The Writing Guides
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In addition to her research and public sociology, Barbara Risman, created with her partner, Deborah Cohan, The Writing Guides to offer workshops, retreats, coaching, and editing services for scholars. Drawing on her experience writing for both academic and public audiences, The Writing Guides helps scholars cultivate their voice, strengthen their writing skills, and integrate writing into their professional lives. For more information, visit thewritingguides.org
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Escape Into your Writing!
April 26, 2024
We all experience trying times in our lives. Sometimes the personal becomes the painful. Perhaps elderly parents begin having trouble living independently. Or a child is being bullied at school. Sometimes the political becomes personal, and painful. We worry about the immigration status of loved ones, or we fear the consequences of federal interference and budget cuts into our universities’ autonomy, and on our own free speech.
Whatever the reason, there are times in all our lives that are simply hard. Very hard. If we think of writing as one more obligation, our writing becomes a burden. If writing becomes a burden, we avoid it. While that might be a reasonable choice, this often ends up hurting ourselves even more. For many of us, writing is part of how we are evaluated, and if we avoid it, we hurt our chances of promotion, raises or even keeping our jobs. But for others, even when we are secure from negative evaluations, we care about having a voice and making a contribution. And while avoiding writing in the short term may feel liberating, in the long run, we feel badly about having our ideas out in the world.
We have another idea, another option.
Think about your writing as an escape from the rest of your life. A quiet time to think, to focus and to blank out the noise, the pain, the conflict. In our own lives, we have learned to escape to our writing, rather than avoid our writing. When one of us was going thru a painful divorce, writing became the shelter from the storm, and productivity actually increased. Writing was the time of the day that the mind was totally absorbed elsewhere, and the thoughts of custody issues and family trauma were banished.
Think about it this way, people often play bridge, or other board games, to relax. And yet, to play bridge, one can has concentrate tremendously during the game. How can such mental work be so relaxing? It is because the game itself is so all encompassing that there is no room in one’s mind for everyday worries. Whether it is bridge, or writing, a laser focus on what you are doing is a great way to take a break from the feeling of pressure that stress brings to us all.
So here are some tricks to learn to escape to your writing.
1) Take 10 deep breaths. This is really a meditation practice. A way to clear your mind and re-center your soul. Remind yourself with each breath that your writing time won’t change anything in your life, or the world around you. Remind yourself as you exhale each breathe, your stress is not helping change the world, just decreasing the quality of this moment of your life. And that the time you give yourself without the focus on problems is good for your mental health. You will be better able to deal with whatever is causing your stress after a break from it.
2) Decide how long you have to escape. You do not have to find a full day, or even a half a day to clear your schedule to write. If what you have is an hour, go for it. Set a timer so you do not have to watch the clock. If the time you have cleared from your schedule seems intimidating, set a timer for a third of the full time. If you have set aside 3 hours, set the timer for an hour. When that’s over, and you realize that you are doing it, set the timer again.
3) Start with what we call a “vomit” draft of your thoughts and feelings. Just start writing about how you feel about writing, about yourself, your world, whatever. Think of this initial writing, which no one but you will ever see, as a kind of writing diary. What’s going on in your own mind? How do you feel about the project? About yourself as a writer? Be reflective. And then put it in a file of such reflections. Six months or a year from now, reading your own history will teach you about yourself as a writer, maybe even as a person. But right now, you are already writing and so have started without any writer’s block.
4) Now start writing about your project! Ignore the world around you, and focus on your writing
5) When the last timer rings, reward yourself. While this isn’t a finished paper, or a publication, or a major success, it is an accomplishment. You are killing two birds with one stone- escaping from the stress around you into your work, and getting writing done too! Congratulations! Go take a walk, or reward yourself with a ridiculously expensive latte, or some extra time with a friend.
6) Hopefully you can better face the challenges you are facing, whether they are personal, or political, after a break from them.
7) And do it all over again tomorrow, or the next day….
