Academic Writing Rules & Tips

Rules:

• Formal Tone

  • Always use a formal tone in your writing. This means avoiding conversational or casual language.

• Active Voice

  • Active voice focuses on the actor and sounds clear and concise, while passive voice focuses on the action and sounds awkward.
  • Avoid passive voice: “The ball is thrown by Jane,” or “The cake is baked by Ben,” or “The paper was written by Avery.”
  • Use active voice: “Jane throws the ball,” and “Ben bakes the cake,” and “Avery wrote the paper.”

• Avoid Contractions

  • For example, “isn't” becomes “is not,” “can't” becomes “cannot,” and “would’ve” becomes “would have.”

Evidence to Support Your Claims

  • Show your reader that you are a credible researcher. Evidence shows how you developed your claim and/or that other scholars agree with you.

• Third-Person

  • Generally, use third-person writing. In other words, things and other people are doing things. “You” and “I” are not. For example:
  • YES: "The study from KSU states that..."
  • NO: "I read in a study that..." | "You see..."

• Conjunctive Adverbs

  • Use conjunctive adverbs like “however,” “therefore,” “additionally,”

“furthermore”, etc. to transition between topics, paragraphs, and sections.

• Apostrophes for Quotes Within Quotes

  • A quote within a quote uses apostrophes.
  • The author remembers, “I asked Bill if he wanted to go bowling. He said ‘I guess’ unexcitedly.”