Do’s and Don’t’s for Writing Formal Academic Essays
• Avoid contractions.
• Avoid "I" statements.
– These weaken your argument. Phrases like "I believe," "I think," "The way I see
it," "It seems to me," and so on, all imply that the statement is only your
opinion, as opposed to an arguable point of fact.
• Avoid "telegraphing" the structure of your essay.
– In other words, avoid using phrases like "In this essay," "My thesis is," "My
next example," and so on.
• Avoid long quotations.
– You should quote from a source text when you want to present to your reader
the specific words used by another writer.
• Provide context.
– Assume your reader has not read the text, or knows very little about the issue
your are discussing. “Get the reader up to speed.”
• Provide specific, credible evidence from the text to support your claims.
• Explain the significance of your evidence, as it relates to your thesis.
– Don’t assume the reader sees the evidence and the connection to the thesis
the same way you see it.
• Cite your evidence in MLA format.