Writing Conference Papers in the Humanities

Have you ever attended an academic conference where some presenters seemed like they were just reading a journal article to you—dry, impersonal, boring, disengaged—or like they'd thrown together a scattered collection of information with no sense of why it matters? For scholars in fields where conference presentations are read verbatim, writing an engaging paper means keeping the medium in mind: you'll be delivering your script aloud to a group of listeners who are processing what you say in real time, and this should affect your approach at every level, from the overall structure to the details of syntax and wording.

This book offers a guide to writing humanities-style conference papers that communicate effectively with the audience, drawing on my perspective as an experienced presenter in musicology who now works as an editor helping scholarly authors improve the clarity and effectiveness of their writing. You'll learn about broader issues of structure and focus, ways of conveying information effectively, and specific techniques for improving clarity at the paragraph and sentence levels. While presentation skills aren't the main focus, I'll also give you some tips for making your writing easier to read aloud and preparing yourself to deliver it with confidence.

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Format: PDF

Word count: 16K

Pages: 67 (plus bibliography and index)