"I" in academic and scholarly writing

[rm]

This is not a search for advice. This is a point of curiosity to me, because my education was sort of extreme and obsessive on this point, and it occurs to me that perhaps other fifth-graders were not scarred for life by writing papers that said things like "this author feels that Disney World would be an idea summer vacation destination for her family."

So, inquiring minds and all that....

[Poll #1563413]

Comments

[iterum.livejournal.com]

As I teach now, both as a writing instructor and as a grader commenting on papers written for other kinds of classes, it depends on the assignment and the discipline. A short history paper about, say, factors contributing to the fall of the Roman empire in the west wouldn't seem to have much room for personal statements beyond gratutious I thinks, while an analysis of a literary text might well. (This is, of course, separate from when I actually assign personal reminiscences in my writing class.)

All that said, for a conference paper that you will be presenting verbally, "this writer" is more likely to bug listeners than "I." When I worked as an editorial assistant at an academic journal, we had whole issues publishing conference proceedings; the first drafts, generally identical to the conference presentations, were usually full of first-person-y goodness and more conversational tones, but then they were whipped into more formal shape for publication.

My own academic writing dips into "as I shall show" and "I have argued elsewhere that" and so on, and no one has complained (although with my dissertation perhaps my committee was just happy that I finally wrote something at all).