Academic writing genres
The term genre (/(d)ʒɑn.ɹə/, from French genre, meaning 'kind, sort') refers to a particular category of writing. A literary genre is defined by various conventions, or typical characteristics and expectations about form and style, that have developed over time. Conventions refer to typical stylistic criteria, characteristics, or standards that are socially agreed upon; for academic genres, that means that researchers have come to agree upon, and have standardized, various techniques and characteristics that they expect or typically use for communicating to colleagues and academic readers in their academic fields.
Academic writing generally goes beyond descriptive and persuasive writing to forms that are more analytical, evaluative, or critical (as in providing a critique or a theoretical interpretation). The writer is expected to develop an original analysis, critique, interpretation, or proposals, in a formal and structured manner. Paragraphs in body text tend to follow more formal and analytical paragraph styles.
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1 General format classifications
Classifying academic genres can be complex and difficult, due to the variety and complexity of different forms of academic writing. Academic writing forms can simply be classified by their purpose and general format, such as the following. The essay types below are typical for written assignments in college, while the others are more typical of graduate student writing and research done by professors.
- Rhetorical, persuasive, or argumentative essay
- Analytical essay
- Problem-solution essay
- Critical essay
- Research essay or paper, e.g., in an academic research journal
- Review, such as an academic book review
- Thesis: a major work involving original research for an advanced university degree, namely, a master's thesis or doctoral dissertation
- Conference paper
- Case studies
- Monograph: a research-based academic book
- Proposals: research proposal, thesis proposal, research grant proposal
Academic people may at times also write popular articles or books, that is, articles or books by academic experts that are intended to inform the general public. They are written at a professional level, reflecting the author's expertise and expert opinions, and are written at a professional level for college educated readers.
2 Classification by cognitive style and demands
Academic writing can be classified by the types of cognitive processes expected of the writers, ranging from relatively simple to more demanding and cognitively involved. The following may describe essay assignments in college, or elements of larger form works like those above, such as different sections of research papers.
- Descriptive
- Analytical
- Persuasive
- Critical
The simplest form is descriptive, which entails reporting facts, data, or information. Example include simple article summaries, literary précis of literary works, and lab reports that report results of experiments. Otherwise, such forms are not commonly used in college writing. Stylistic and grammatical elements typically include simple past and present tense verbs, and descriptive verbs like find, determine, ascertain, result, identify, report, record, summarize, define. Paragraphs may be narrative or descriptive style paragraphs.
Analytical forms may involve some descriptive contents, but then one must go beyond that to organizing and classifying data, identifying relationships, contrasting or comparing, or identifying causes and effects. The analysis might be guided by a particular research method or theory. Typical elements might include present, past and perfect verb tenses, and verbs and expressions pertaining to classifications, contrasts, comparisons, causes, effects, or results, such as analyze, compare, contrast, relate, examine, determine, find, ascertain, conclude, infer. Paragraph forms might include process, classification, contrast, comparison, or cause-effect paragraphs.
Persuasive forms or elements are common to many forms of academic writing, as one must convince writers of the validity of their analyses or ideas. Thus, persuasive writing includes elements of analytical writing, but goes beyond it by considering one's own perspective, and the perspectives of likely readers. This entails a greater need to provide evidence and argumentation for one's views or conclusions, such as data, other supporting research studies, comparisons with others' ideas or findings, and detailed explanations of one's ideas that can satisfy readers. This naturally entails citing other sources to support one's findings, as well as interpreting and evaluating others' ideas or findings. The language includes verbs and expressions of argument, recommendations, suggestions, critiquing, evaluation, evaluation, and discussion.
Critical writing is particularly common in academic research, especially for graduate students and professors. It includes elements of persuasive and analytical writing, but also involves examining different possibilities or points of view. The author may express his/her informed perspective, but must also consider and evaluate other perspectives or possibilities as well as his/her own. This may also be referred to evaluative or interpretive writing. This may involve critiquing different theories, different interpretations of events, differing interpretations of a piece of literature, or different ways of evaluating a program. This can involve arguing for one interpretation over another, such as different theoretical perspectives of social phenomena, or possible interpretations of literature. Such writing may be involved in analyzing research results, evaluating a program or methodology, engaging in scholarly debate, or writing a review of an academic book. The language can be more abstract and theoretical, involving expressions pertaining to evaluation, critique, debate, argumentation, evidence, and theories.
3 Research approach
The research approach can influence the style of the writing. These can be briefly summarized as follows.
- Qualitative
Research based on observation and/or holistic interpretation of data. The researcher makes decisions about how to classify data, or examine them holistically or based on a particular theory. The writing is somewhat structured, and can involve the writer's own perspectives more than other kinds of research. Common examples of this are seen in ethnographic research, where one observes individuals or people, how they interact, etc., such as work by some anthropologists, sociologists, language researchers, and education researchers.
- Quantitative
This is scientific or experimental research, which involves statistical analysis, and examining or comparing specific hypotheses. This is often the type of research in science, engineering, and some social sciences. This would include various kinds of experimental and statistical evidence, including experimental and statistical comparison of groups.
- Theoretical
Some research may be primarily theoretical, based on logical argumentation of ideas and facts, and little use of collected data, except maybe hypothetical examples or examples from the writer’s own mind or experience. Examples include philosophy, some area of math, and theoretical linguistics.
- Critical / evaluative
A data set, situation, or phenomenon is analyzed and evaluated according to a set of norms or standards, often those established by a particular academic viewpoint or theory. For example, a particular educational program might be evaluated to assess its effectiveness, according to the standards of a particular sociological or educational model.
- Interpretive
A theory or model is used to interpret a data set, situation, or phenomenon, to provide insights or analyses that would not be so apparent otherwise. For example, a set of data about a social problem in a city’s educational system might be interpreted according to a sociological theory to yield deeper theoretical insights into the issue. This is somewhat similar to, and overlaps with, the critical / evaluative category.
