Comments on: Losing voice in academic writing

By: KyKy

KyKy — Sun, 11 Nov 2018 09:43:04 +0000

Researchers have demonstrated the successful of mother-tongue instruction right from the start. children are more likely to enroll and succeed in school (Kosonen, 2005); parents are more likely to communicate with teachers and participate in their children’s learning (Benson, 2002). Countries possessing high rate of student success have governments ensuring that mother tongue is taught as a subject in schools if not as a medium of instruction. Personally, all student must be proficient in their mother tongues first before learning other languages, including English.

By: KyKy

KyKy — Sun, 11 Nov 2018 09:33:50 +0000

The article appears to be critical of the pressure placed on foreign students to use English proficiently, and only English, in their academic endeavours. It is certainly plausible and likely that there is a systematic bias towards the use of English, and the dismissal of other languages as unimportant in the field of academia. However, this particular example provided seems more indicative of a failure on the teacher’s part, instead of the system as a whole. The teacher appeared to be less interested in enabling competency in English writing, and more on pedantic formatting issues

By: Ngoc Hiep Nguyen

Ngoc Hiep Nguyen — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 04:52:17 +0000

It can’t be denied that academic literacy instruction has important role in helping all the stakeholders with relating academic works. However, it is also reasonable to concern about one’s own voice in academic writing. My situation relating to academic area is a good case in point. I am currently a postgraduate student at one Australian university in which a lot of academic writing work are required to be done. The university has its academic guide, especially in academic writing. Most of these academic instructions require students to comply with formal format, genre, discourse, disciplines… which may lead to different kinds of voice in writing work. It is this that may influence and limit the flexibility of the writer’s voice.

By: Xinyue Ji

Xinyue Ji — Wed, 24 Oct 2018 05:31:24 +0000

Actually I was shocked when I read Owen’s narrative. I agree that English is a general language and knowing how to effectively and correctly use English is significant in academic writing. However, because of the different thinking patterns and cultures, people express their opinions in different ways and they need a long period to adapt to English patterns. As a result, teachers need to guide foreigner students rather than negatively critisize.

By: N

Thu, 11 Oct 2018 15:20:28 +0000

Writing is the skills that ESL students who study overseas may need time for adaptation and get used to Academic culture particular areas. For me, I have studied English for Academic courses before I studied degree too. In class teachers focused on structure and hoe to organize the essay to clearly understand by readers. It is very useful when I study in the Uni. However, I still have problems of how to show my stance too and also cultural differences that cannot learn in class ,as mentioned in the article, which may cause misunderstanding and conflict between people.

By: Nidhi

Nidhi — Wed, 10 Oct 2018 04:05:42 +0000

The article reflects the situation of most of international students who come from totally different environment and face challenges in learning and getting fit in new settings especially in education system. As I come from India I face difficulties in writing assignments in academic English because I have studied in different system with totally traditional translation methods. I often feel losing confidence because of wrong way of writing by translating ideas.

By: jlakjl

jlakjl — Tue, 09 Oct 2018 15:00:07 +0000

15. This article makes me wonder both the quality and the dedication of the instructor mentioned. She must have spent not enough time on reading her students writings and giving feedback on those writings. It is obvious that English academic writing does not require writers to use English only and to target only English readers. I also study Translation and Interpreting and read a lot of writings whose writers use other languages than English (of course with English translations).

By: Duyen Ngo

Duyen Ngo — Tue, 09 Oct 2018 03:30:09 +0000

With me, this blog has a very interesting content. As an international student, I face with a lot of problems about academic writing. Sometimes, I feel that voice and identity are such a complicated matter and they are real challenge for teacher in supporting students’ academic writing.

By: v

Mon, 08 Oct 2018 15:02:29 +0000

When learning a second language, I was astonished to find exactly how little perfectly translates an interpretation of starting with one language to another. Interacting in our local language enables us to pass on subtleties that are frequently impractical in our second or third language. Thus, I feel that pieces of Owen’s meeting directed in Mandarin, joined by an English interpretation, would give further experiences to the (imaginable various) Mandarin speakers perusing his theory that the English interpretations alone.