April 26, 2024
We all experience trying times in our lives. Sometimes the personal becomes the painful. Perhaps elderly parents begin having trouble living independently. Or a child is being bullied at school. Sometimes the political becomes personal, and painful. We worry about the immigration status of loved ones, or we fear the consequences of federal interference and budget cuts into our universities’ autonomy, and on our own free speech.
Whatever the reason, there are times in all our lives that are simply hard. Very hard. If we think of writing as one more obligation, our writing becomes a burden. If writing becomes a burden, we avoid it. While that might be a reasonable choice, this often ends up hurting ourselves even more. For many of us, writing is part of how we are evaluated, and if we avoid it, we hurt our chances of promotion, raises or even keeping our jobs. But for others, even when we are secure from negative evaluations, we care about having a voice and making a contribution. And while avoiding writing in the short term may feel liberating, in the long run, we feel badly about having our ideas out in the world.
We have another idea, another option.
Think about your writing as an escape from the rest of your life. A quiet time to think, to focus and to blank out the noise, the pain, the conflict. In our own lives, we have learned to escape to our writing, rather than avoid our writing. When one of us was going thru a painful divorce, writing became the shelter from the storm, and productivity actually increased. Writing was the time of the day that the mind was totally absorbed elsewhere, and the thoughts of custody issues and family trauma were banished.
Think about it this way, people often play bridge, or other board games, to relax. And yet, to play bridge, one can has concentrate tremendously during the game. How can such mental work be so relaxing? It is because the game itself is so all encompassing that there is no room in one’s mind for everyday worries. Whether it is bridge, or writing, a laser focus on what you are doing is a great way to take a break from the feeling of pressure that stress brings to us all.
So here are some tricks to learn to escape to your writing.
1) Take 10 deep breaths. This is really a meditation practice. A way to clear your mind and re-center your soul. Remind yourself with each breath that your writing time won’t change anything in your life, or the world around you. Remind yourself as you exhale each breathe, your stress is not helping change the world, just decreasing the quality of this moment of your life. And that the time you give yourself without the focus on problems is good for your mental health. You will be better able to deal with whatever is causing your stress after a break from it.
2) Decide how long you have to escape. You do not have to find a full day, or even a half a day to clear your schedule to write. If what you have is an hour, go for it. Set a timer so you do not have to watch the clock. If the time you have cleared from your schedule seems intimidating, set a timer for a third of the full time. If you have set aside 3 hours, set the timer for an hour. When that’s over, and you realize that you are doing it, set the timer again.
3) Start with what we call a “vomit” draft of your thoughts and feelings. Just start writing about how you feel about writing, about yourself, your world, whatever. Think of this initial writing, which no one but you will ever see, as a kind of writing diary. What’s going on in your own mind? How do you feel about the project? About yourself as a writer? Be reflective. And then put it in a file of such reflections. Six months or a year from now, reading your own history will teach you about yourself as a writer, maybe even as a person. But right now, you are already writing and so have started without any writer’s block.
4) Now start writing about your project! Ignore the world around you, and focus on your writing
5) When the last timer rings, reward yourself. While this isn’t a finished paper, or a publication, or a major success, it is an accomplishment. You are killing two birds with one stone- escaping from the stress around you into your work, and getting writing done too! Congratulations! Go take a walk, or reward yourself with a ridiculously expensive latte, or some extra time with a friend.
6) Hopefully you can better face the challenges you are facing, whether they are personal, or political, after a break from them.
7) And do it all over again tomorrow, or the next day….
Writing Through The Chaos
February 17, 2025
Unpredictable and monumental changes surround us in this current social and political climate. As those inhabiting higher education, we are deeply affected as teachers, writers, and researchers. Yet, we cannot let the chaos surrounding us rob us of our ability to live the lives we choose, to do the work we care about, and to have joy in our personal and professional lives.
Academic work, in all its iterations, remains incredibly important. Effective social policy relies on good science and smart analysis.
But how to concentrate at this moment in history? If you’re anything like us, it is not easy. Here are some tips that may help.
1) Self-care remains important. If you don’t get a good night’s sleep, you can’t get your work done. If you don’t stay healthy, you aren’t helpful to anyone else. Take care of yourself!
