Approved and funded by the 2020 Graduate Program of Peking University’s Graduate School, the compulsory course, “Academic Writing”, was warmly received by Yenching Academy Scholars in the fall semester of the 2020–21 academic year.
Professor Lu Yang, Director of Graduate Studies of Yenching Academy, was in charge of the course affairs. The Academy invited eminent scholars in humanities and social sciences to give lectures on critical thinking and academic writing. The lecturers focused on interdisciplinary approaches and diversified viewpoints integrating China’s economy, law, society, history, philosophy, literature and international relations. Yenching Scholars were encouraged and inspired to enhance their research capabilities. Three lectures were given by Professor Lu Yang; Prof. Thomas Manson, QC, Foreign Expert of the School of Foreign Languages, Peking University; and Associate Professor Chen Li, Chair of History, Global Asia Studies and Sociology Studies at the University of Toronto.
On 24 September 2020, Prof. Lu Yang gave his lecture on how to write an eligible China-focused MA thesis with interdisciplinary and intercultural approaches. He first elucidated the characteristics of humanities and social sciences and the possible viewpoints. Then, Prof. Lu recommended extensive study and in-depth thinking and encouraged an open mind to research topics by combining multiple research areas.
Prof. Lu attached importance to readjusting the study’s structure. The author’s thinking and argumentation are materialised in the thesis’ structure. Thus, a thesis must be well-structured around the topic, with statements clarified and substantively supported, to reach a convincing conclusion. The thesis must be well-knit, clearly expressed and smoothly accomplished.
Prof. Lu stressed that students should keep effective communication with thesis advisors and ask for help and instructions. In addition, students were encouraged to consult teachers with specialised expertise in case of an interdisciplinary topic. He added that a pre-drawn timetable marked with deadlines would greatly help in thesis writing.
Prof. Lu wrapped up his lecture by quoting the German expert Walter Benjamin: “Work on good prose has three steps: a musical stage when it is composed, an architectonic one when it is built, and a textile one when it is woven.”
Ignacio Albe from Argentina, a 2020 Yenching Scholar in Politics and International Relations, found himself more familiar with the course and more explicit about his role. Despite new tasks and challenges imposed for him in the graduate program, he would be confident about his academic life at YCA.
On 19 November, Prof. Manson gave the lecture on a structuralist approach for effective academic writing. He talked about topic selection, the logic of structure, and writing style peculiarities. Structuralism is a research approach with variations. In a broad sense, structuralism explores the significance of a topic by combing correlations between structural elements. A discipline or school of academic thoughts has the paradigm of academic writing despite the absence of unified rules for thesis writing.
Prof. Manson recommended extensive reading and emphasised Chinese texts, which would be of great help in selecting the thesis topic. He saw possibilities of independent research and originality in fields like the alternative interpretation of old ideas, new theories and application of technologies in new areas.
Prof. Manson gave details of models widely employed in today’s academic circles, presented with visual examples. According to him, writing style and structure depends on the specific discipline. Despite the argument on limits of structuralism, Prof. Manson held that one works more effectively if he understands the structure of his work. Structuralism spares students the waste of time on useless and ineffective writing.
Prof. Manson saw the Yenching Academy as a place of creativity. He has enjoyed his teaching here, as he could meet students from all around the world with diversified personal experiences and cultures. He cherished his time at YCA because it was particularly fantastic to meet more new minds every year.
To the question on personal writing or co-authorship, Prof. Manson attached importance to collaboration in academic research. The more the partnership, the better participants understand their roles in academic writing and the more they benefit from others’ work. Be it individual writing or collaboration and co-authorship, Prof. Manson emphasised effective communication and writing.
One may fail to compose a single sentence despite thumping thoughts in mind. It is a common problem to move from vague ideas to a fascinating paper. Prof. Chen Li focused on this issue on 31 December. He started with thesis topics collected from students, looking at the problems inherent in the topics and possible difficulties they may raise when writing beings. Thus, according to Prof. Chen, it’s most critical and challenging to find a fascinating, feasible and significant topic in academic writing.
A topic must be “fascinating and intriguing”. To measure a topic, one may assess how much time to spend on the topic, what the research interests are in this topic, and whether it could attract others. Scholars require extensive reading and research for topic choosing. The professor recommended at least five hours spent in academic databases like JSTOR and Google Scholar and two days more on text reading to answer the question: “Why am I interested in the topic?”
Feasibility is another issue. Prof. Chen suggested that students select a topic based on its workability and the accessibility of sources when writing. But it does not necessarily mean a fundamental topic or one in a narrow sphere. On the contrary, students must be original and “think big” before putting ideas down to a practical research plan. To this, Prof. Chen recommended a writing schedule, which would help narrow down the scope of research and analysis by looking closer at accessible sources, time for reading, interviews and data collecting, time for revision, and time for bottleneck handling.
Prof. Chen asked students to employ the “window method” and reminded them to see beyond what they “saw” in written materials. He encouraged them to look for what they “did not see” and the reasons behind it. He observed that scholars would need critical thinking to remove prejudices. They must think about their thesis topics like detectives and deduce and write the dissertation like lawyers.
Prof. Chen was well impressed by the students’ writing capabilities, reading and theoretical grasps. He was satisfied with their preparation and classroom performance and felt happy the students could think critically and write to the depth of an issue.
Prof. Chen emphasised Chinese learning besides classroom study and reading. He encouraged students to meet more from all walks of life and go deep into China’s politics, economy, culture and society outside the campus.
“Academic Writing” aims to cultivate students’ capabilities for academic writing in humanities and social sciences, enhance their English writing and research calibre, and help international students better understand China.
The Academy will invite academics within and outside Peking University to give lectures on this course in the coming Spring semester, improving our scholars’ interdisciplinary research and academic writing skills.
