Pushpa Priya

Academic writing is central to communication since it has a wide range of significance in communicating written messages at large.
Mary R. Colonna and Judith E. Gilbert define academic writings as a social endeavour, a way of communicating with others, informing them, persuading them, debating with them. They perceive writing as not only an expression of one’s individuality and personality but also as an active social process involving discussion, interaction with teachers, group work and peer evaluation.

Critical Thinking
Through these collaborative experiences, one is skilled in recognising unique strengths by employing critical thinking skills and becoming a more effective writer. Dr Varinder Bhatia, Associate member All India Management Association, New Delhi, defines academic writings as an integral part of business communication where written communication like letters, memos, reports and other types of documents are essential to the modern business world.
Similarly, Hartley James refers to academic writings as a style of expression that researchers use to define the intellectual boundaries of their disciplines and their specific area of expertise.
Academic writing is a skill that is required in many contexts throughout life. Writing skills is an essential part of written communication. It takes the shape of letters, memos, reports and other types of documents essential to the modern business world.
In business, communication is a key function of management. An organization cannot operate without communication between levels, departments and employees. Managers spend approximately 50 per cent of their time reading and writing. Employees at all levels must be able to express their ideas and document their decisions and actions and must be able to read to communicate with others inside and outside the organisation.
The main advantage of written communication in business is that it provides a permanent record. Others can read a document sometime later and get the same message as the original, distorted by time. Most importantly, formal letter writing that comes under academic writing plays vital roles in the context of organisational function.
A letter has been defined as a conversation by post. One cannot meet a person or even speak on the phone for transacting day to day business. Out of necessity, one has to resort to letters in the business world.
A letter represents the work culture of an organisation and acts as an ambassador of its goodwill. It is therefore essential for professionals to cultivate the art of letter writing. Besides, Academic writing is useful for a term paper.

Information Dissemination
According to Krishna Mohan, Professor of Birla Institute of Technology and Science, The term paper is a documented prose work incorporating the results of an organized analysis of a subject written mainly to record and disseminate information or knowledge or to present a point of view on a selected topic. Sometimes, it is also called the research paper, the investigative paper or the library paper.
Academic writing has many uses for business managers, researchers, professors, students to convey ideas clearly and concisely, make arguments, and engage in scholarly conversation. In the case of students, its necessity is perceived when he/she attains for essay writing, thesis writing, research papers etc.
Business managers find their utility when they work for meeting organisational goals in the most efficient manner.,Also, we find its necessity for Book reviews where several publishers send new book information leaflets, catalogue and sometimes write sales letters to prospective readers and also in journals and newspapers.
Moreover, many scholars convey their perceptions on different topics based on research through articles writing in newspapers. Professors find its necessity while writing research articles, Academic Journal, Conference Paper. Therefore, systematic learning of Academic Writing carries a wide range of importance mainly in today’s business world.
Strong relationships are critical to a business summit. Companies place a high value on long term relationships with clients, and customers, and put much effort into building these relationships. Strong relationships among company employees are necessary so people can work together effectively. In this sense, tactful writing enables us to build credibility to set up good public relations that result in the goodwill of the organisation.
There are many objectives of Academic writing. It helps one to interact with academic content: reading, writing, listening and speaking. In other words, it develops one’s effective communication skills.
According to Dr Varinder Bhatia, communication is always instrumental in the management of business organisation because the orders are issued, the advice is sought and given, the decisions are conveyed by functional authorities to the concerned people, the instructions are given by the supervisors to the operators and number of other activities such as planning, directing, coordinating, organising, controlling etc. are carried out by maintaining effective communication.
Academic writing helps one to demonstrate an ability to think critically and distinguish facts from opinions. In addition to it, it also helps in developing higher-order thinking like critical, reflective, logical and creative thinking in conveying agreed meaning about complex ideas or concepts for a group of scholarly experts and also helps in understanding the research problem.
Most importantly, it develops one’s analytical skills by experience in analysing ideas, making inferences, supporting opinions, understanding points of view and writing for different audiences. That finally prepares one to write on a wide variety of themes that reflect the academic curriculum.

Training
Training on ‘Academic Writing’ is a basic necessity for English teachers in educating students for effective writing skills that are for their academic success. The training will develop the teachers’ ability to educate their students in the following areas:
- In writing effective and coherent paragraphs.
- Comprehending the overall and internal organisation of an academic essay.
- In building academic vocabulary.
- In using grammatical structures accurately.
- In preparing students with good written communication skills.
- To help business students with key strategies for professional business writing.
- In educating students communication skills so that they turn out to be effective communicators.
Furthermore, the training on Academic Writing equips the faculties to bring out their full potential in educating students most efficiently.
One of the most important attributes of a good teacher is the ability to explain complexity in a way that is understandable and related to the topic being presented. This is also one of the main functions of academic writing-examining and explaining the significance of complex ideas as clearly as possible

(The writer teaches English at Kathmandu colleges)