Writing & Revision
Write@UNG Series
Dr. Michael Rifenburg
Department of English
CTLL Faculty Fellow for Scholarly Writing
@jmrifenburg
core values
connecting
cultivating
creating
Reminders
positive
P&T focused
writer focused
External v Internal
Writers revise writing.
Writing needs revision.
Self-prompted or reviewer-prompted
but first...
you gotta get words on the screen.
"Revising while you generate text is like drinking decaffeinated coffee in the early morning: noble idea, wrong time. Your first draft should sound like they were hastily translated from Icelandic by a nonnative speaker
. . .
Rejoice in writing your gnarled and impenetrable drafts, just as you rejoice in later stamping out your fuzzy phrases and unwanted words"
--Silva, How to Write A Lot
Internal revision
Who will read it?
What will they read for? Be specific.
Internal Revision
Content and Style
Hard copy
Quite place / blue pen / mark it up.
All paragraphs revolve around main point
My last paragraph really my main point?
Read to hate, read to scratch out
External revision
your work is going to be read anonymously. And critiqued heavily
How do you respond to reader's reports?
Reader's reports
- resist the temptation to fire off an email. You're likely to become defensive, even before you can figure out what the reader is saying. Take at least 24 hours. But don't disappear--a month is too long.
- take notes as you read the report
- take the report seriously.
- No matter what's in the report, don't get angry.
-Germano Getting it Published
A report
...
...
...
...
While revising
Track your changes.
I write them quickly on a separate word document.
After REVISING
Compose a detailed revision memo based on your document
Single-spaced, UNG letter-head.
Fully-justified.
Add your electronic signature.
Be specific.
Send with your revised ms.
My opening paragraph
Please
find a zip folder attached to this email. Inside this folder, I have included
the front matter and text to my revised manuscript The Literate Practices of Big-Time College Sports. I would like thank
you and the two reviewers for the thoughtful and extensive comments. In keeping
with these comments, I have made a number of significant revisions. Chapters
1-3, per Reviewer 1’s feedback, remain the same; I revised chapter
4; I completely rewrote chapter 5. The manuscript now runs roughly 63,000 words.
Revision Memo Example
next
Writing Groups
Wednesday, April 26
Revision
By mrifenburg
