3.10 Impersonal writing style
Rationale
When they start university, many students are puzzled about the requirements to write impersonally and think lecturers don’t want to know about their opinions. However academic assignments are all about showing your understandings and ideas about the work you are covering in your course. These ideas must be supported with evidence (usually from your reading) and it is better if they are presented objectively rather than as a subjective opinion. Impersonal language will help you to achieve the objective tone of academic writing.
NOTES:
Some lecturers don’t mind if students use the personal pronoun ‘I’, but it is still important to avoid giving an unsubstantiated opinion - that is an opinion given without evidence to support it.
When writing a reflective journal, it will be necessary to use the pronoun ‘I’ because you have been asked to reflect on and analyse (with reference to your reading) your own experiences. To try and write about these in the third person (that is, impersonally) would sound unauthentic.
One pronoun to avoid in academic writing is ‘you’, as this makes for a conversational and very informal style. Direct questions also fall into this category, and it can be irritating for the reader to be presented with a question they don’t have the opportunity to reply to. Questions can also be seen as ‘padding’ by the marker of an assignment, since the writer has to answer them anyway.
Characteristics
Look at the three passages below and see if you can decide which is academic writing.
1. A baby who won’t stop crying for ages drives anyone to despair. You feed him, you change him, you nurse him, you try to settle him, but the minute you put him down he starts to howl. Why?
2. When a baby cries it can be very troubling for parents, particularly if they don’t know the reason. However crying is an effective distress signal for human babies because they have a prolonged period of dependence on their parents.
3. The compelling sound of an infant’s cry can be regarded as an effective distress signal and appropriate to the human infant’s prolonged dependence on a caregiver. However cries may be alarming to parents, many of whom find it very difficult to listen to their infant’s crying particularly when the reason is not clear.
Paragraphs 1 & 3 Adapted from Eggins, S. (1994)If English is your first language, you will probably instinctively feel that the paragraphs become progressively more formal. The first is so informal it resembles everyday speech, the third seems very formal and ‘academic’ in style, while the second paragraph is somewhere in between.
Don’t worry if this wasn’t immediately clear to you, because examining and analysing the language features of these passages can help you to understand what makes one paragraph formal and impersonal, and another informal, more personal, and subjective rather than objective.
A baby who won’t stop crying for ages drives anyone to despair. You feed him, you change him, you nurse him, you try to settle him, but the minute you put him down he starts to howl. Why?
This passage which could be everyday speech or which could have been written for an article in a non-specialist magazine for parents has the following features:
| Contraction | won’t (instead of will not) |
| The use of personal pronouns | you; he/him which refer to a particular baby |
| The use of a direct question | Why? |
| Strong, emotive vocabulary | for ages, despair, howl |
| Clichés and figures of speech | for ages, drive anyone to despair, the minute ... |
| Short simple clauses + action verbs | you feed him, you change him, etc. |
| Subjective assessment/judgement | drives anyone to despair |
These features personalise the writing, with the use of the personal pronoun ‘you’ involving the reader in the text, and the direct question ‘why? further engaging the reader. Similarly, the baby referred to as ‘him’ is, by inference, yours (the reader’s). The writer makes a subjective assessment of babies’ crying which ‘drives anyone to despair’ (raising the questions: How does the writer know this? From their own experience only?) and uses colourful and emotive terms such as ‘howl’ instead of ‘cry loudly’. Clichés and figures of speech which occur in everyday speech are also evident, such as ‘the minute you put him down’ and ‘drives anyone to despair’.
NOTE: Paragraph 2 will be discussed after an examination of Paragraph 3.
3. The compelling sound of an infant’s cry can be regarded as an effective distress signal and appropriate to the human infant’s prolonged dependence on a caregiver. However cries may be alarming to parents, many of whom find it very difficult to listen to their infant’s crying particularly when the reason is not clear.
This paragraph includes many features which are typical of formal, objective, academic writing. They are as follows:
| Long complex noun groups | ‘The compelling sound of an infant’s cry’; ‘the human infant’s prolonged dependence on a caregiver’ |
| Use of the passive | ‘can be regarded’. This allows the writer to present his/her arguments in an objective and impersonal way by avoiding terms such as ‘I think’ or ‘In my opinion’. |
| Technical/professional vocabulary | ‘the human infant’ (instead of ‘babies’) ‘prolonged dependence on a caregiver’ (instead of ‘need their parents for a long time’) |
| People and phenomena referred to in general, not in particular or personally | ‘an infant’, ‘the human infant’, ‘parents’ ‘cries’ (instead of ‘his cries’) ‘the reason is not clear’ (instead of ‘the baby’s parents don’t know’) |
| Judgments modified by: - use of modal verbs | ‘can be regarded’ (not ‘is an effective distress..’) may be alarming’ (instead of ‘are alarming’) |
| - restrictions on general statements | By saying ‘many of whom’ instead of just ‘who’ the writer avoids implying all parents find it difficult to listen to their infant’s crying |
| Absence of: | |
| - emotive vocabulary, | There are no ‘howls’ or feelings of ‘despair’ in this text. Even ‘alarming’ is modified to ‘may be alarming’. |
| - contractions | ‘is not clear’ (instead of ‘isn’t clear’) |
| - and action verbs/verb groups | There are only four finite verbs (as against eight in the first paragraph). and these are relating (‘is’, ‘may be’) or sensing (thinking) verbs (‘can be regarded’, ‘find’) |
| - personal pronouns ‘I’, ‘we’ ‘our’ | These draw attention to the writer, rather than the ideas the writer wants to present |
| - direct questions | Such questions are called rhetorical questions because the reader cannot respond to them. While they may be suitable for oral presentations, they are not appropriate for written assignments |
By referring to people and phenomena in general terms and moderating statements, the writer achieves an objective and impersonal tone. This is reinforced by the use of complex noun groups and the passive voice which will be discussed in 3.13.
2. When a baby cries it can be very troubling for parents, particularly if they don’t know the reason. However crying is an effective distress signal for human babies because they have a prolonged period of dependence on their parents.
This passage has features of both academic and informal texts. The long, complex noun groups and technical vocabulary (‘an effective distress signal’, ‘prolonged period of dependence’) are typical of texts for a specialist, professional and/or academic audience. However the contraction (don’t) and the use of the active rather than the passive voice are characteristic of informal and spoken language, which is less static and more dynamic. Such a text could be found in lectures and oral presentations in the university context. The dense written style of paragraph 3 is not appropriate for these situations because it is hard to listen to.
Impersonal expressions
There are several useful impersonal expressions that are commonly used in academic writing:
- There is/there are ...
- This essay/paper focuses on/examines/analyses ...
- The evidence suggests ...
- It would appear that/it seems that ...
- The topic for today’s presentation is ...
- It is necessary
By avoiding the personal pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’, and phrases such as ‘in my opinion’, these expressions allow writers to achieve an impersonal style and present their arguments and ideas objectively rather than subjectively.