study and its implications (where and by whom these results can be used), squeezing the relevance, goals and methods as much as possible, since it is the first, and not the last, that is new. In this case, the account goes to prepositions, conjunctions and bundles, not to mention adverbs and adjectives. Russian authors, on the other hand, write annotations without saving either on words or on common places, not thinking about the fact that the fate of the text depends on it: international colleagues, most likely, will not notice an uninformative annotation, and no one will bother downloading the text. In the same way, editors of major international journals tend to review and evaluate abstracts, and only if they are of interest, open the full text. The full text will not be accepted if it is not “polished” to the maximum clarity and informativeness, if it contains deviations from the topic of the article or is slurred.

Teaching academic writing as a social practice requires specialized knowledge, not imitative practice or literary talent. Rhetorical and publishing conventions developed by Western experts in academic writing can and should be taught in order to learn how to construct a text in full accordance with the requirements of the global

scientific communication, gradually getting rid of false academicism. In connection with the involvement of a large number of scientists around the world in the publication process, the issue of training writing specialists is particularly acute today. If "academic writing" is an "umbrella" term that includes teaching independent, discussion writing at school and research writing at the university, then originated in the 2010s. the new direction "English for research purposes" is intended specifically for the training of scientific and pedagogical workers. It is designed to help them write according to international rhetorical and publishing conventions, as well as to understand editors and reviewers as they and here there are certain, developed over the past 70 years, methods of communication.

Academic writing continues to develop rapidly, dynamically covering ever new angles of research. In the latest edition of his book "Teaching and Reasearching Writing", K. Hyland emphasizes that academic writing continues to assert itself as " key indicator the quality of life of millions of people around the world, as a measure of successful education, academic competence, professional development and institutional recognition".

Conclusion

Today it is already obvious that academic writing is vital for higher education in Russia, because without the systematic training of students and researchers in the rhetorical and publishing conventions adopted in the global academic discourse, we will not be able to reach a competitive level either in scientific publications or in the training of scientific personnel.

This article provides only a brief overview of the history of the development of academic writing.

A detailed study of the theoretical and methodological foundations of this new discipline for us was carried out by me in my dissertation research for the degree of Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences “Theory and Practice of Teaching Writing in Foreign and Domestic Universities” and was partially reflected in the monograph and, of course, in publications in the journal. It is important to emphasize that the development of academic writing in Russia is a major scientific and pedagogical task that cannot be solved without involving representatives of various disciplines and education management specialists, without informing the academic community and building purposeful interaction with foreign scientists. In other words, an integrated approach based on comparative studies is required, and a step-by-step approach, during which personnel will be trained, experiments will be carried out, programs and educational materials will be developed. And in order for these programs to be consistent and effective, serious scientific, theoretical and methodological research is needed.

Returning again to the discussion on the pages of the journal, I would like to once again focus the attention of colleagues on the value of publications in the “Academic Writing” section of specialists in various fields working in a variety of professional and educational contexts. Unfortunately, recently their participation has been greatly reduced, and the rubric began to publish mainly representatives of academic writing in English, which narrowed the range of research and transferred them to the applied direction. I believe that we need to return to the title "Academic writing and research competencies", inviting everyone who is interested in improving the quality of texts written by students and specialists to participate in the discussion.

Acknowledgments: Article prepared in

within the framework of the state assignment of the Institute for Education Development Strategy for 2017-2019. (Project No. 27.8520.2017/BCh).

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The article was received by the editors on July 16, 2018 Revised on July 19, 2018 Accepted for publication on September 15, 2018

Academic Writing in Russia: The Urge for Interdisciplinary Studies

Irina B. Korotkina - Cand. sci. (Education), Assoc. Prof., e-mail: [email protected] Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, Moscow, Russia Address: 82, bldg. 1, prosp. Vernadskogo, 119571, Moscow, Russian Federation Moscow School of Social and Economic Sciences, Moscow, Russia Address: 82, bldg. 2, prosp. Vernadskogo, 119571, Moscow, Russian Federation

abstract. Debates over academic writing as a new discipline, or rather trend, started in the journal seven years ago and initially involved academics from different fields. However, when the focus shifted towards teaching writing in English, the discussion narrowed and lost its urge. The analysis of the first papers shows that the importance of developing academic writing skills is understood by the Russian academic community, but most academics have limited awareness of academic writing as a discipline and field of research aimed at solving major problems in education and science. The paper focuses on the theoretical and methodological issues of academic writing and gives a brief overview of how it has emerged into a well-developed discipline in Western, mostly US, universities. To achieve the goal of introducing academic writing into the higher education, Russian academics need to collaborate and get involved into multilateral action and interdisciplinary research. The paper concludes that disciplinary divides can be overcome through developing theoretical and conceptual issues of academic writing as rhetoric and composition studies.

Keywords: academic writing, rhetoric and composition, rhetorical and publishing conventions, interdisciplinary research, English for research publication purposes

Cite as: Korotkina, I.B. (2018). . Vysshee obrazovanie v Russia = Higher Education in Russia. Vol. 27. No. 10, pp. 64-74. (In Russ., abstract in Eng.)