By: Tamanna Habib

Tamanna Habib — Mon, 08 Oct 2018 12:09:16 +0000

Academic writing is very important for higher education and it demands a lot of things. I have completed my bachelor degree in Bangladesh. I noticed that the Australian academic system is very different from my country. Even after more than a year of study, I still face problems in writing my assignments. Two major problems I had: writing academically and expressing my own voice in my writing. Finding own voice is important as it helps writer to express their own ideas and creating an identity of a specific cultural background.

By: tting

tting — Mon, 08 Oct 2018 11:52:18 +0000

This article teaches students how to express their own opinions precisely and accurately. What is more important is how to transfer the authors’ meaning into their own words without changing the writers’ original opinions. Students should also focus on the learning methods when they study, develop a habit like reading broadly, deeply, and critically. Read in-depth within your academic field but also read outside your field. After acquiring more knowledge relating to more aspects, the students would get more proficiency in academic writing.

By: Kim

Kim — Mon, 08 Oct 2018 02:10:31 +0000

As an EFL international student, it takes me quite a while to understand the concept of ‘showing your voice’ in academic writing and speaking. This could be because of the educational system that does not require to integrate the students into such academic debates. Back in 2016, I was completely illiterate about the concept of academic writing the mid of 2017 when I received a scholarship offer to study in Australia and granted an intensive pre-departure training in Bali for several weeks. This is when I first exposed to ‘voice’ in academic writing. Since then I have realized that to have a ‘voice’ is important in academic life as it could be one of the ways I can contribute for the running discussions and may also give another insight for other people about certain issues. I have also realized that to have a ‘voice’ is not simple, it involves a long journey of research until I or maybe other people reach a point where I feel confident enough to take a stance.

By: Rochelle

Rochelle — Sun, 07 Oct 2018 16:37:25 +0000

Upon reading this article, it highlights to me that it is important for the writer to express himself or herself accurately. While I was pursuing my course for NAATI, I thought that it should be easy for me to do the course as I am bilingual however upon taking up the course, I find that it is so difficult to translate or express some terminology or ideas from Mandarin to English at times because of the words and the meaning may not be accurate in the process of illustrating the ideas down, especially in academic writing.

By: Shaher Mohammed Shaher Asiri

Shaher Mohammed Shaher Asiri — Sun, 07 Oct 2018 15:27:40 +0000

Hello everyone,

This article is useful for individuals who aspire to study abroad and assist them for academic writing. In my experience, I confronted struggles on how to present my voice in academic writing. Students need to take intensive courses before starting their academic studies in order to succeed. I remember the first time when I wrote an academic essay, I got a lot of feedback from lecturer since I have not presented my voice in that essay. I used my mother tongue essay structure. I realized that voice is a compulsory skill that learners have to pay close attention in this aspect and learn it in order to meet the requirements for English academic writing.

By: yym

yym — Sun, 07 Oct 2018 13:28:27 +0000

English is widely used in the global academic community, students need to overcome the difficulties of writing. The first time I need to write an academic writing, it is confused for me. In China, the English writing has been taught in a fixed mode. However, when I come to Australia, the critical thinking will be more emphasized. In addition, it is true that we can obtain the guidance feedback on tasks by asking the lecturers, native English-speaking, and academic professionals.

By: Fern

Fern — Sun, 07 Oct 2018 13:06:24 +0000

These two interesting vignettes illustrate a monolingual mindset which denies the cultural diversity that non native speakers bring into the discipline . However, I believe that this works at two levels. As EAP teachers, at a lower level of language proficiency teachers tend to correct student writing ascribing their errors to direct translations of cultural expressions which do not read well. Also at this level the target audience would be and English speaking and reading audience. This behaviour is focused on seeing into where the error comes from and used as a corrective tool for the improvement of the students. But at an academic level feedback of this nature would not only result in linguistic insecurity but also discrimination against non English speaker students. Therefore feed back on academic writing at tertiary level should be an inclusive practices on the part of instructors/academics where diversity is accommodated .