NU Data Centers Energy Performance Case Study

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Read the article’s week#3 will help you to answer the question.The aim of this assignment is to get you familiar with how to write an abstract.For primary responses: You need to pick one peer-reviewed article that is related to your topic. You need to look into the abstract of the article and dissect it into the following 6 components:Background/problemObjective/aimMethod/designResults/findingsConclusion/discussionKeywords

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Writing
Your
Journal
Article in
Twelve
Weeks
Writing
Your
Journal
Article in
Twelve
Weeks
A Guide to Academic Publishing Success
Second E dition
Wendy Laura Belcher
T H E U NI V E R S IT Y OF CH IC AG O P R E S S • CH IC AG O AND L ONDON
For my parents, with respect and gratitude
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2009, 2019 by Wendy Laura Belcher
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without
written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews. For more
information, contact the University of Chicago Press, 1427 E. 60th St., Chicago, IL 60637.
Second edition 2019
Printed in the United States of America
28 27 26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19?? 1 2 3 4 5
isbn-­13: 978-­0-­226-­49991-­8 (paper)
isbn-­13: 978-­0-­226-­50008-­9 (e-­book)
doi: https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226500089.001.0001
The first edition of this book was published in 2009 by SAGE Publications, Inc. Any questions
concerning permissions should be directed to the Permissions Department at The University of
Chicago Press, Chicago, IL.
Mention of individuals’ names does not imply their endorsement or recommendation of this book,
nor does it affirm their participation in any of Belcher’s workshops. For more information, see
www.wendybelcher.com.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Belcher, Wendy Laura, author.
Title: Writing your journal article in twelve weeks : a guide to academic publishing success / Wendy Laura
Belcher.
Other titles: Chicago guides to writing, editing, and publishing.
Description: Second edition. | Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2019. | Series: Chicago
guides to writing, editing, and publishing
Identifiers: LCCN 2018057646 | ISBN 9780226499918 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780226500089 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Scholarly publishing—United States.
Classification: LCC Z471 .B45 2019 | DDC 070.5—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018057646
This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso z.48-­1992 (Permanence of Paper).
Contents
Preface to the Second Edition ix
Acknowledgments? xi
INTRODUCTION: Using This Workbook 1
The workbook’s goals, field-­tested nature, pragmatic emphasis, radical audience, revision focus,
and disciplines.
General instructions: Using the print or electronic version. Completing tasks. Following disciplinary
tracks and stage pathways. Using the workbook according to your temperament; by yourself; in a
writing group; with a writing partner; with coauthors; or to teach a class or workshop.
Some publishing terms and processes: What is a journal? What is an article? What processes
do journal articles go through?
Giving feedback to author
WEEK 1: Designing Your Plan for Writing 14
Instruction: Understanding feelings about writing. Keys to positive writing experiences: successful academic writers write; read; make writing social; persist despite rejection; and pursue their
passions.
Your tasks: Designing a plan for submitting your article in twelve weeks. Day 1, reading the
workbook. Day 2, designing your writing schedule. Day 3, selecting a paper for revision. Day 4, rereading your paper to identify revision tasks. Day 5, setting up your writing site, citation software,
and file backup system; addressing coauthorship; and reading a journal article.
WEEK 2: Advancing Your Argument 60
Instruction: Myths about publishable journal articles: being profoundly theoretical, packed with
ideas, and entirely original. What gets published and why: how publishable articles pair evidence
and approaches. What gets rejected and why: perfectly acceptable articles and those with no argument. Understanding and making arguments: what is an argument; how do you know whether
you have one; how do you make strong arguments; and how do you write an argument-­driven article?
Your tasks: Organizing your article around your argument. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2,
testing out your argument. Day 3, reviewing your article for argument. Days 4–­5, revising your
article around your argument.
v
vi
Contents
WEEK 3: Abstracting Your Article 90
Instruction: Abstracts as a tool for success. Ingredients of a good abstract: good SciQua and
HumInt abstracts.
Your tasks: Crafting an effective abstract. Day 1, talking your way to clarity about your article.
Day 2, reading others’ abstracts and drafting your own. Day 3, reading strong articles in your field.
Day 4, reading articles to cite in your article. Day 5, getting feedback on and revising your abstract.
WEEK 4: Selecting a Journal 110
Instruction: Good news about journals. The importance of picking the right journal. Types of
academic journals: nonrecommended, debatable, and preferred publishing outlets.
