Hi. I'm Rebecca. And in today's lesson, I'll explain twelve common errors that students
make in academic English. Now, what's academic English? It's the English that you need to
use in school, college, or university when you're reading, writing, listening, and speaking
-- okay -- ideally, but most importantly, when you're writing. Now, what's the difference
between academic English and general English? Well, academic English in general -- there
are many differences, but in general, academic English is more formal; it's more objective,
and also, it has to use a lot of referencing. You always have to let people know where you
got your information from. You have to cite the source. You have to give the source. You
can't claim to write something and claim it as your own. Okay? If you do that, that's
called "plagiarism". It's a very serious offense in academic circles. But today, we're not
going to talk about how to reference a source. We're going to talk about the two other aspects:
How to write more formally and objectively, and what are the ten common errors that students
make when they are not formal enough. Okay? So not ten, twelve. Here we go.
So first of all, using contractions. All of these are what you should not do, okay? So
avoid using contractions. Sorry. In this case, don't use contractions at all. So don't say
"don't"; say "do not". Don't say "isn't"; say "is not". All right? That's academic English.
Next, avoid phrasal verbs. So for example, instead of saying "go up" -- "Prices went
up. -- say, "Prices increased." Instead of saying "take away", say "removed". Avoid these
multi-part verbs. All right? It's not as formal.
Next, avoid idioms. Instead of saying, "It was A1", say, "It was excellent." All right?
Avoid slang. Don't say "kids"; say "children". Use the proper terminology for various subjects.
Avoid pronouns. So for example, instead of saying, "You can see from the graph..." -- all
right. We use the pronoun "you". Instead of that, say, "The graph shows..." all right?
Next, avoid negatives. For example, instead of saying, "Something is not effective", just
say, "It is ineffective." Instead of saying something is "not positive", say, "It's negative."
So avoid these kinds of negatives.
Next, avoid clichés. Now, what are "clichés"? "Clichés" are a kind of idiom, basically
-- commonly used expressions. All right? And so on. Kind of a common wisdom about different
things. And so you want to avoid these kinds of expressions. For example, instead of saying,
"When all is said and done" -- all right? We use that in conversation, but you don't
want to use it in your academic writing. Instead of saying that, you'd probably use an expression
like "in conclusion". All right?
So next, there are certain kinds of punctuation -- there are actually lots of rules about
punctuation. And the kind of punctuation, the style of punctuation that you use in academic
writing depends on the style guide that you have been asked to follow in your school,
college, or university. Some very well-known style guides are the MLA or APA. These are
certain style guides, and they tell you everything about how you need to write, what rules you
need to follow, what are the rules of punctuation and of quotations marks, of this and that.
Okay? A lot more than what I'm covering here. But in general, I can just tell you that we
don't see that many exclamation marks in academic writing, okay? We do see a lot of semicolons.
All right? That's kind of -- when do we use a semicolon? Do you remember? Okay. What's
the difference between a period and a semicolon? A period clearly divides two sentences. And
a semicolon has one sentence which is a complete sentence; then you put the semicolon. You
do not capitalize the next letter, and the next sentence is connected, and you want to
show that it's connected to the first sentence, which is a very academic, intellectual, philosophical
thing to do. So learn to use semicolons if you're in university especially.
Next, avoid vague language. Don't say "a bit", "a lot", "kind of", "sort of". The days for
using that kind of language are over. The days are over once you've reached university,
right? So instead of that, say "a considerable number", "a considerable amount". Okay? That's
why sometimes they say that you can tell when someone has been to university because they
use higher-level language, which doesn't mean that you cannot use higher-level language
if you have not been to university. You can still learn to use excellent language.
Next, simple vocabulary. Don't use simple vocabulary. You want to use slightly more
sophisticated vocabulary. Instead of saying "a big difference", say "a major distinction".
Okay? Now, this is academic.
Next, avoid giving your personal opinion. Okay? In academic circles, they are not so
keen on knowing your opinion. Don't say "I think", "I believe", "in my view". Instead
of that, say "according to so-and-so", "according to this research study" and you mention the
particular research study. You have to always give credit to the source. Where did you get
your information? Who wrote that book? What happened? Okay? You have various styles and
ways in which you can mention that information, but you must always give credit to the source.
And don't really give your opinion, unless it specifically asked for it in a particular
assignment. Okay?
And last, don't use language which is too direct or too strong because then, maybe it
cannot be justified. So you can't make very broad claims about anything. You have to be
able to justify anything that you write especially. So in other words, in academic English, your
goal is to speak like your professor and write like your textbook. And if you can do that,
then you're probably going to do very well in the academic world and also out there in
your career. Okay?
If you'd like to do a quiz on this, please go to our website, www.engvid.com.
Thanks for watching. Good luck with your English.