Writing a journal article in 12 weeks: Week Seven

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 Seven.

Week Seven deals with presentation of evidence. First, Belcher talks about different types of evidence: qualitative, quantitative, historical, geographic, textual, and artistic. Then, she explains how evidence is presented in social sciences and in humanities. The part that I found most interesting and potentially helpful was Belcher’s advice to go beyond discovery of particular themes and to explore “how the text reproduces the conflicts of its period or culture, participates in constructing particular knowledge systems, or highlights social or political contradictions” (p. 198). I think my initial problems with the lack of a clear argument and the resulting data-driven nature of my paper (I mentioned that in Week Three) were caused by my inability to integrate, within the theoretical framework of the study, various connections, that I established between my findings and the socio-cultural processes, and to use those connections to develop an argument. Belcher’s explanation of argument as a statement with which you can agree or disagree helped me to put those connections together to form a skeleton of my paper, to which everything else now is attached.

Once again the week started with reading the workbook. On the second day, I talked to people in the communication studies discipline about what constitutes evidence in our field. I didn’t learn anything new, but those discussions helped me crystallize my thoughts. On the third day, I used Belcher’s instructions to review each paragraph of my paper to determine whether my evidence was clear, and whether my interpretation of that evidence was adequate and comprehensible. The rest of the week I spent reshaping my evidence around my argument. I had to go back to the interview transcripts and locate missing pieces of evidence. I still have several excerpts that need to be translated into English. Overall, my progress was slower than I wished, but I’m glad it’s been steady.

Writing a journal article in 12 weeks: Week Six

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 week was Week Six.

Week Six deals with strengthening the article’s structure. Belcher explains that

Structure is the organization of your argument and the evidence for your argument. When each part of your article leads logically to the next part, you have a coherent structure. (p. 172)

Structure occurs at the level of the whole article, as well as at the paragraph level. Belcher calls those macro and micro structures. She discusses 5 basic micro structures, which journal articles use in combination, such as description, sequence, causation, problem/solution, and comparison. Belcher acknowledges that knowing those structural types doesn’t necessarily help a writer determine which organizational principles to use and when. For some reason, the section on micro structure reminded me of a discussion of organizational patterns commonly included in public speaking textbooks. In the section on macro structure, Belcher argues that journal articles, as a genre, have some rhetorical features that have persisted for centuries, and, in addition, there are some new organizational structures that appear every day. Then, she outlines common structures of articles (qualitative and quantitative) both in social sciences and humanities. The final section of this week’s chapter is devoted to solving structural problems. Belcher shares several suggestions on how to improve the structure of an article, among them using of subheadings and summaries, stating one’s argument first and presenting evidence second, organizing the article around its argument, staying on topic, etc. 

As usual, on the first day of the week, I read the workbook. On the second day, I created an outline of the model article, which I selected several weeks ago. This outline closely resembled some of Belcher’s examples. On the third day, I worked on outlining my own article, which helped me identify some gaps and deviations. I spent the next two days restructuring my paper. First, I once again revised my argument. Then, I worked on my research questions, ways of representing textual evidence and framing my discussion in order to better connect them to the argument. Two days were not enough to revise everything, but overall Week Six was fruitful and productive.

Writing a journal article in 12 weeks: Week Five

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. Last week was Week Five. I had such a busy time that I forgot to post this update on time.

Week Five is about reviewing the related literature. Belcher talks about different types of scholarly literature, such as original literature, which is primary sources used in the study, derivative literature, which are textbooks or other texts for general public, which are based on secondary sources, contextual literature, which provides background information on a research topic, methodological literature, which describes and defend a methodology used in the study, theoretical literature, which outlines conceptual approaches to a specific topic, and related literature, which is the prior research on the same topic. She argues that a scholarly article should include no (or almost no) derivative literature, while other types of literature should be present and well balanced. Belcher also outlines some effective strategies for reading theoretical and relevant literature and looks at the reading habits of three well-known scholars—Henry A. Giroux, Edward O. Wilson, and Klaus Herding. To my shame I admit that I’ve never heard about the last two. She sums up that section with the following: “Even if you never read as much as these successful scholars, you can learn from their principles of reading: reduce articles to their essence, read and write in the same day, subscribe to journals, and learn to skim” (p. 150).

