Rethinking the Research Paper

Have you ever struggled with writing an essay? Then this blog is here to help you! The book ‘ The Curious Researcher’ written by author Bruce Ballenger is a great guide on how to write research papers.

The first topic the book challenges us with is ‘Rethinking the Research Paper’

There is a great way to challenge the way we thinking about the research papers we write . We can use a technique called ‘fastwritting’.  Fastwriting is basically writing down what ever comes to mind, not worrying about whether you’re being eloquent, grammatically correct, or even smart.

I am going to apply the fastwritting technique with two statements.

The first statement is:  “ You’re writing mostly for the instructor.”

Is this statement true or false? (Applying fastwritting)

In my opinion this statement is false. This is an area a lot of us struggle in, it is so easy to write an essay just to please our teacher/ instructor, and often we do this without even thinking.  Our writing should be aimed at a certain target audience, based on certain information such as the topic of my paper, if responding to an argument, who the topic is applicable to etc. If we write for the main objection of pleasing our instructor, where would my voice be in the paper? Who would my paper impact? How would my paper be beneficial to others or even myself? I think its pretty clear that when we write a paper that we need to have a purpose for writing and this purpose includes a certain target audience. For example if you write a paper on obesity crises in the youth, the way you write the paper would be affected on whether your audience is parents, fast food restaurants or even the youth itself. The target audience influences your language, your voice and even the set up of your paper.

The second statement is: “ There is a big difference between facts and opinions”

I agree with this statement. There certainly is a difference between facts and opinions however they often go hand in hand.  Fact is absolute truth about something where as opinion is ones point of view about something, hence there is defiantly a clear and distinct difference between facts and opinions. However they are often linked, most of the time we have opinions on facts, this is seen in arguments and conversations. For example, it is fact that the Bible says the greatest commandment is to Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. Love your neighbor as yourself. (Matthew 22:36-40) but we have different opinions on how to carry out this commandment.

Most of us were taught to think before we write however fastwritting is a great technique that teaches us to think through our writing. This technique has been beneficial to me and I hope it helps you to improve the way you think about you research paper.  

Love, Serve, Repeat.