Your tasks: Finding suitable academic journals. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2, searching
for journals. Days 3–­4, evaluating academic journals. Day 5, reading relevant journals and writing
query letters.
WEEK 5: Refining Your Works Cited 150
Instruction: Reading scholarly texts. Types of scholarly texts: primary, original, or exhibit
sources; scholarly or secondary literature; and derivative or tertiary documents. Advice for scholars at resource-­poor institutions. Strategies for citing your reading: common mistakes in citing
texts; establishing your “citation values”; avoiding improper borrowing; good citation habits; and
post-­borrowing solutions. Strategies for getting reading done: reading theoretical literature; related literature; and original, primary, or exhibit literature. Strategies for writing your related-­
literature review: what’s your entry point; what is a related-­literature review; and how do you write
a methodological-­or theoretical-­literature review?
Your tasks: Writing about others’ research. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2, evaluating your
current Works Cited list. Day 3, identifying and reading any additional works. Day 4, identifying
your entry point into the related literature. Day 5, writing or revising your related-­literature review.
WEEK 6: Crafting Your Claims for Significance 190
Instruction: On the difference between arguments and claims for significance. What is a claim
for significance: types of claims; examples of claims; making claims; and the “So What?” exercise.
Types of feedback: what to do (and not do) when giving and receiving feedback.
Your tasks: Claiming significance. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2, exchanging writing and
doing the “So What?” exercise. Day 3, writing and inserting your claims for significance. Days 4–­5,
revising your article according to feedback received.
WEEK 7: Analyzing Your Evidence 216
Instruction: Analyzing evidence. Types of evidence: textual; qualitative; quantitative; and
experimental.
Your tasks: Revising your evidence. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2, highlighting and analyzing your evidence. Day 3, analyzing the quality, relevance, and placement of your evidence. Day 4,
analyzing your interpretation of your evidence. Day 5, collecting additional evidence.
Contents
WEEK 8: Presenting Your Evidence 238
Instruction: Presenting evidence in SciQua articles, in HumInt articles, and in illustrations; obtaining image or text permissions.
Your tasks: Revising your presentation of evidence. Day 1, reading the workbook. Days 2–­4, revising your presentation of evidence. Day 5, checking your presentation of evidence by section.
WEEK 9: Strengthening Your Structure 256
Instruction: On the importance of structure. Article-­structuring principles: macrostructure and
microstructure; structural building blocks; rhetorical orders of structure; structure signals; and common genres’ structures. Types of journal article macrostructures: SciQua; HumInt; disciplinary;
and synaptic macrostructure. Types of pre-­and postdraft outlining.
Your tasks: Revising your structure. Day 1, reading the workbook. Day 2, outlining someone else’s
published article. Day 3, making a postdraft outline of your article. Days 4–­5, restructuring your article.
WEEK 10: Opening and Concluding Your Article 280
Instruction: On the importance of openings: fashioning your title; molding your introduction;
and choosing your name. On the importance of conclusions.
Your tasks: Finalizing your opening and conclusion. Day 1, reading the workbook and revising
your title. Day 2, molding your introduction. Day 3, molding your introduction and choosing your
name. Day 4, revising your abstract and author order. Day 5, constructing your conclusion.
WEEK 11: Editing Your Sentences 308
Instruction: The nature of microrevising. The Belcher Editing Diagnostic Test and its principles: reduce lists; strengthen verbs; clarify pronouns; decrease prepositions; and cut unnecessary
words.
Your tasks: Editing your article. Day 1, Reading the workbook and running the Belcher Editing
Diagnostic Test. Days 2–­5, revising your article using the Belcher Editing Diagnostic Test.
WEEK 12: Sending Your Article! 330
Instruction: On the importance of finishing. Following journal submission guidelines: understanding the journal’s style manual; implementing the journal’s documentation, punctuation,
and spelling style; collecting journal submission information; and writing a submission cover letter.
What to do after sending.
Your tasks: Getting your submission ready. Day 1, identifying what remains to be done. Day 2,
putting your article in the journal’s style. Days 3–­4, wrapping up any remaining issues. Day 5, send
and celebrate!
WEEK X: Revising and Resubmitting Your Article 358
Instruction and tasks: Navigating the review process. Receiving the journal’s decision: tracking the journal’s time to decision; emotionally managing and interpreting the journal’s decision.