2) Remind yourself WHY what you write about matters, even now. Perhaps now more than ever. If it doesn’t, spend your time doing something that does.
3) Create a schedule. It doesn’t need to be complicated or even detailed. It can be what days per week you do your research and writing, and what hours during those days. And do it. Turn off the internet, stop doom scrolling, and move your project forward.
4) Find two or three other writers who are trying to stay the course during these troubled times, and have coffee together weekly, in person if possible, on line if not. Hold each other accountable. Tell each other what you will accomplish before the next meeting. The goal here is to not be beaten down. Support one another. Remind one another why your writing matters!
5) Remember that moving your own life forward is good for your mental health, not just your career.
6) Don’t only work. If you have strong values as a citizen, make time to do what you need to do to be involved and help your community. The world needs research, writing, and good science! These make a difference for inhabiting a robust democratic society.
7) Stay strong, and hug your loved ones.
February 17, 2025
Unpredictable and monumental changes surround us in this current social and political climate. As those inhabiting higher education, we are deeply affected as teachers, writers, and researchers. Yet, we cannot let the chaos surrounding us rob us of our ability to live the lives we choose, to do the work we care about, and to have joy in our personal and professional lives.
Academic work, in all its iterations, remains incredibly important. Effective social policy relies on good science and smart analysis.
But how to concentrate at this moment in history? If you’re anything like us, it is not easy. Here are some tips that may help.
1) Self-care remains important. If you don’t get a good night’s sleep, you can’t get your work done. If you don’t stay healthy, you aren’t helpful to anyone else. Take care of yourself!
2) Remind yourself WHY what you write about matters, even now. Perhaps now more than ever. If it doesn’t, spend your time doing something that does.
3) Create a schedule. It doesn’t need to be complicated or even detailed. It can be what days per week you do your research and writing, and what hours during those days. And do it. Turn off the internet, stop doom scrolling, and move your project forward.
4) Find two or three other writers who are trying to stay the course during these troubled times, and have coffee together weekly, in person if possible, on line if not. Hold each other accountable. Tell each other what you will accomplish before the next meeting. The goal here is to not be beaten down. Support one another. Remind one another why your writing matters!
5) Remember that moving your own life forward is good for your mental health, not just your career.
6) Don’t only work. If you have strong values as a citizen, make time to do what you need to do to be involved and help your community. The world needs research, writing, and good science! These make a difference for inhabiting a robust democratic society.
7) Stay strong, and hug your loved ones.
New Year’s Resolutions for the Productive Scholar
January 5, 2025
The first resolution must be to own the title that you are indeed a productive scholar. Productivity is not about how many words you write a day, a week, or a month. It is not about the number of lines on your vita. Scholarship is bigger and more meaningful than that. A scholar both creates and disseminates knowledge. If your students are learning, you are a productive scholar. If you are engaging in work that will create knowledge, you are being productive.
And yet, those around you measure productivity by writing and being published. If you are a graduate student, productivity means moving your thesis forward, or a dissertation chapter sent to your advisor. If you are an Assistant Professor, productivity means doing enough of whatever will get you tenured, to reach that goal. If you are an Associate Professor, you may be wondering what productivity means to you, now that your livelihood doesn’t directly depend on relentless and external expectations. With the freedom of tenure, you’re given the chance to reflect on what you really want to produce. And for senior faculty, productivity is still something worthy of consideration for what it means to you and the trajectory of your life and career.
But now, during these first moments of the dawn of a new semester, it’s time to be reflective. Who are you writing for? And why do you want to do it? Too often we approach things on autopilot, and since writing is part of our job as academics, we simply plow on forward. Or try to. But writing isn’t exactly the same as other work. To do it well, you need to care about what you write, and to whom you hope to communicate and why.
We challenge you, now, before you sit down and write, to take a moment, and make a New Year’s Resolution. Take some time to reflect on WHY you write, and resolve to focus on that reason. Take time to reflect on for WHOM you write, and resolve to focus your attention on that audience. Take time to reflect on why your topic is important, and resolve to focus on your central important message.
