Are you interested in presenting at the 2025 TAA Virtual Conference? Submit your proposal by October 13, 2024, for the chance to share your expertise. Attendees are textbook, academic and aspiring authors, as well as graduate students and industry professionals, all of which are eager to learn and grow in this industry.
The 2025 Textbook & Academic Authoring Conference will be held online June 6-7. We invite presenters, first-time to veteran-level, to submit a proposal.
By Michelle Rivera-Clonch, PhD
We often hear about the hazards of an Unskilled Inner Critic and, like most things, there’s more to the story. Our Skilled Inner Critic, when called upon, promotes a writing flow that encourages us to be calm, cool, connected and creative. We have access to both Critics—it’s about the intensity and frequency that we rely upon each one to help us complete the writing project.
Why is writing so terrifying? Dr. Michelle R. Boyd’s Becoming the Writer You Already Are explains why being afraid of writing is neither strange nor shameful. And introduces the Writing Metaphor, a tool that illuminates what you already know about overcoming writing challenges. Becoming shows you how to consult, trust, and follow that process. So you can live a pleasurable, productive, satisfying writing life.
By Laura Poole
I’ve been copyediting scholarly nonfiction for many years now, and I have some gentle suggestions to academic writers who would like to tighten up their prose.
These are all suggestions at the phrase level, not the sentence level, to reduce wordiness, impose active voice, and improve flow. There are NOT hard-and-fast rules and should not be done as a knee-jerk reflex. There are times when these suggested edits won’t work or will change the meaning of the phrase; in these cases, don’t do them!
By Charles Corbin
Any of us who have served in academia, especially those who are at research intensive universities, are aware of the many anti-text arguments. Numerous hours are spent in tenure, promotion, and salary (merit raise) meetings debating what “counts” as scholarship and what doesn’t. Often textbooks are discounted. In a journal article published in Kinesiology Review in 2022, The Importance of Textbooks in Kinesiology, my coauthors, Hyeonho Yu, Diane L. Gill, and I, offer a historical perspective on the role of textbooks in physical education and kinesiology. The historical perspective provides a base for the discussion of topics related to the value of textbooks in our field and more broadly in all fields.
TAA member Dr. Wendi Zimmer, PhD, a mindset expert, writing consultant, and Clinical Assistant Professor at Texas A&M University. is writing a book titled, The Force Continuum: How to Shift Your Mindset to Transform Your Life, which will contain simple strategies to be who you were made to be and develop your force.
“The Force Continuum is a series of four pillars (mindset, identity, energy, and habits) that when strengthened, allow us to apply the information we already know to believe in ourselves and take control of our lives,” said Zimmer. The book’s release date is January 10, 2025. Congratulations, Wendi!