Responding to the journal’s decision: responding to a journal’s decision to reject your article or
vii
viii
Contents
to a revise-­and-­resubmit notice; setting up for revising your article; revising your article; drafting
your revision cover letter; and resubmitting your article. After the journal publishes your article:
bringing attention to your article and reviewing someone else’s article.
WEEK 0: Writing Your Article from Scratch 390
Instruction and tasks: Writing your article from scratch without an idea: setting up, getting
an idea, testing your idea, collecting evidence for your idea, drafting your article, and revising your
article using the workbook. Writing your article from scratch with an idea.
List of References? 401
Index 419
Preface to the Second Edition
W
hen I was writing the first edition of this writing workbook, I conceived of it as a
specialized text for a narrow audience: graduate students in the humanities and
qualitative social sciences. I did not anticipate that it would become popular in many
disciplines and with a much wider range of academics, including junior faculty, postdoctoral
research fellows, adjunct instructors, recent PhDs, faculty in the professional schools, and
even instructors of upper-­level undergraduate courses. So I was delighted that academics
came to regard this workbook as the bible of journal article publishing, the one text on the
subject that they used. Dozens of articles have been published about the positive results of
using this workbook to teach writing.
As a result, in producing this second edition I have kept this broader audience in mind.
For instance, although many wrote to tell me how much the workbook had helped them,
some readers, often new graduate students with no writing experience, didn’t have a paper
to revise and needed advice about writing journal articles from scratch. So I have added
a chapter to help anyone who wants to use the workbook to write an article from its very
inception.
In addition, I hadn’t anticipated that the amount of time that scholars needed to complete their article-­writing tasks would be so wildly divergent. In the first year after the
book came out, a quantitative behavioral scientist said to me, “Twelve weeks?! I don’t have
twelve weeks; I need to write up research in one week.” And a literary scholar lamented,
“Twelve weeks?! I can’t write an article in that short a time; I need at least twelve months.”
So in this second edition, I’ve better addressed these differing needs. “Twelve weeks” remains in the workbook’s title, but you’ll now find instructions to aid you in completing
articles in different time frames.
I did anticipate that I would receive quibbles about chapter sequence: How can readers
possibly work on argument until they have selected the journal they’d like to publish their
article? How can readers possibly select a journal when they haven’t completed their literature review? Unfortunately, not all information can be packed into the first chapter. So in
defense of my choices, the order of chapters in the book has nothing to do with what’s most
important to know or do, and everything to do with what’s most important to keep you
motivated and feeling good about writing. That said, I did rearrange or add a few chapters:
I moved the chapter about argument to the second week, since it undergirds the book and
your writing, and I added chapters about analyzing evidence and claiming significance.
I have made other improvements as well. My thanks to all of you who emailed me to
note errors in the first edition! I must have received one hundred emails about the typo
“Inw writing tasks” in the introduction, and I felt happy when I got each one, knowing
that people were reading the workbook with such care. I saved and used all your emails
to address such mistakes. Second, I updated the citations on faculty productivity and
ix
x
Preface to the Second Edition
scholarly writing, guiding you according to the latest research. Third, I updated the workbook according to how journals have changed their publication procedures in the years
since the first edition was published. And I improved the flow of instruction within chapters, making the tasks even easier to follow.
Although much about the second edition is new, I have kept what readers liked about
the first: its humor, its encouraging tone, its stories, its detailed instructions, its base in
the scholarly research on writing, and its rich content about getting journal articles published. I have continued to assume that its main readers are those who have published little
or not at all. Although people at different stages of their academic career have used the
book, my understanding of graduate students’ struggles remains the organizing principle
of the advice in its pages.
I hope that you find this second edition even more useful than the first. And keep
those comments coming! I love to hear from you; just email me at wbelcher@ucla.edu
(my lifetime email).
Acknowledgments
I
n writing the second edition, I am grateful to all the readers who emailed me feedback
about the workbook. Of those who took the time to point out errors or inconsistencies in
the first edition, none was more appreciated than Steven Gump, who sent me many pages
of thoughtful comments and corrections.
I am also grateful to my beta testers, who over the summer of 2016 used my first draft
of the second edition to work on an article for publication. Each Monday, they reported
how they had used the book that week and what they thought I could improve about
it. Among the beta testers were some of the amazing teachers in Princeton University’s
Writing Program, including Marina Fedosik, Steven A. Kelts, Maria A. Medvedeva, and
George R. Laufenberg; other testers included Princeton faculty members Brian E. Herrera,
Desmond D. Jagmohan, and Ruha Benjamin and graduate students Jill Stockwell, Jane C.
