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Writing scientific articles in English

Instructor: Dr. Adrian Wallwork

Duration: 15 hours

Period: March 20 - May 5, 2006

Place: Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell'Informazione: Elettronica, Informatica, Telecomunicazioni, via G. Caruso, meeting room, ground floor

Credits: 4

Aim

The lectures will teach students how to:

• structure a scientific paper
• write clearly, concisely and accurately
• use an English style of writing
• avoid typical grammar and vocabulary mistakes
• write emails to correspond with foreign colleagues, referees and editors

The sessions will be as interactive as possible in order to give participants some practical experience

Contents

Writing style

• fundamental differences between English and Italian
• choosing the right title (avoiding: ambiguity, strings of nouns, redundancy)
• structuring the paper (Abstract, Introduction etc)
• typical phrases used in various parts of a paper
• use of numbers, acronyms, abbreviations, bullets, captions, references etc
• word order (struttura della frase)
• avoiding ambiguity and redundancy
• punctuation
• linking sentences
• English preference for verbs rather than nouns

Grammar

• tenses used in various parts of the paper (ie present simple, past simple and present perfect)
• active vs passive, modals (eg can vs may)
• gerund vs infinitive
• that vs which
• definite article, determiners
• countable vs uncountable
• conditionals

Vocabulary

• typical mistakes (eg like vs as, consistent vs substantial, also vs too, independently vs irrespectively)
• false friends

Email

• formal vs informal
• initial and final salutations
• typical phrases
• typical mistakes
• letters to the editor, reporting changes made after referee’s reports etc.