Let’s make 2025 the year we resolve to write to be our best selves, and not to simply satisfy others’ requirements. When you satisfy yourself first, others will likely be even more appreciative of your product.make a plan!
January 5, 2025
The first resolution must be to own the title that you are indeed a productive scholar. Productivity is not about how many words you write a day, a week, or a month. It is not about the number of lines on your vita. Scholarship is bigger and more meaningful than that. A scholar both creates and disseminates knowledge. If your students are learning, you are a productive scholar. If you are engaging in work that will create knowledge, you are being productive.
And yet, those around you measure productivity by writing and being published. If you are a graduate student, productivity means moving your thesis forward, or a dissertation chapter sent to your advisor. If you are an Assistant Professor, productivity means doing enough of whatever will get you tenured, to reach that goal. If you are an Associate Professor, you may be wondering what productivity means to you, now that your livelihood doesn’t directly depend on relentless and external expectations. With the freedom of tenure, you’re given the chance to reflect on what you really want to produce. And for senior faculty, productivity is still something worthy of consideration for what it means to you and the trajectory of your life and career.
But now, during these first moments of the dawn of a new semester, it’s time to be reflective. Who are you writing for? And why do you want to do it? Too often we approach things on autopilot, and since writing is part of our job as academics, we simply plow on forward. Or try to. But writing isn’t exactly the same as other work. To do it well, you need to care about what you write, and to whom you hope to communicate and why.
We challenge you, now, before you sit down and write, to take a moment, and make a New Year’s Resolution. Take some time to reflect on WHY you write, and resolve to focus on that reason. Take time to reflect on for WHOM you write, and resolve to focus your attention on that audience. Take time to reflect on why your topic is important, and resolve to focus on your central important message.
Let’s make 2025 the year we resolve to write to be our best selves, and not to simply satisfy others’ requirements. When you satisfy yourself first, others will likely be even more appreciative of your product.make a plan!
Writing Tips For Bidding The Semester Adieu: MAKE A PLAN!
November 27, 2024
We have heard from so many students and academics recently that they are exhausted. We are all citizens as well and the election season has been an emotional roller coaster. So if you are overwhelmed just now, please know you’re in good company.
Our hypothesis is that many of us are still recovering from what has been a very rough few years. The pandemic lockdowns are now a fading memory, but the disruption to our lives was, and still is, real. And yet, in this overly competitive individualist world we live in, it is easy to forget that trauma can linger, rob us of the ability to unwind, rest and rejuvenate. And the political season was just icing on this cake. Self-care is critical, as corny as that sounds. Remember that your moral worth is not measured by your productivity! So start planning something for the break. Maybe it is a the time for a staycation, or an unplanned camping trip, or if you are unbelievably lucky, a visit to a friend who lives in a beautiful place.
At this point in the semester, there are two kinds of academics, including both graduate students and faculty. There are those who are racing eagerly to finish all the writing they intended to do over the fall, and those that are shocked to see the semester nearly behind them, feeling drained and disappointed in themselves for not getting enough accomplished during the semester.
Our advice for the break: choose self-care. For some that means writing intensively because you enjoy doing so, or at least will enjoy having done so, once the winter semester begins. For others, that means a real vacation without email or working on revisions, or guilt for not doing so. Just enjoying your family for the holidays. Take the at least two weeks before the semester begins to do whatever gives you joy. Every class is better with a joyful professor at the helm. Every paper is better written with a rested
author choosing the words.
But everyone needs a plan. There is no sense going into the next semester, just hoping you will find time to write. Without a plan, we can guarantee you that there will be no time that appears magically waiting to be filled with your writing. Without a plan and a writing practice, you won’t get much at all done.
So how to make a plan? The first thing to do is honor yourself. Make a conscious choice about how to use your time. Would you prefer to take a somewhat slower path in your career and spend more time with your children while they are young? Do it! No guilt or explanation required. There is nothing particularly moral to prioritizing career growth over your relationships. Still, for many tenure track academics, writing is a requirement to keep the job and is non-negotiable. But exactly how much you should write, and where you should publish is entirely context specific. In many teaching intensive colleges, two articles before tenure and a few book reviews might be sufficient. In other settings, a book and a few articles are required for promotion and tenure. At other institutions, you need to write a dozen articles.
