# Workshop on Writing --- {%youtube 8Gv0H-vPoDc %} --- ## Write :pencil: what is my relation with writing write for 5 minutes - try not to stop --- What is writing? (non-fiction, academic) What metaphors come to mind? ## :white_flower: ---  --- ## What are your rules for writing? Quick groupwork ---  ---  --- ## My Writing Principles ### (or how do I approach writing) --- ### 1. Writing as Thinking  --- ### 2. Shitty First Draft  --- ### 3. Never start from scratch (Nobody ever starts from scratch!)  --- ### 4. Revision Revision Revision  --- ### 5. Writer's Block Means Fear  --- More on writing strategies, tools, style --> Course **"Argumentative and Persuasive Writing"** --- ## Useful Techniques (for me) --- ### 1. Free Writing - getting started - getting unstuck - problem-solving - idea generation (*Writing as Thinking* and *Shitty First Draft*) --- ### Instructions - Think about topic/question/problem - Timer for 5, 10, 15, 20, ... minutes - Write --- ### Your turn:dart: - What is your next essay/written assignment? - Write for 5 min - Don't think about grammar, rules, sentences --- ### Elaboration of the Technique - Looping Write - Reflect - Write --- ### Technique 2: Tiny Texts - Not Notes - Mini versions (summaries) - Make bigger later (*Nobody Starts From Scratch* and *Writing as Thinking*) --- I want to write about the role of women in the Iranian protests. I think that the comparison with the protests in Belarus in 2020 because ... I have collected three interesting stories. Story about A lets me explain X, story about B demonstrates how ... --- ### AKA Žižek Method {%youtube G9SRIrWoAeo %} --- ### Your Turn :dart: - Read text from the previous practice - Extract 2 ideas - Write 2 "tiny texts" --- ### Technique 3: Columbo principle (or Getting to The Point)  --- ### Make your papers like an episode of Columbo Don’t keep your readers guessing what your thesis is. Tell it to us right up front. The mystery (“narrative tension”) comes from our curiosity at how you arrived at your surprising thesis. --- ### How? --> 3 Formulas --- **1: Make Your First Sentence the Question You Are Trying to Answer**  --- **Why do people tip waiters in restaurants to which they will never return?** Tipping is one means of encouraging good service when we dine at that restaurant the next time. But most Americans tip the waitstaff in restaurants on roadside stops, at highway exits, and in places that they are unlikely to visit again. Is this the result of mere habit? Or is it a function of social conditioning? Or do the roots of this behavior reveal something deeper about human kindness? **My research suggests** that tipping in distant places stems primarily from a deeply ingrained sense of class solidarity. --- **2: Make Your First Sentence Your Thesis**  --- Geographic advantages enabled Europeans to dominate the world. Scholars from numerous fields have long wondered why some countries are rich while others are poor. Do the disparities in the distribution of global wealth and power stem from racial, cultural, climatic, or other sources? If we understood book of global inequities, would we be better equipped to redress them? --- I maintain that the natural geographic advantages of the Eurasian land mass afforded Europeans an enormous head start in their development. This head start ultimately enabled them to colonize much of the rest of the world. To understand how this complex process unfolded, we must first step back in time to an age before societies existed. Paraphrasing Jared Diamond’s argument in his book *Guns, Germs, and Steel* --- ### Reasons: - signals that you have something to say - keeps you focused as you write --- **3: Craft an Arresting Opening**  --- > In Moulmein, in lower Burma, I was hated by large numbers of people— the only time in my life that I have been important enough for this to happen to me. Beginning of George Orwell’s essay “Shooting an Elephant” --- ### Technique 4: Do Anything ---  (*Fear Management*) --- ## Next week - planing - structuring - paraphrasing - quoting - referencing --- ## Homework assingment:dart: - write your short analytical essay on the topic "What distinguishes a social science essay from a newspaper article, a report, or an exam answer?" - ~ 400 words - Deadline: **Monday**, November 28, 22:00 ---