Manners, Jessica Wright, Melanie Webb, and and Katherine R. Hilliard.
Thanks to all those who posted reviews online or wrote about the workbook on social
media—­your comments were important to the revision process, whether for keeping what
worked or changing what didn’t. Special thanks to Lisa Munro, Ellie Mackin, Beatriz Reyes-­
Foster, and others who blogged about their experiences of using the workbook to write
an article in twelve weeks.
I am especially thankful for my marvelous University of Chicago Press peer reviewers—­
Raul Pacheco-­Vega, Tanya Golash-­Boza, Regina Dixon-­Reeves, Patricia Morse, and Jane
Hindman—for their insights on how to improve the second edition, and to the Press’s staff
members, including the amazing senior editor Mary Laur, the gifted copy editor Sandra
Hazel, the exceptional production editor Susan Karani, the meticulous senior production
coordinator Joe Claude, the dynamic publicist Lauren Salas, and the talented designer
Michael Brehm. It has long been a dream of mine to be published by the best-run press
in the world, and now I am.
Finally, I thank my superlative friend Bonnie Berry LaMon for saving me from myself
since I was fourteen years old.
In the acknowledgments of the first edition, I thanked many, and I’m still grateful to
all of them, including my wonderful parents.
xi
INTRODUCTION
Using This Workbook
I TS G OA LS
The primary goals of this workbook are to aid you in revising a classroom essay, conference
paper, BA or MA thesis, dissertation chapter, talk, or unpublished article and sending it to
the editor of a suitable academic journal. That is, the goals are active and pragmatic. The
workbook provides the instruction, tasks, structure, and deadlines needed to complete an effective revision. It will help you develop the habits of productivity that lead to confidence, the
kind of confidence it takes to send a journal article out into the world. By aiding you in taking
your paper from classroom or conference quality to journal article quality, the workbook also
helps you overcome any anxiety about academic publishing. For those who don’t have a draft
to revise, I provide instructions in the chapter “Week 0: Writing Your Article from Scratch.”
I TS FI EL D – T­ ESTED NATU RE
Nothing quite like this workbook exists. Most books about scholarly writing give advice
based on the experiences of only the author or a few scholars in the same field as the
author. This workbook isn’t the product of one person’s experience or thought. It wasn’t
written over just a semester or a year. This workbook is the product of decades of repeated
experimenting, with and by hundreds of scholarly writers. I have revised it repeatedly
based on my own experiences of running a peer-­reviewed journal and regularly teaching
the workbook around the world, as well as the feedback of its thousands of readers. By
staying in touch with my students as they submitted articles to scholarly journals, I learned
more and more about what actually succeeds in the peer-­review process, not what is theorized to succeed. Based on this knowledge gathered from the field, the latest research,
and the laboratory of the classroom, I wrote and then revised this workbook to make it
as helpful as it could be. Very few books about scholarly writing have undergone the fire
of testing among hundreds of scholars across a wide range of disciplines. This one has.
I TS P R AGM ATI C EMPH ASI S
Most instruction books are prescriptive, setting up an ideal process and demanding that
you adhere to it. I see such demands as impractical. My aim is helping graduate students,
recent PhDs, postdoctoral fellows, adjunct instructors, junior faculty, and international
faculty understand the rules of the academic publishing game so that they can flourish,
not perish. Thus, this workbook is based on what works. I don’t tell you to write eight hours
a day; that doesn’t work. I don’t advise you to read everything in your field; you can’t. I
1
2
Introduction
don’t describe how to write perfect articles; no one does. Publication, not perfection, is
the goal here, so the workbook advises you based on what academics have told me they
actually did, and what they were willing to do. This workbook is intended not for academic
purists but for those in the academic trenches who sometimes grow discouraged and who
fear that they are the only ones who haven’t figured it all out.
As a result, the workbook details shortcuts and even a few tricks. And it always tells
the truth, based as it is in the real world, however upsetting that world can sometimes be.
Some journal editors don’t like me saying that publishing in certain types of journals won’t
serve you well when it comes to getting hired or promoted at research universities and
many colleges in the United States. Some professors don’t like me saying that pre-­tenure
scholars should prioritize certain types of articles and research. Some academics don’t
like me saying that publishing in US journals is more prestigious. But I state these unfortunate truths anyway. And the workbook’s advice continues to help academics achieve
publishing success.
