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    Cohesion and Flow

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    Francesc Oromí Soldevila
    This document discusses synthesizing sources for academic writing. It explains that synthesis goes beyond summarizing individual sources by combining ideas to make an overall point or discuss a concept. Writers should look for similarities, differences, and where sources agree or disagree to organize their paper around key ideas rather than individual sources. Cohesion is important and can be achieved through techniques like repeated words, reference words, transition signals, substitution, and ellipsis to ensure ideas flow together smoothly. Coherence relates to the overall organization of ideas at a macro level.

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    Cohesion and Flow

    Uploaded by

    Francesc Oromí Soldevila
    22 views15 pages
    This document discusses synthesizing sources for academic writing. It explains that synthesis goes beyond summarizing individual sources by combining ideas to make an overall point or discuss a concept. Writers should look for similarities, differences, and where sources agree or disagree to organize their paper around key ideas rather than individual sources. Cohesion is important and can be achieved through techniques like repeated words, reference words, transition signals, substitution, and ellipsis to ensure ideas flow together smoothly. Coherence relates to the overall organization of ideas at a macro level.

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    This document discusses synthesizing sources for academic writing. It explains that synthesis goes beyond summarizing individual sources by combining ideas to make an overall point or discuss a concept. Writers should look for similarities, differences, and where sources agree or disagree to organize their paper around key ideas rather than individual sources. Cohesion is important and can be achieved through techniques like repeated words, reference words, transition signals, substitution, and ellipsis to ensure ideas flow together smoothly. Coherence relates to the overall organization of ideas at a macro level.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pptx, pdf, or txt
    22 views15 pages

    Cohesion and Flow

    Uploaded by

    Francesc Oromí Soldevila
    This document discusses synthesizing sources for academic writing. It explains that synthesis goes beyond summarizing individual sources by combining ideas to make an overall point or discuss a concept. Writers should look for similarities, differences, and where sources agree or disagree to organize their paper around key ideas rather than individual sources. Cohesion is important and can be achieved through techniques like repeated words, reference words, transition signals, substitution, and ellipsis to ensure ideas flow together smoothly. Coherence relates to the overall organization of ideas at a macro level.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pptx, pdf, or txt
    of 15

    SYNTHESIZING YOUR SOURCES

    COHESION AND FLOW

    Dr. Jennifer Ament UAB Advanced Academic Writing


    2022-2023
    GOING BEYOND SUMMARIZING

    • Once you have read and summarized your sources you need to synthesize them
    and show how your research fits into thee bigger picture
    • What does this mean?
    • It means you need to combine them, rather than summarize each one in turn.
    • Put all the ideas together in order to make your point or discuss a concept or theory.

    • Ideas from: https://www.simplypsychology.org/synthesising.html


    HOW DO I START?

    • Look for similarities or commonalities and differences among your sources


    • This is the creative process, get out your colours, bubbles, sticky notes, pile,
    tables, excel ? etc… (summary table, theme and authors).
    • Here you will begin to see where the literature agrees and disagrees, Where
    scholars converge and diverge on your themes.
    • You will then be ready to make your outline/structure how will you group the
    ideas? Which order will you discuss the themes?
    • Organize your paper by ideas, not by sources / authors.
    • Creating sections will help as will writing strong topic sentences that guide
    your paper.
    • Ex:
    • “ Early research on [x] focused heavily on [y]. ”
    • “Several scholars have pointed out the flaws in this approach.”
    • “While recent research has attempted to address the problem, many of these
    studies have methodological flaws that limit their validity.”
    CHECK LIST FOR SYNTHESIS
    Do I introduce the paragraph with a clear, focused topic sentence?

      Do I discuss more than one source in the paragraph?

      Do I mention only the most relevant findings, rather than describing every part of the studies?

      Do I discuss the similarities or differences between the sources, rather than summarizing each source in tu

      Do I put the findings or arguments of the sources in my own words?

      Is the paragraph organized around a single idea?

      Is the paragraph directly relevant to my research question or topic?

      Is there a logical transition from this paragraph to the next one?


    COHESION

    • Cohesion is mainly achieved through


    • Repeated words/ ideas
    • Reference words
    • Transition signals
    • Substitution
    • Ellipsis
    • Shell nouns
    • Thematic development
    • (source: https://www.eapfoundation.com/writing/cohesion/)
    REPEATED WORDS

    • You can and should use key words once you establish their meaning.
    • You might use synonyms of your key words but avoid confusing the reader
    with too many terms for the same thing!
    EXAMPLE

    • Cohesion is an important feature of academic writing. It can help ensure that


    your writing coheres or 'sticks together', which will make it easier for the
    reader to follow the main ideas in your essay or report. You can achieve
    good cohesion by paying attention to five important features. The first of these
    is repeated words. The second key feature is reference words. The third one is
    transition signals. The fourth is substitution. The final important aspect is
    ellipsis.
    REFERENCE WORDS

    • Which, it , this, these


    • This helps join your sentences and paragraphs. However, avoid vagueness and
    losing your reader by using the reference word with a concrete noun.
    • Eg. This phenomenon, these examples, this issue, these xxx.
    EXAMPLE

    • Cohesion is an important feature of academic writing. It can help ensure that


    your writing coheres or 'sticks together', which will make it easier for the
    reader to follow the main ideas in your essay or report. You can achieve good
    cohesion by paying attention to five important features. The first of these is
    repeated words. The second key feature is reference words. The third one is
    transition signals. The fourth is substitution. The final important aspect is
    ellipsis.
    TRANSITION SIGNALS

    • Pragmatic markers, connectors, linkers etc..


    • Make sure you use them to show the relationship between your sentences,
    ideas, paragraphs and sentences.
    • But be careful to use them only when necessary, Not every sentence needs one.
    SUBSTITUTION AND ELLIPIS

    • Substituting words in the text with other words. Similar to reference words, but
    are used for something more recent.
    • Ex. Drinking alcohol before driving is illegal in many countries, since doing
    so can seriously impair one's ability to drive safely.
    • Leaving out words because the meaning is clear from the contex.
    EXAMPLE

    • Cohesion is an important feature of academic writing. It can help ensure that


    your writing coheres or 'sticks together', which will make it easier for the
    reader to follow the main ideas in your essay or report. You can achieve good
    cohesion by paying attention to five important features. The first of these is
    repeated words. The second key feature is reference words. The third one is
    transition signals. The fourth is substitution. The final important aspect is
    ellipsis.
    SHELL NOUNS

    • Abstract nouns that help summarize the meaning of information already


    mentioned or to come.
    • Eg. This change, this class, approach, category, factor, event, feature, issue,
    manner, method, reason, result…. Etc..
    • Often used with these, that, this, etc..
    • Virus transmission can be reduced via frequent washing of hands, use of face
    masks, and isolation of infected individuals. These methods, however, are not
    completely effective and transmission may still occur, especially among health
    workers who have close contact with infected individuals.
    COHESION VS COHERENCE

    • Cohesion relates to the micro level of the text, i.e. the words and sentences and
    how they join together. Coherence, in contrast, relates to the organisation and
    connection of ideas and whether they can be understood by the reader, and as
    such is concerned with the macro level features of a text, such as 
    topic sentences, thesis statement, the summary in the concluding paragraph
    (dealt with in the essay structure section), and other 'bigger' features including
    headings such as those used in reports.

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