Step 1: Figure out what you need to do in your setting. Only then can you write a plan. What is your goal for your next promotion, and what would it take to get there? Talk to your mentors. And if you don’t have any, find some (another blog will focus on how to do that!). Map out your goals for your next promotion (to associate with tenure, or to full) and then you will know what you need to do this academic year.
Step 2: Reflect on what you want to write. It may be the same as what you identified you need to do for your job. If so, you’re all set. But for many of us, there is other writing we want to do, even if it isn’t what we are required to do. For example, for both of us, writing for the public is also a priority. It isn’t required for either of our academic positions but we are committed to making a difference beyond the academy, so we do it still. For some academics, writing a memoir might be a goal. One of us has written an award-winning memoir, although not at all as part of her academic responsibilities.
Step 3: Prioritize whatever is on your list from Steps 1 and 2, and make an ordered list of what you want to accomplish for the fall semester.
Step 4: Carve out some time and block off your calendar. But how? There is no trick here, you just have to pay yourself first. Treat those blocked out hours as sacred. You are not available for meetings, and you will not let teaching preparations spill over into them. Of course, this is much easier said than done. Figure out what other demands on your time are non-negotiable. In some colleges, you must be available for several committees every semester; at others, that’s more negotiable. Some of us meet weekly with students, and some rarely have students visit their office hours. Norms vary tremendously. Some writing coaches insist you must write every day. But we think that is unrealistic. Who has energy to write once you have taught three courses or even prepped two new ones? What you need to do is figure out how many hours per week it will take you to meet your goals, and plan accordingly. Be realistic. No one writes a chapter for an edited volume in four hours!
Step 5: Re-assess your pedagogy. Teaching matters! We think it is our moral responsibility to provide the best education possible for our students, and we know you believe that as well. But the most time intensive is not necessarily the best. Do you write comments on papers that are never picked up or comment extensively on papers submitted online where it is clear that many students are not attending to these remarks? Do you really need to change the readings every semester? Can you assign homework and tests that are quickly graded? We find that many academics, especially relatively new ones, over-prepare for their classes, and that can make protecting writing time very difficult.
Step 6: Adopt a wide, deep, and broad definition of what counts as writing. Do you have to finish reading another article to be able to write that literature review? That kind of targeted reading counts as part of the writing process. Does a reviewer want you to re-run some analyses with a new control variable for R&R? That counts as writing. Have you put placeholders in your article, because you don’t remember the exact citation? Searching for it counts as writing. Sometimes we are emotionally or psychologically worn out, but if we define writing so broadly, there is always a task we can conquer in our blocked off time, even if only using Google Scholar.
Step 7: Celebrate every victory! Did you finally submit that paper? Go out to dinner to celebrate. Did you begin that new chapter that has been intimidating you? Why not celebrate by taking a walk when
your writing time is over?
So here’s to hoping you enjoy your break and while doing so, take the time to make a plan!
November 27, 2024
We have heard from so many students and academics recently that they are exhausted. We are all citizens as well and the election season has been an emotional roller coaster. So if you are overwhelmed just now, please know you’re in good company.
Our hypothesis is that many of us are still recovering from what has been a very rough few years. The pandemic lockdowns are now a fading memory, but the disruption to our lives was, and still is, real. And yet, in this overly competitive individualist world we live in, it is easy to forget that trauma can linger, rob us of the ability to unwind, rest and rejuvenate. And the political season was just icing on this cake. Self-care is critical, as corny as that sounds. Remember that your moral worth is not measured by your productivity! So start planning something for the break. Maybe it is a the time for a staycation, or an unplanned camping trip, or if you are unbelievably lucky, a visit to a friend who lives in a beautiful place.
At this point in the semester, there are two kinds of academics, including both graduate students and faculty. There are those who are racing eagerly to finish all the writing they intended to do over the fall, and those that are shocked to see the semester nearly behind them, feeling drained and disappointed in themselves for not getting enough accomplished during the semester.
