Guest Posting: From a Workshop in Zambia

[Note: Recently AuthorAID helped find a leader for a writing workshop in Zambia. Below, the workshop leader, Tom Lang, presents some highlights. Thanks very much, Tom!]

In August, I taught a week-long course on report writing and scientific publications at the National Institute for Scientific and Industrial Research in Zambia. Among the 19 participants were several  from other countries, including Rawanda, Malawi, and Swaziland. The largest group of participants consisted of physicians involved with HIV/AIDS research. Most of the rest were in food and agricultural science.

We met in a state-of-the-art computer training room, which was both good and bad. Good, because the room was pleasant; bad, because each participant had to look over or around a computer screen to see my slides, and each knew that if I got boring, they could check their e-mail during the lecture.(!)

One of the items they enjoyed most was the discussion of the differences between the writing we learn to do in school (what I call “practice writing”) and the writing we need to do as working scientists (what I call "applied writing"). Selected slides on this topic are attached.

People all over the world are taught to write in the tradition of the humanities and are thus ill-prepared to write in the sciences. By calling attention to this fact, I allow participants to change their opinions about writing. Those who objected to writing "personal-reaction essays" in school are now free to see that applied writing in the sciences is an integral part of the research process and a skill worth developing.

Tom Lang