"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

[http://users.livejournal.com/eljay_/]

{delurks}

At school, I was taught never to use "I", "my opinion", "the author" - anything of that ilk. I still think that doing so in scientific writing sounds faintly unprofessional. No-one commented on my style at university. (Perhaps they would have if I'd used "I?) My first graduate supervisor held the same opinion as me.

However, the times, they are a'changin'. The passive voice is now apparently frowned on in many journals, mostly because it is thought to be difficult for non-native English speakers to understand. My current supervisor is not a tyrant on this matter, but he does tend to go through my papers removing my more contortionist passive voice and replacing it with "we". For some reason I find "we" more acceptable than "I"...

Personal opinion? I prefer first person to be used only in moderation, but whether this is merely habit is an excellent question.