DOI: https://doi.org/10.31992/0869-3617-2018-27-10-64-74

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5. Martishina N.I. (2011). . Vysshee obrazovanie v Russia = Higher Education in Russia. no. 5, pp. 129-135. (In Russ., abstract in Eng.)

6. Orlova, G.A. (2011). . Vysshee obrazovanie vRossii = Higher Education in Russia. no. 7, pp. 127-133. (In Russ., abstract in Eng.)

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11. Korotkina, I.B. (2016). . Vysshee obrazovanie v Russia = Higher Education in Russia. no. 8 (203), pp. 56-65. (In Russ., abstract in Eng.)

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13. Day, R.A. (2011). How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper. Greenwood, 300 p.

14. Young, A. (2006). Teaching Writing Across the Curriculum. 4th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 70 p.

15. Lynn, S. (2010). Rhetoric and Composition: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 330 p.

16. Jarratt, S. (1991). Rereading the Sophists: Classical Rhetoric Refigured. Carbondale: Southern Illinois Univ. Press, 184 p.

17. Blair, H. (2018). Dr. Blair's Lectures on Rhetoric. W.E. Dean, Creator. Sagwan Press, 276 p.

18. Bain, A. (2017). English Composition and Rhetoric: A Manual. (Classic Reprint) Forgotten Books, 356 p.

19. Hyland, K. (2011). Academic Discourse. In: The Bloomsbury Companion to Discourse Analysis. Hyland, K. & Paltridge, B. (Eds.) Bloomsbury, pp. 171-184.

20. Flowerdew, J. (2013). English for Research Publication Purposes. In: The handbook of English for Specific Purposes. B. Paltridge, S. Starfield (Eds). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 301-321.

The course is dedicated to modern scientific activity in Russian. The subject of discussion is both general problems of scientific style and scientific genres, and basic principles organization of the publishing infrastructure. All questions are considered in a practical plane, which allows you to consolidate the knowledge gained by completing specific tasks.

About the course

The course is addressed to those who have connected or are going to connect their lives with science. First of all, it is designed for those who are starting their own research activities, but, as the authors of the course believe, it will be useful - at least in some of its parts - and to fully accomplished scientists.

How do we see the objectives and relevance of this course? In science, as in other areas of life, talent and hard work are valued. However, today it is not enough just to be gifted and hard-working in order to fully declare oneself and the results of one's scientific activity. The scientific, in other words, academic, community has developed a number of rules of corporate behavior, without observing which the researcher is unlikely to be able to count on success. Someone willingly accepts these rules and procedures, someone objects to them, but today it is impossible not to know about them, not to take them into account when conducting research work.

Young scientists, and not only scientists, are constantly faced with questions to which they sometimes do not know the answer. He does not know, among other things, because these answers are not in the program of our university academic disciplines.

How to write an article and publish it in significant magazine? And which magazine is considered significant? Which conference is better to participate in and why? How to prepare an application for participation in the conference so that it is accepted? Why is everyone so concerned about the presence of their scientific works in databases and what are these databases? What do the mysterious words mean: Web of Science, Scopus, RSCI? Is it true that for a published article you can get a solid increase in wages? These and dozens of other questions require clarification.

Our course aims to tell about modern science- not in its content, but in functional and formal aspects, not about what it says, but about how it says, about how it works.

We named the course "Academic Writing" because the vast majority of the facts of scientific activity are related to writing: we write articles and reviews on them, dissertations and reviews about them, we participate in conferences and write their chronicles, we make oral presentations, but we use a pre-written text.

These and other scientific written genres have their own laws and not quite obvious features.

Format

During the course, students will get acquainted with short video lectures, perform a large number of practical tasks, read and evaluate each other's work, and discuss the most controversial issues on the forum.

Requirements

The course is designed for a wide range of students, regardless of whether they have a specialized liberal arts education, who are interested in the laws by which the modern Russian scientific discourse functions.

Course program

Course sections:

1. What is the modern scientific style of speech
2. Genres of scientific publications. Elements of a scientific publication
3. Types of scientific journals. Elements of a scientific journal. Publication policy, ethics and practice
4. Scientific infrastructure: bibliographic databases
5. How to write scientific article. Helpful Hints
6. How to issue a scientific article. Links, notes, lists. Bibliographic Managers
7. Institute of peer review. Principle of peer review. How to write a review
8. How to prepare a report at the conference. How to write and publish an article based on the report
9. Other types of scientific publication activity
10. Scientific discussion and academic communication

You have 1 week to complete each section. At the end of the training week, students must complete 1 mandatory examination task.

Learning Outcomes

After completing the course, students:
- learn to master the scientific style of speech;
– learn to work in different scientific genres;
– learn to extract the necessary information from the journal;
– learn how to select a journal for publication;
- learn how to write scientific articles;
– learn how to design scientific articles, taking into account the requirements of different journals;
- learn how to review scientific articles;
– learn how to write a report for presentation at the conference;
- learn to master auxiliary scientific genres (bibliographic index, chronicle of an event, review of a dissertation or abstract, etc.);
– learn to establish and maintain scientific contacts.