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Succeeding in postgraduate study
Succeeding in postgraduate study

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9 Writing at postgraduate level – general characteristics

Different disciplines will have certain conventions, vocabulary and types of discourse that you will need to become familiar with over the course of your degree. There are, however, some general characteristics of academic writing that are relevant across disciplines. We will examine these further in the presentation below.

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Session 2, slidecast 2: writing at postgraduate level – some general principles
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Activity 4 Reflecting on your writing

Timing: Allow approximately 20 minutes

Look again at the writing you produced for Activity 3 in Session 1. The activity required you to summarise information that was provided to you, and to condense this to formulate a written conclusion that put your views across clearly, concisely, and in your own words.

  • How well did your writing meet this brief?
  • In what ways did your writing conform to the ‘general’ academic requirements discussed in this section?
  • In what ways could your writing be improved?
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You can view an example that we have prepared for reference: Example conclusion from Session 1 Activity 3 [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)] .