Most useful textbook and academic posts of the week: January 14, 2022

Why do you write? Are you writing to share you knowledge with others? Are you writing to get the thoughts out of your head and onto paper? Perhaps, here at the start of the year, you are writing (or not) because you have resolved to do so. Or are you like Flannery O’Connor who said, “I write to discover what I know.”

In this week’s collection of articles from around the web, we find insight on new years’s resolutions for authors, writing deadlines, writing strategies, the end of writer self-doubt, and the future of open access. Whatever your reasoning, we encourage you to write every day. Happy writing!

AcWriMo starts tomorrow – see what we have planned

Established in 2011, Academic Writing Month (AcWriMo) is a month-long academic write-a-thon that happens every November. Here at TAA, we have continued to plan special opportunities for our members to engage in AcWriMo as a group to enhance their individual writing efforts. Some of our members have also created or sponsored additional AcWriMo events throughout the month.

This year, TAA has decided to focus on a theme of “Distinguishing features of academic writing”. Specifically, we have used a list of academic writing features to further focus our weekly TweetChat discussions and shared resources to include: academic precision, complexity, formality, objectivity, and accuracy. Below are several of the planned activities we have scheduled for AcWriMo 2019.

Poll: Have you made any writing-related resolutions for 2015?

Making writing-related New Year’s resolutions can be a great way to kickstart your writing in the new year. But just making a resolution isn’t enough. You also need a plan and support to keep you on track. If your resolution is to finish your textbook or complete your dissertation, you will need to break that project up into manageable steps and create deadlines that will keep you on track. You might also want to join a writing group to provide feedback and support along the way. If your resolution is to write every day, you will need to decide what time of day works best for you, create a writing space that is free of distractions, and let your friends and family know you are not available during your writing time.