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The author considers the significance of teaching post-graduate students the module of written scientific communication to avoid problems facing them in future publishing career. The notion ‘academic writing’ is interpreted as the key to realizing national differences in intercultural written interaction. The author highlights the inevitable interference of the English scientific language and the native language of a researcher, the international part of a modern academic paper being English as lingua franca. Typology of cultures helps to explain possible misunderstanding in reading academic papers. Linguistico-culturological analysis of several scientific articles written in English by investigators from various countries allows the author to conclude that any researcher writes in English under unconscious domination of his national features.

The round table discussion of the journal Vysshee obrazovanie v Rossii (Higher Education in Russia) took place on March 14, 2017 within the framework of Humanities Readings at Russian State University for the Humanities. The key theme - the model of the modern research journal in various aspects: philological (academic writing, IMRaD), philosophical (criteria of scholarly publication), historical and cultural, economical. The participants have touched upon such issues as interrelations between an author and an editor, types of peer review, the epistemological model of editor's activities, assessment of research activities, scientific communication. Special attention was paid to academic writing and suitability of IMRaD format for Humanities papers, scientometrics.

The round table discussion of the journal Vysshee obrazovanie v Rossii (Higher Education in Russia) took place on March 14, 2017 within the framework of Humanities Readings at Russian State University for the Humanities. The key theme - the model of the modern research journal in various aspects: philological (academic writing, IMRaD), philosophical (criteria of scholarly publication), historical and cultural, economical. The participants have touched upon such issues as interrelations between an author and an editor, types of peer review, the epistemological model of editor's activities, assessment of research activities, scientific communication. Special attention was paid to academic writing and suitability of IMRaD format for Humanities papers, scientometrics.

The author considers the ways to prevent errors and mistakes in English language abstracts of papers written in Russian by university faculty, post+graduate students and students earning their Master’s degree in engineering. Common errors have been identified and systematized. The articleprovides examples of common lexical and grammar errors and errors of style and their presumable roots. The process of training includes ‘writing for training’ and ‘writing for communication’ stages. During the second one the studentsread and analyze some samples of abstracts, write their own drafts and discuss them inclass (peer+to+peer review). As a result the quality of abstracts has improved and the number of errors and mistakes has decreased significantly.

The requirement to submit and publish scientific articles in indexed journals has become a part and parcel of life in academia. Although Russian scientists are becoming more visible in the world of science due to their research achievements, they are not sufficiently recognised by a wide audience for several reasons. In this study, we scrutinize the published papers of Russian researchers working in the domains of social sciences and humanities. We aim at investigating the logic and organisation of such publications to see how the articles correspond to the meta-requirements established by the international academia. To achieve the goal we have analysed the logic and organisation of 55 published articles from the Russian scientometric database e-Library. The results emphasise that most Russian researchers do not follow the IMRaD format accepted by the majority of international journals. As a result, such articles have minimal chances to be accepted by international editors. This is not surprising, as unclear structure means lack of readability and, consequently, loss of readers accustomed to a certain article format. This situation causes concerns because Russian scientists do have a lot to say to the world of science.

The paper discusses the preliminary results of teaching academic writing to scientific and academic staff at South Ural State University (national research university) within the framework of advanced training courses. The 36 and 72-hour training programs were developed by the academic and methodological department of the Office of Academic Writing. The Office was opened at the university in 2016 in order to improve the academic literacy of the university’s academic staff, develop professional communication skills in English, and assist authors who aspire to get their papers published in top rated scientific journals indexed in the scientific citation databases Scopus and Web of Science. Upon completion of these programs, authors of scientific papers gain knowledge about the basics of academic writing, the structure of a scientific paper, the English scientific style and its lexical and grammatical features, as well as editing a paper, working with scientific citation databases, and elaborating a publishing strategy. We conducted a study from October 2016 to December 2018 and calculated data on the attendees’ affiliation (an institute or higher school), the contingent (position), and the importance of the offered training programs (the number of attendees in each course). The obtained data indicates that representatives of social-humanitarian and technical fields show a special interest in the courses. The courses of academic writing are most popular among associate professors who have experience in publishing papers in Russian. Authors are especially interested in intensive practice-oriented programs. Upon completion of the courses and with the support of the Office of Academic Writing, attendees prepared scientific texts in English and submitted them to top rated journals and conference proceedings. The educational activity of the Office of Academic Writing can be developed through elaboration and implementation of new advanced training programs, including the distance ones. Their effectiveness will be evaluated by an increase in the publication activity of the university’s employees.