Then, Belcher explains what to do after one has embarked on reading, how to cite prior scholarship, and how to write a literature review. She insists that a literature review is needed to establish the significance and origin of the argument, to identify its relationship to previous arguments, to defend the approach or methodology used in the study, etc. According to Belcher, a writer needs to start by identifying her relationship to the related literature and establishing an entry point, which is her argument’s relationship to previous arguments.

All of [possible] entry points can be reduced to three traditional positions you can have regarding the previous research:

·       finding it inadequate or nonexistent and filling the gap,

·       finding it sound and extending it, and

·       finding it unsound and correcting it. (p. 152)

Belcher points out that many articles require more than one related literature review and more than one entry point because they try to integrate information from different fields. She explains that an introduction is a good point to give a broad overview of the prior research, but much of the analysis of this research might appear throughout the article. Belcher also discusses some common mistakes in citing literature and gives suggestions on avoiding plagiarism.

During the first day of the week, I read the workbook. On the second day, I evaluated my current citations and identified the type of literature (i.e., original, derivative, etc.) to which each of them belongs. I found that my paper has no derivative literature and that it can use some additional related and methodological literature. On the third day, I needed to identify and read the related literature. I looked at two different new sources, which I thought may enhance my paper, but eventually decided not to include them. I also took a second look at the book already cited in my paper. It gave me a new idea on how to reframe my argument, which I did on the fourth day. During that day, I was supposed to evaluate the related literature, but I felt that, with my new and revised argument, I didn’t need any additional related literature. According to Belcher’s book, the fifth day should’ve been about writing and revising my related literature review, but I was busy attending a writing boot camp and didn’t do any revision. As a result, there are still some small lit review revisions left. However, I was able to decide on the journal I plan to submit my article to, and I feel good about it.

Writing a journal article in 12 weeks: Week Four

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 Four

Week Four is devoted to selecting a journal. Belcher argues that many journals need authors (and their papers) even more than scholars need journals. According to her, only a fraction of academic journals has a rejection rate of 90% or above, and authors just need to find suitable journals where their chances of acceptance are higher

As usual, on the first day, I read the workbook. I spent the second day searching for journals. My first step was to ask several people in the field (of communication studies) for advice on where to send my paper, which gave me 2 journals. Then, I did an old-fashioned shelf search at the library. The search took me awhile, and I was able to find only 2 additional journals. My next step was looking through various (inter)disciplinary electronic databases and playing around with keywords. I spent about 2 hours on that and located 4 more journals, which brought the total to 8. During the third day, I worked on filling Belcher’s review form for each of these journals. The form contains the title of the journal, the name and contact information of its editor, other additional facts about the journal (i.e., whether it’s peer reviewed, whether its editorial office is U.S. based, type of the journal, its longevity and reputation, no. of articles a year, word/page limits, style manual, board members I know, etc.). I spent the fourth day reading the journals I selected. I started with looking through their tables of content, which immediately eliminated 3 journals, leaving me with 5, 2 of which I crossed off my list because soon they will go through a transition and have new editors starting January 2015. Belcher strongly recommends to avoid submitting a paper to journals which are about to have new editors, new titles, new publishers, etc. Thus, I was left with 3 potential publication outlets. Then, I spent several hours skimming through the recent issues of these journals and closely reading some of their articles. On the fifth day, I was supposed to write query letters to editors asking about the number of submissions the journal receives a year, the journal’s turnaround time, its backlog, etc. For some reason, I felt uncomfortable about writing to the editors and was unable to get over that. So I decided for now just to make informal inquiries about people’s experiences with those journals and to write a massage to the associate editor of one of the journals whom I’m briefly acquainted with. And that’s what I did.

Overall, Week Five went well. Although I haven’t decided on a specific journal where to send my paper or haven’t been able to start catching up on the tasks I hadn’t accomplished during the first three weeks, I did practically everything that I was supposed to do this week. I also have come closer to making a decision on where to submit and reduced the number of possible journals. One of the three that are left seems less attractive than the rest, because of its content and because it requires MLA style while my paper is currently in APA. Hopefully, I would get more info on one of the other two journals from its associated editor, and then I’ll be able to make a decision. And, if my paper gets rejected, I still would have another journal where I can submit.