00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page i Writing and Presenting Research 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page ii © Angela M Thody, 2006 First published 2006 Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form, or by any means, only with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction, in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency Inquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers SAGE Publications Ltd Oliver’s Yard 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320 SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B-42, Panchsheel Enclave Post Box 4109 New Delhi 110 017 British Library Cataloguing in Publication data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN-10 4129 0292 ISBN-10 4129 0293 ISBN-13 978 4129 0292 ISBN-13 978 4129 0293 (pbk) Library of Congress Control Number: 2005934768 Typeset by C&M Digitals (P) Ltd, Chennai, India Printed on paper from sustainable resources Printed and bound in Great Britain by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall Study skills SAGE 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page iii Writing and Presenting Research Angela Thody SAGE Publications London ● Thousand Oaks ● New Delhi 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page iv Contents Overview Conventions or Alternatives? page Want to know what style to go for? This chapter helps you sort it out Adapting to Audience: Adjusting for your Purposes page 49 Do you know your aims? Will you reveal them to your readers and listeners? Is it ethical to let audience aims have priority over yours? Literature and Methodology page 89 Find out why you need to include them, what’s the right style and how to organize them Principles for Selecting Appropriate Writing and Presentation Styles page 18 Follow this framework from the first day you start researching a topic The Arts and Craft of Writing page 58 From getting started to proofreading, learn how to cope with everything from jargon and colloquialisms to tenses and tone Adapting to Audience: Adjusting for their Aims page 34 Your readers and listeners really matter, so find out what is wanted by academics or less specialized audiences, national or international Primary Data page 79 Collected a mountain of data? Find out how to get it under control Quantified Data page 109 Qualitative Data page 129 This is how to make your numbers really count But without forgetting that the words matter too It’s pretty crowded with all those voices to report Here’s how to make them really expressive 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page v CONTENTS OVERVIEW 10 Narrative Data page 145 11 Beginnings and Ends page 159 Poetry, history, stories: are you writing a novel bestseller or a research report? Impact, guide, review, impress Discover the significance of how you start and finish 13 Becoming a Presenter page 203 14 Getting into Print page 214 15 Copyright page 221 Whether conventional or alternative is your style, find out how to be effective This is what you write for so use this quick reference guide to help An introduction to copyright and intellectual property 16 Epilogue page 235 17 Appendix: Research Method for this Book page 238 Bibliography page 241 Who supports my belief about the importance of, and choices for, writing and presentation? Where you fit in? Author bio-data Discover how I wrote this book and what were its antecedents 12 Citations: Bibliographies, Referencing, Quotations, Notes page 185 Getting it correct – the final exciting challenge All the text references and further reading v 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page vi 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page vii Contents List of Boxes List of Figures List of Tables Hazard Warning Appreciation PART I PREPARATION xi xiii xiv xv xvi 1 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 Conventions or Alternatives? Debates to resolve Context of the debates Conventional formats Alternatives Resolving the debates? Chapter outlines Review 3 10 14 16 17 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 Principles for Selecting Appropriate Writing and Presentation Styles Framework of principles Dialogue with the data Writing and presenting After writing Review 18 18 18 24 31 33 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 3.8 Adapting to Audience: Adjusting for their Aims The value of an audience Attitudes to audience Assessing readers and listeners Academic audiences Audiences outside academia Academic and less specialist audiences combined Acknowledging the power of readers and listeners Review 34 34 35 36 38 42 44 47 48 4.1 4.2 4.3 Adapting to Audience: Adjusting for your Purposes Contrasting purposes Defining your purposes Overt purpose: enhancing knowledge 49 49 50 50 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd viii 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page viii WRITING AND PRESENTING RESEARCH 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Covert purposes: careers and finance The overt and covert combined: influencing policy Ethics Review 51 52 55 57 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 The Arts and Craft of Writing How easy is writing? The writing process Style and tone Review 58 58 59 66 76 PART II SELECTION AND REDUCTION 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 Primary Data Selection and reduction How little you need? Using the guiding principles to select and reduce data Using categorization to select and reduce data Review 7.1 7.2 7.3 7.4 7.5 Literature and Methodology Literature reviews and methodology surveys: definitions Literature reviews and methodology surveys: locations and extent Literature reviews Methodology surveys Review PART III 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 8.5 8.6 8.7 8.8 8.9 8.10 PRODUCTION Quantified Data Quantified data presentation: purposes Quantified data presentation: the challenges Qualitative and narrative data quantified Reduction Influencing readers Supporting explanations Language and style Appearances Ethics Review Qualitative Data 9.1 Polyvocality 9.2 Qualitative data writing and presentation: purposes 77 79 79 79 80 84 88 89 89 90 91 99 105 107 109 109 110 111 111 114 118 120 121 122 125 129 129 132 00-Thody-Prelims.qxd 5/23/2006 3:39 PM Page ix CONTENTS 9.3 9.4 9.5 9.6 9.7 9.8 9.9 Qualitative data formats Observation data Interview data Focus group data Historical, literary and legal data Ethics Review 132 133 135 139 141 143 144 10 10.1 10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5 10.6 Narrative Data Definitions Narrative’s allure Narrative’s challenges Getting started Ethics Review 145 145 146 146 156 158 158 11 11.1 11.2 Beginnings and Ends Why beginnings and ends matter Abstracts, executive summaries, key points, prefaces Acknowledgements, appreciation, forewords Appendices Author notes or bio-data Bibliography, endnotes, references Conclusions, summary, recommendations Contents listings Glossaries Introductions Keywords or descriptors Quotations at the beginnings and ends of texts Titles and title pages Review 159 159 11.3 11.4 11.5 11.6 11.7 11.8 11.9 11.10 11.11 11.12 11.13 11.14 12 12.1 12.2 12.3 12.4 12.5 12.6 12.7 Citations: Bibliographies, Referencing, Quotations, Notes Uses for citations Major citation systems End-of-text citations: bibliography, references, works cited, further reading In-text citations (what to put in those brackets) Quotations in the text Notes Review 161 164 166 167 168 168 171 172 173 175 176 178 184 185 185 186 189 190 193 194 200 ix ... viii WRITING AND PRESENTING RESEARCH 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 Covert purposes: careers and finance The overt and covert combined: influencing policy Ethics Review 51 52 55 57 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4 The Arts and. .. conventional and alternative research writing styles: poetic format Differentiating conventional and alternative research writing styles: textbook format 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 Example of the same research. .. 9.1 9.2 Qualitative data writing and presentation: purposes Writing and presenting individual interview data: requirements 132 135 10.1 Challenges to be met in the writing and presentation of narrative