The article focuses on describing the structure and functional characteristics ofthe Academic Writing Office of South Ural State University (National Research University), member of the project 5-100, which provides for increasing competitive ability of Russian universities in the global research and education market. The Office aims to improve the academicians and postgraduate students' writing skills in English and to support those authors wishing to publish their papers in high-ranking scientific journals indexed in scientometric databases Scopus and Web of Science. The implementation of the goals of Academic Writing Office of South Ural State University (SUSU) is assured by the interaction of its administrative, consulting, translating and educational blocks supported by Office official site.

Academic writing is considered to be the most challenging and difficult skill in terms of English as a Second Language. This study critically explores the obstacles in academic writing faced by students at Tomsk Polytechnic University, Russia. To investigate, a comprehensive questionnaire has been floated among professional teachers to get their expert opinions (about students’ obstacles in writing) in order to identify some problems and form effective remedial strategies eventually. This paper focuses on the two significant aspects of academic writing, namely language skills (LS) (Grammar etc.) and writing skills (WS) (writing itself as a skill). Equally relevant to the issue are organization, coherence, and connectivity. The authors claim that Russian learners have poor learning background in writing skills due to the lack of balanced syllabus and teaching technologies. Aside from this, only determining problems is not sufficient to take students out of writing phobia. Furthermore, it is necessary to point out the fact that poor reading skills also lead to this kind of disappointment. Most of Russian learners do not know how to initiate their composition (essays). This paper will prove to be an academic contribution to improve the writing skills among ESL/EFL Russian learners in general and students of Tomsk Polytechnic University in particular. The presented analysis should also be of interest to researchers in other countries (universities) in which the field of academic writing is emerging.

This paper reveals the importance of overcoming writer’s block for university researchers as second language writers. The idea and materials for the paper come from the experience of the Center for Academic Writing “Impulse” at the University of Tyumen, Russia. The target audience of the Center is the university faculty and researchers who have a lack of time to immerse in the writing process, rather they mainly want to obtain an immediate tangible result. However, our research shows that they often get frustrated by their inability to complete their writing piece because they get stuck at different stages of the writing process. For example, some people find it difficult to finish their papers, or others fade away in the middle, but the main problem is to start writing. Thus, they face writer’s block which can be referred to moderate blockage. To overcome the block, we offer the researchers a variety of activities during courses and special projects. This paper describes two strategies: classroom intervention including mainly pre-writing activities, such as freewriting, looping, word association, aimed to overcome the fear of a white page, and individualized intervention based on the project entitled “Drop in & Reboot your Writing”. The project comprised 10-20 weekly individual meetings lasting for 30 minutes and aiming at dealing with a particular writing issue. The individual approach to each participant led to a better understanding of the causes of writer’s block and finding the cures. These strategies aim to develop researchers’ positive attitude to writing, to enable them to boost their awareness of the writing process in receiving the desired results, and build confidence as second language writers.

The paper provides information to support its title (“Skeptic’s comment…”). The author shares his attitudes towards a new research area of academic writing (AW) and a system of teaching AW. The paper is presented in a form of a dialog between the author and the advocates of AW. In the author’s opinion, these advocates do not answer a number of questions to be asked for including their ideas into the scope of pedagogical knowledge. While admitting the value of analyzing foreign publications on AW, interpreting them and creating a teaching and learning system tailored for our national practice, the author states that the arguments to recognize AW as an independent academic discipline or a new research area are not sufficient. The author supports this idea by a series of speculations expanded in the paper sections to follow. They include doubts about the completeness of methodological arguments (considering the contemporary state of matter in epistemology, attitude towards new type rationality, unique features of cognition in science and humanities, rationale for the relevance of social constructivism for AW, and etc.), and about the insufficient attention towards the contemporary pedagogical methodology. The status of AW is discussed as if sidestepping the national achievements in investigating the language, speech, text (academic), discourse, linguistic and rhetoric conventions, and etc. The skepticism regarding the AW system can also be explained by the fact that the author does not agree with a number of statements denying the figural and publicistic images in an academic style, personal characteristics, opinions, emotional experiences and beliefs; negating the talent, literature expertise and imitation as assistants for academic writing; inferring the impossibility of learning academic writing independently. The author is confused by the insufficient attention towards the investigations on eloquence carried out in the 1980s in our native country (e.g. by S.S. Averintsev, A.K. Avelichev, and etc.); it is clear that the expertise in foreign research does not negate the knowledge about the research in our native country. Through critically analyzing the components of the AW system, the author concludes that AW is to be considered as one of possible technological solutions for the problem of creating a scholarly proper academic text.

