Academics often ask me for tips about writing newspaper and magazine articles, blogs, and books for public audiences. Below are a few simple ideas:
Brevity: My mantra is “cut out half the words and get to the point.” We academics tend to wander in and out of ideas and concepts, but strong public writing doesn’t meander. Be direct.
Clarity: Good writing is as much clear thinking as it is about the writing. Know what you want to say, and keep questioning your point until you get to that nugget of wisdom that has the elegance of simplicity.
Voice: Effective writing for the public is conversational; the best pieces aren’t highly stylized, but sound like the writer chatting. Don’t try to replicate a stilted, formulaic “opinion piece” voice, or academic-speak; find the voice that sounds like you.
Emotion: Carefully reasoned ideas and arguments certainly have a place in public writing, but it’s emotion that really grabs the reader. Consider whether your piece is eliciting feeling, be it tragedy and tears, comedy and laughter, or simply the exhilaration of learning something new. Embrace feelings.
Personalize: Do not be afraid of the words “I” and “We.” The first tells readers who you are, and the second includes you with the readers rather than keeping you separate. Let me repeat that: Do not be afraid of “I” and “We.”
Story: Your piece should tell a story, whether it’s an intellectual adventure or a deeply personal tale. Take the reader on a journey . . .
Characters: Bring in characters into your story; do some interviews, have some quotes, hang the progression of your piece on someone’s experience. For readers, entering a piece through your eyes and through a character’s experience can be a powerful way to begin.
Pace: On that journey, don’t stay in the flatlands. Take the reader up and down, carefully pacing your writing with a number of small summits and the high peak at the end.
Sentences: Watch for monotonic sentence length. Follow a long sentence with a short one, and throw in phrases, or even a single word, if it gets the job done.
Jargon: Avoiding the terminology of your academic discipline is so obvious I’m embarrassed to mention it, yet I continue to be amazed at how many public pieces from academics are replete with jargon.
Thesaurus: The thesaurus is your best friend. Use it liberally to find new words, the exact word that fits, and to keep from repeating the same words. I just did that above, using my computer’s Thesaurus to find a word (“terminology”) so that I could avoid using “jargon” twice.
Know Your Outlet: Before submitting, read the publications you’re interested in, and insure that your piece will be a good fit, topically and stylistically.
Submission guidelines/word count: All of the places where you might publish an article have instructions, telling you how many words, how to submit, whether to send as an attachment or in an email text, whether to pitch or submit a full article, and other guidelines. Follow them carefully; editors receive a lot of submissions, and will quickly move on to a properly submitted piece.