Writing a journal article in 12 weeks: Week Two

I’m using Wendy Laura Belcher’s book Writing Your Journal Article in 12 Weeks: A Guide to Academic Publishing Success to prepare my paper for publication. This is Week Two.

In the Week 2 section, Belcher discusses different types of articles (i.e., annotated bibliography, book review, review article, theoretical article, social science research article, etc.). If a junior scholar works on revision of a paper which is not a research article, Belcher recommends to consider converting it into one. Then, she debunks the myths about publishable journal articles and explains what gets published and why. Belcher insists that “a publishable article is organized around a single significant new idea that is demonstrably related to what has come before” (p. 49). A publishable article can approach new evidence in an old way, look at old evidence in a new way, or pair old evidence with old approaches in a new way. Belcher asserts that writing an abstract should be one of the first steps of revising an article, because writing an abstract helps to clarify the purpose, structure, and content of the article. According to her, a good abstract should state the topic of the article, explain the methodology used, describe the findings, and discuss the conclusions that can be drawn from the project/argument.

On the first day of the week, I read the workbook and worked on refining the topic of my paper. First, I described to a friend what my paper was about. Then, I wrote one sentence starting with “My article is about …” After completing that exercise, I felt more confident that my paper indeed has a clear point, which I need to successfully convey to my audience to get published. On the second day, I located my paper on my computer, printed it out, reread the hard copy—first without changing anything, just to get a sense of it, and then with pen in hand. After that, I made a list of revision tasks. On the third day, I followed Belcher’s directions and drafted my abstract. On the fourth day, I went through online databases in search for an article that can serve as a model in revising my own. I found several, read them, and picked one that seemed to be a better model. Then, I studied the how the article is structured, how it presents information, how the argument is built, etc.

There are also some tasks that I failed to accomplish this week. On the third day, I was supposed not only to draft my abstract but also to share it with someone else to get suggestions for revision, and on the fifth day I needed to revise the abstracts. I didn’t do that and will have to deal with these tasks later, which is not a good thing. On the other hand, I’m glad I’ve managed to accomplish something because I’m still recovering from the bug I caught in Europe, tired from feeling unwell and trying to get rid of lingering cough.