I TS R A D I CA L A UD I ENC E
Over the history of writing this workbook and teaching my courses, I have noticed that a
preponderance of my students were women, people of color, non-­Americans, and/or first-­
generation academics. I would repeatedly hear from them, “No one ever told me this” or “I had
no idea!” This workbook fills a gap in graduate education training, and has been responsible
for helping many on the margins—­racially, economically, internationally, and politically—­
feel more confident and frame their work in ways that would be acceptable to peer reviewers.
That’s why several people have told me that I should call this an “underground” guide to entering the profession, since it demystifies Euro-­American academic conventions. Sometimes
I’ve struggled with the aim of the workbook, wondering if I’m wrong to be helping scholars
succeed in the flawed academic system as it exists, rather than working to change it. Aren’t
I part of the problem if I aid scholars across the globe in formatting their ideas to be palatable to mostly American white male Protestant and middle-­aged peer reviewers (or those
trained by them)? But in the end, I always decide that it is right to level the playing field so
that everyone can play the game and advance, even those disadvantaged by that very system.
I believe that everyone should have access to the rules and a chance to succeed. My hope is
that enabling more scholars from the periphery—­whether in terms of their scholarship or
their background—­to publish in scholarly journals will improve (and radicalize) academic
fields and disciplines for the better.
I TS REV I SI ON F OCU S
Most books about academic writing assume that the most difficult part of the writing
process is arriving at good ideas. But in my experience, most academics, even as graduate
students, have good ideas (even if they don’t think so). The real problem is how many good
ideas languish in unfinished, unpublished articles. What most academics need is a way to
make publishable the research they have already conducted, or written about in graduate
school, or taught. They know that their classroom essays, conference papers, BA or MA
Using This Workbook
theses, dissertation chapters, or unpublished articles aren’t ready for journals, but they
don’t know how to improve them.
Thus, in my workshops I focused on guiding students through a revision of something they had already written, an exercise new to many. It turned out that revising their
drafts was far more effective in training them to be better, more productive, and less anxious writers than having them start writing from scratch. Further, once they learned to
diagnose and correct their erroneous tendencies by revising, they wrote their next article from scratch easily. I firmly believe that revision is the heart of good writing, and
that many scholars are unpublished because they have never learned how to revise their
drafts, not because they have bad ideas. This workbook focuses on revision as a key to
publication.
If you think that you have no draft to revise for publication, read the section titled
“Selecting a Paper for Revision” in the chapter “Week 1: Designing Your Plan for Writing.”
You may find that you do have something to revise. It doesn’t matter if the draft is poor or
little more than an outline—­the workbook will still aid you in revising it (although you’ll
need to allot more time for writing). If you really don’t have a suitable draft, please turn
to the final chapter, “Week 0: Writing Your Article from Scratch.”
Most books about academic writing are also excessively concerned with style. Half their
pages are devoted to improving word choice and syntax. In my experience, this was the
least of academics’ problems. Scholarship about writing supported my own observation
that what most authors need is a better grasp of macrorevising (such as making arguments, structuring the whole, and summarizing), not microrevising (such as improving
style through better punctuation and the reduction of adverbs). Thus, this workbook is
devoted to “deep revision” (Willis 1993), the changes that make the greatest difference to
an article’s quality and hence its success.
I designed this workbook to help you build both skills and self-­assurance. Whether you
have neither, one, or both—­welcome.
I TS D I S CI PL I NES
This workbook is useful for those in a wide range of disciplines, including the humanities,
social sciences, health sciences, behavioral sciences, professional schools, and some applied
sciences. I have divided these disciplines into two tracks. (Many people use the words field and
discipline interchangeably, but I use field throughout to mean a subcategory of a discipline.)
Many scholars have used this workbook to write journal articles in the humanities or
interpretive social sciences (abbreviated in the workbook as HumInt). The humanities
disciplines include philosophy, religion, history, literature, and the arts (including visual
arts like painting and photography; media arts like film and television; applied arts like
architecture; and performing arts like dance, theater, and music). Some have used the
workbook to write interdisciplinary articles about social constructions such as gender,
sexuality, race, culture, ethnicity, nation, region, class, and ethics. And some have used it
to write articles in the interpretive social sciences such as cultural anthropology, cultural
sociology, human geography, political theory, and so on.