Our advice for the break: choose self-care. For some that means writing intensively because you enjoy doing so, or at least will enjoy having done so, once the winter semester begins. For others, that means a real vacation without email or working on revisions, or guilt for not doing so. Just enjoying your family for the holidays. Take the at least two weeks before the semester begins to do whatever gives you joy. Every class is better with a joyful professor at the helm. Every paper is better written with a rested
author choosing the words.
But everyone needs a plan. There is no sense going into the next semester, just hoping you will find time to write. Without a plan, we can guarantee you that there will be no time that appears magically waiting to be filled with your writing. Without a plan and a writing practice, you won’t get much at all done.
So how to make a plan? The first thing to do is honor yourself. Make a conscious choice about how to use your time. Would you prefer to take a somewhat slower path in your career and spend more time with your children while they are young? Do it! No guilt or explanation required. There is nothing particularly moral to prioritizing career growth over your relationships. Still, for many tenure track academics, writing is a requirement to keep the job and is non-negotiable. But exactly how much you should write, and where you should publish is entirely context specific. In many teaching intensive colleges, two articles before tenure and a few book reviews might be sufficient. In other settings, a book and a few articles are required for promotion and tenure. At other institutions, you need to write a dozen articles.
Step 1: Figure out what you need to do in your setting. Only then can you write a plan. What is your goal for your next promotion, and what would it take to get there? Talk to your mentors. And if you don’t have any, find some (another blog will focus on how to do that!). Map out your goals for your next promotion (to associate with tenure, or to full) and then you will know what you need to do this academic year.
Step 2: Reflect on what you want to write. It may be the same as what you identified you need to do for your job. If so, you’re all set. But for many of us, there is other writing we want to do, even if it isn’t what we are required to do. For example, for both of us, writing for the public is also a priority. It isn’t required for either of our academic positions but we are committed to making a difference beyond the academy, so we do it still. For some academics, writing a memoir might be a goal. One of us has written an award-winning memoir, although not at all as part of her academic responsibilities.
Step 3: Prioritize whatever is on your list from Steps 1 and 2, and make an ordered list of what you want to accomplish for the fall semester.
Step 4: Carve out some time and block off your calendar. But how? There is no trick here, you just have to pay yourself first. Treat those blocked out hours as sacred. You are not available for meetings, and you will not let teaching preparations spill over into them. Of course, this is much easier said than done. Figure out what other demands on your time are non-negotiable. In some colleges, you must be available for several committees every semester; at others, that’s more negotiable. Some of us meet weekly with students, and some rarely have students visit their office hours. Norms vary tremendously. Some writing coaches insist you must write every day. But we think that is unrealistic. Who has energy to write once you have taught three courses or even prepped two new ones? What you need to do is figure out how many hours per week it will take you to meet your goals, and plan accordingly. Be realistic. No one writes a chapter for an edited volume in four hours!
Step 5: Re-assess your pedagogy. Teaching matters! We think it is our moral responsibility to provide the best education possible for our students, and we know you believe that as well. But the most time intensive is not necessarily the best. Do you write comments on papers that are never picked up or comment extensively on papers submitted online where it is clear that many students are not attending to these remarks? Do you really need to change the readings every semester? Can you assign homework and tests that are quickly graded? We find that many academics, especially relatively new ones, over-prepare for their classes, and that can make protecting writing time very difficult.
Step 6: Adopt a wide, deep, and broad definition of what counts as writing. Do you have to finish reading another article to be able to write that literature review? That kind of targeted reading counts as part of the writing process. Does a reviewer want you to re-run some analyses with a new control variable for R&R? That counts as writing. Have you put placeholders in your article, because you don’t remember the exact citation? Searching for it counts as writing. Sometimes we are emotionally or psychologically worn out, but if we define writing so broadly, there is always a task we can conquer in our blocked off time, even if only using Google Scholar.
Step 7: Celebrate every victory! Did you finally submit that paper? Go out to dinner to celebrate. Did you begin that new chapter that has been intimidating you? Why not celebrate by taking a walk when
your writing time is over?
So here’s to hoping you enjoy your break and while doing so, take the time to make a plan!
