Sociology writing

I found a book that every social scientist should read at least once: Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish your Thesis, Book, or Article by Howard Becker. The book makes me want to write my best every time. He encourages you to stick with revisions and spend the time to make your paper great. He talks a lot about how grad school trains us to become bad writers. We don't have enough time to do our papers well, we use bad writing in journals as a guide, and we lack the self-confidence to just say what we mean without qualifying it. I started reading the book a few nights ago and could not put it down. Every page or two I'd jump up in excitement, "Yes," I'd say, "That's exactly how I feel!" Until I read this book I never realized why I didn't apply the same standards I use in my fiction writing to my academic writing. My excuses ranged from "they're different types of writing", to "no one will notice." But Becker noticed and he makes me want to do it write (haha, a play on words).

Today's Grad Gravy: Your writing represents you in the professional world.