Debates over academic writing as a new discipline, or rather trend, started in the jour­nal seven years ago and initially involved academics from different fields. However, when the focus shifted towards teaching writing in English, the discussion narrowed and lost its urge. The analysis of the first papers shows that the importance of developing academic writing skills is understood by the Russian academic community, but most academics have limited awareness of academic writing as a discipline and field of research aimed at solving major problems in education and science. The paper focuses on the theoretical and methodological issues of academic writing and gives a brief overview of how it emerged into a well-developed discipline in Western, mostly US, universities. To achieve the goal of introducing academic writing into the higher education, Russian academics need to collaborate and get involved into multilateral action and interdisciplinary research. The paper concludes that disciplinary divides can be overcome through developing theoretical and conceptual issues of academic writing as rhetoric and composition studies.

Abstract. The paper presents the experience in forming academic writing skills within the minor program “Business English Translator” at Kazan National Research Technological University. The author considers the training elements of academic writing skills, such as grammar, morphology, and stylistics, as well as their practical application for preparing and publishing scientific papers in foreign journals.

Written to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the rubric “Academic Writing and Research Competences” established by the journal’s late editor-in-chief Mikhail Sapunov, the paper focuses on the origins of academic writing and traces its development in terms of rhetoric. The five stages of classical rhetoric are interpreted as five key components of academic writing: research, logic, culture, knowledge, and language. This approach helps visualize academic writing as a wholesome model composed of cognitive and linguistic elements, describe the impact of this model on the rhetorical and publishing conventions of the global academic discourse, and define the problems in knowledge construction as deviations from the model’s unity in various sociocultural contexts. The study concludes that the low quality of an academic text may result from either losing the predominance of the first two stages of rhetoric (invention and arrangement) or of the other three (style, memory, and delivery). The former signifies an ideological pressure on researchers to substitute their own rhetoric with quotes from canonized sources, whereas the latter provokes them to disregard language and style as inferior to research, because of which texts diminish in clarity. In either case, communication lacks in efficiency. The study of academic writing in the historical perspective contributes to better understanding of the latest trends in its development and elicits the problems which impede the quality of Russian scholarly and academic texts.

Retaining its unifying function in creating academic texts, academic writing is undergoing various changes brought about by digitisation. The key trends are related to three aspects of academic writing: formal bibliometrics, principles of collaboration, and interaction with the readers. The first trend concerns the growing importance of identifiers, citation standards, key words and other metadata that underlie the creation of data bases allowing universities and scientific centres to take administrative and organizational decisions. Secondly, information technologies for collaborative writing stimulate the shift from individual authorship to the collective one and from thematic collaboration to the functional distribution of authorship. Finally, academic writing has adopted marketing strategies and instruments in communicating scientific knowledge to the audience. Digitisation has caused the emergence of postproduction in academic writing, i.e. applying Internet resources to enhance the reach of one’s academic papers. These trends require a revision of the approach to teaching academic writing and a more profound study of the new phenomena conditioned by the digital era.

Writing academic texts in English introduces certain difficulties associated with translating Russian sentences with pronounced stylistic peculiarities, especially for young researchers who are just starting their publication activity. It seems impossible to study any genre without analysing examples of the discourse, which highlights the use of computational linguistics as it allows automating a lot of language and text processing mechanisms and generates relatively accurate quantitative results. The present study considers the application of AntConc and Coh-Metrix toolkits for analyzing master students’ abstracts to research papers written for international English-language journals or conference proceedings (Learner Corpus) in comparison with international researchers’ abstracts published in high-impact journals (Reference Corpus). The analysis conducted in the above-mentioned software tools revealed the drawbacks and strengths of master students’ texts, allowed characterizing them on the words, sentence and discourse levels, as well as outlined the potentials of their use in teaching academic writing skills.