Other scholars have used the workbook to write experimental, quantitative, or qualitative journal articles in the social, health, and behavioral science fields (abbreviated in
3
4
Introduction
the workbook as SciQua). These include the experiment-­based fields in the disciplines of
anthropology, sociology, psychology, and geography, and in the qualitative and quantitative
disciplines like political science, economics, archaeology, and linguistics. Those in the health
sciences have also used it to write up research in all branches of medicine, including public
health, epidemiology, nursing, pharmacy, health literacy, medical decision-­making, and
preventive health behaviors like cancer screening, diet, and exercise.
Still others have used it to write about research in the social science professions,
such as education, business management, communications, public policy, social welfare,
urban planning, library science, criminology, development studies, forestry, or international relations. They follow the SciQua track if the article reports on a qualitative or
quantitative study, or the HumInt track if the article is interpretive. Only a few have used
it for legal writing.
The workbook was not originally written for those in the natural sciences. That’s because I have no graduate degrees in the sciences (mine are all in the humanities and social
sciences), and I have rarely taught scientists. However, so many scientists have told me
that they are using the workbook that I’ve had to bow to reality and do more to address
such readers in this edition. So those writing up research in most of the applied sciences
(e.g., engineering, computer science, aerospace, agricultural science, operations research,
robotics), most of the life sciences (e.g., ecology, biology, botany, paleontology, neuroscience, zoology), and perhaps even the formal sciences (e.g., mathematics, logic, theoretical
computer science) and the physical sciences (e.g., astronomy, chemistry, physics, and the
earth sciences) will find the workbook more useful than they had. They follow the SciQua
track. However, such readers will have to do more than other readers to adapt the book
for their purposes, especially regarding time frames. I still recommend that scientists
read and use How to Write and Publish a Scientific Paper (Gastel and Day 2016), which is
practical and accessible, although rather oriented toward biology; Writing in the Sciences
(Penrose and Katz 2010), which includes writing grant proposals and conference papers;
and the encyclopedic Scientific Writing and Communication (Hofmann 2016), which emphasizes sentence and paragraph structure.
GENER A L I NSTRUCTI ONS
Although I wish it were otherwise, this workbook doesn’t work by osmosis. You can’t just
turn the pages, read the occasional text, and then magically have an article materialize
by the time you turn the last page. Reading the workbook is just a fifth of the work you
must do to ready an article for a journal. The workbook makes that work easier and more
straightforward, but it doesn’t do the work for you. If you read the workbook just to pick
up some tips, you won’t learn nearly as much as you will by completing the related tasks.
And you probably won’t retain much. Doing is learning.
Using the Print or Electronic Version
Your reading in the workbook each week isn’t passive: you must answer its questions, write
in its boxes, and check off its forms. If you have the print version, go ahead and write your
Using This Workbook
responses directly on the pages. That’s how the book was designed to work. If you don’t
want to write in your print copy or you have an e-­book that you can’t write in, you can
download some of the forms and checklists as PDFs or Microsoft Word documents from
my website, wendybelcher.com, at “Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks Forms.”
Then you can fill them out either electronically or by hand after printing them out. Also,
check my website to see whether any interactive forms have been posted.
Completing Tasks
Each workbook week consists of some instruction from me as well as specific tasks for you
to complete each day for five days of that week.
Daily Tasks
The daily tasks encourage limited but daily writing, so that the revision of your article
can proceed steadily despite your other responsibilities, such as teaching, working at a
full-­time job, caring for family members, or writing your dissertation. That is, I founded
this workbook on the research that shows that those who write daily publish more than
those who write rarely. They are also happier! I’ll tell you a lot more about this philosophy
in “Week 1: Designing Your Plan for Writing.”
Task Timeline
If you happen to fall behind on the daily tasks, which take one to three hours per day, don’t
give up or feel guilty! The times listed for the duration of each task are minimums; some
tasks may take quite a bit longer. If you fall behind, have a catch-­up session or reset your
twelve-­week calendar accordingly. I have seen many cases where authors took twenty-­four
weeks or even twenty-­four months to send their article to a journal, and were published
just the same. Persevering is the key. By contrast, if you find that you have moved through
a week’s tasks more quickly than anticipated—­for instance, if you already had a strong
abstract or structure—­don’t stop working for that week. Either move right into the next
week’s tasks or spend the extra time reading related articles or books.
Task Types
There are five types of tasks in this book. In workbook tasks, you read the workbook and
complete the exercises. In social tasks, you talk about or share your writing with another
academic, a writing partner, or a writing group. In writing tasks, you write some part