Bad Ideas About Writing

Study overview of the reviewed opening

Ball and Loewe’s introduction explains the collection as a response to ideas about writing that scholars consider unhelpful but that continue to shape public expectations. Teachers, students, administrators and other readers influence how writing is understood, yet may not encounter specialist writing-studies research.

The entries translate research and teaching experience into concise arguments intended to start discussion. Rather than using full discipline-specific citation systems throughout, they provide resources for further reading and keywords that help a reader continue investigating the topic. The format is argumentative, so claims should remain associated with their contributors.

Eight categories organise the collection, but the editors encourage reading across them and attending to disagreement. Several entries may address a similar issue from different perspectives without being forced into a uniform conclusion. The page’s overview covers the introduction and verified thematic contents, not all individual arguments. It does not present the entire anthology as a single set of universally accepted writing rules.

Book contents

1. Introduction
2. Bad Ideas About What Good Writing Is
3. Bad Ideas About Who Good Writers Are
4. Bad Ideas About Style, Usage, and Grammar
5. Bad Ideas About Writing Techniques
6. Bad Ideas About Genres
7. Bad Ideas About Assessing Writing
8. Bad Ideas About Writing and Digital Technology
9. Bad Ideas About Writing Teachers

Questions for study

The following prompts are Academic Master’s editorial material.

• Why might specialist research fail to reach public understandings of writing?
• What is gained by comparing entries that disagree?
• How can keywords and further reading support evaluation of a claim?

Sources and coverage

Introduction read in full (PDF pages 12–14); publication, identifiers, licence, cover credit and thematic contents checked.

Source edition · Source licence