Classical elements permeate global academic discourse and scientific terminology. Understanding the meanings and functioning of these elements can help multilingual scholars cope with disciplinary literature and write for publication and is therefore essential in teaching English for academic and specific purposes. However, few manuals on academic vocabulary explore word-formation in-depth or use it as a tool to alleviate learning through analysis and synthesis rather than memorizing words. Russian, as many other European languages, is a synthetic language in which affixation is as productive as in Latin. The paper presents a well-designed and approbated course of academic vocabulary for social scientists, analyses relationships between linguistic studies and teaching academic vocabulary, and discusses the ways of increasing the effectiveness and clarity of teaching by more systematic study of classical elements, enhancing students’ analytical skills through innovative methodology and using the advantages of similarities between Russian and Latin word-formation. Comparative analysis demonstrates that the key features of the course, such as interactive computer-based visual materials and various analytical tasks involving students’ background knowledge and academic awareness, help students not only decipher unknown words, but also produce neologisms, which is essential in coping with new terminology. Published as a book, Academic Vocabulary for Social Sciences is now available for teachers, students and researchers as a resource for study and self-study. The effectiveness of the approach demonstrates that it can be used as a model to design similar specific vocabulary courses for students of other synthetic languages.

The article deals with the analysis of academic writing from the viewpoint of activity- oriented and competency-based approaches in present-day linguistic didactics, and with regard to the peculiarity of strategic behaviour concerning mental and speech activity. The author looks at academic writing as a complex type of activity, on the one hand, and the product of this activity, on the other hand. One of the examples of academic writing is a scientific article which is under consideration in the paper. The author describes the principles of working out a competency-based model of a scientific article primarily intended for the teacher and uses it as the basis for working out a step-by-step instruction for writing an article mainly aimed at the student. The model and the instruction can serve as a tool for organizing purposeful training in higher educational institutions and for implementing self-controlled academic activity.

Abstract. Russian universities are now involved into a severe competition for university rankings with a special focus on academics publishing in international journals. The directive demand from the government meets the understandable response in terms of quantification, which does not reflect the quality of published research, nor does it foster pursuit for such quality. Establishing writing centers in leading universities seems to help solve the problem on the qualitative basis. However, to implement the policy aimed at raising the quality of research papers, Russia needs more than local, optional institutions or even a volunteer association of writing centers, such as the newly established Russian Consortium. To be taken seriously by governmental bodies and the academic community, academic writing ought to be introduced as a discipline taught at all levels of education. The concept of an interuniversity writing center, based on the financial support from universities is considered to be the most appropriate decision at the initial stage of the development of academic writing, for it will unite Russian experts and enable them to work openly and independently for the whole nation, and not only for a particular institution.

The article describes one of the most challenging aspects of academic writing, or rhetoric and composition, the focus. Special attention is paid to narrowing down the topic of an academic text, formulating a clear thesis statement and the development of the main idea throughout the text. An academic text is viewed as an intellectual procedure, which enables the writer to construct new knowledge and successfully communicate it to the academic community. The paper is aimed at helping Russian students and researchers better understand the requirements of Western universities and international academic journals to theses and publications. Recommendations are based on the WAC approach, although the examples are drawn mainly from social sciences and humanities.

The paper describes linguistic approach to the development of academic writing in the world. Historical analysis is carried out for changes of languages used for academic writing, their interrelation and succession. German language is selected to study modern issues of scientific writing and excessive use of English words. Different types of linguistic adoptions are discussed, provided examples reveal their influence on grammar, lexicology and punctuation of academic German language.

The author gives an overview of the first few academic writing centers in Russian universities and compares their missions and functions in terms of target audience and outcomes for the universities. She concludes that writing centers in Russia will currently develop with the aim of providing help for faculty in publishing their papers in international academic journals rather than helping students with their academic writing. Students' writing should remain the responsibility of university language programs, which need considerable improvement and involve academic writing methodology. The future of writing centers is viewed as a tool in overcoming disciplinary and institutional borders and leading to the internationalization of Russian higher education. The author recommends that both academic writing and writing for publication should be delivered in both English and Russian, thus covering a much wider audience of students and faculty.

Since 2016, the rapid spread of writing centers in Russian universities tends to become a trend. In a few months, their number increased from three to eleven, and the process might soon involve most federal and research universities. Most centers follow the US model of a writing center with its hand-off approach to tutoring. Experts from the USA also show increased interest in the process, providing help in consulting future directors. However attractive the adoption of a ready-to-use and efficient model may seem, it is limited by the social, cultural and academic differences between the USA and RF. These differences involve the interests of many agents, who may oppose innovation due to understandable reasons. If this becomes the case, establishing academic writing in the Russian system of education may fail with fewer opportunities to recover in the future. The paper presents the comparative analysis of the US model's efficiency in Russia and the USA based on the seven sets of parameters introduced by Russian economist Oleg Sukharev. The analysis is a part of research carried out by the author for the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration.