As Amy Joy states, “Writing is easy. Writing well is hard work.” While you’re working hard on your writing this week, we’re working hard to keep you informed of current news related to textbook and academic writing. Below you will find articles from the past week on the cost of textbooks, continued efforts to combat counterfeiting, historical research, and censorship issues in academic writing. You will also find writing tips for staying motivated, scientific literature reviews, stylish writing, and advice from Nobel Prize for Literature winners. Continue the discussion in the comments below and this week, write well.

9 Tips to stay motivated when writing a book

In this video post, Brian Tracy explains nine tips you can use to keep writing and meet your deadlines.

Doctoral writing: Exercises for stylish writing

Beginning with a question of whether guiding the doctoral writing process should be focused on a submittable result with feedback limited to content, structure, and ideas, or whether it should incorporate feedback on style that can be sustainable in future writing endeavors, Susan Carter offers style guidelines and exercises drawn from Helen Sword’s research in this article.

Writing a scientific literature review

How do you approach writing a scientific literature review? What do you need to consider before you start writing? Researcher, Syed Ghazi Sarwat, shares his tips in this article.

Writing tips from authors who won the Nobel Prize for Literature

Five Nobel Prize winners across the years, including 2017 winner, Kazuo Ishiguro, share tips on writing. Despite their different disciplines their approach to their craft is united over the notion that writing is as about discipline, observance and good old fashioned imagination.

Students shouldn’t have to pay for college textbooks

An argument that textbook costs, exceeding $1,000 and equating to nearly one-third of the cost of tuition at Cal State Fullerton, should be included in the tuition costs already paid by students.

Students fight corporate publishing control to combat rising textbook costs

In response to rising costs of textbooks through traditional purchasing options, this article presents initiatives taken at Minneapolis Community and Technical College (MCTC) to reduce student costs.

As demand for digital materials rises, states adjust policies

A discussion of how four states, as documented in the State Educational Technology Directors Association’s guide, have modified their practices for selecting and purchasing classroom resources in response to a shift from print to digital course materials.

Major publishers dismiss lawsuit against Follett Corporation

Follett Corporation, a textbook distribution company, announced this week that it has agreed to adopt a set of “Anti-Counterfeit Best Practices,” a list of guidelines co-developed and endorsed by four major textbook publishers. As part of the agreement to adopt the principals, the publishers suing Follett, claiming the company was purchasing illegal copies of textbooks and selling them at its college stores and through other distribution channels, dismissed their case.

Publishers take academic networking site to court

Scholarly publishing giants Elsevier and the American Chemical Society last week filed a lawsuit in Germany against ResearchGate, a popular academic networking site, alleging copyright infringement on a massive scale.

‘Events like this teach us’

Will events such as Indigenous Peoples’ Day replacing Columbus Day in 55 cities nationwide bring focus to historical research often left out of standard textbooks?

A dangerous withdrawal

Bruce Gilley’s article “The Case for Colonialism” has been revoked from the Third World Quarterly journal because the editor of the journal has received credible threats of violence. Some call it a disturbing precedent that could make academics less safe.

In China, scholars are being punished amid growing squeeze on public expression

Focused on the firing of Beijing Normal University professor, Shi Jiepeng, for (among other reasons) “expressing views outside the mainstream of society”, this article includes a discussion of the recent attempts at censorship of journal articles published by Cambridge University Press.

 

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