Introduction.  Many students enter the MLIS program with undergraduate or graduate backgrounds that include a strong orientation to research and writing.  Other students perhaps have had different experiences or have been out of school for a considerable period of time.  Whatever is the case, students will be expected to do considerable research and many writing projects as part of their time in the School.  My intent here is to provide some recommendations for some basic tools and guides that might help them in their assignments here.  These are personal recommendations, and students should be prepared to follow recommendations from other faculty for particular courses.  Since the library, archives, and information professions publish many different kinds of journals, practice manuals, and research monographs, there are a variety of style manuals and other basic research and writing tools that are appropriate for MLIS students.

What I have described below are print publications.  Students may find a variety of research and writing tools online, but my personal preference is for a bookshelf of printed references.  While I may go into the online version of the Oxford English Dictionary to investigate a word’s meaning and origins, mostly I find it is more convenient to pull off a bound volume and use its index or table of contents to answer a question, check out a grammatical rule, or confirm my suspicion about how to cite a source.  Students need to discover, and perhaps some may have already in a previous education program or workplace, what works best for them to prepare written assignments in this program.  Faculty members are here to advise them, and students should take advantage of their availability to answer questions about appropriate research and writing tools.  What students learn here will be useful for them in their subsequent professional careers.

Style Manuals.  Students need to follow specific course requirements for the use of a style manual, and students will find that there is a variety of such manuals used by different faculty members.  Some students also will enter the program having experience with a particular style manual.  Students should plan on acquiring the various manuals recommended to them, since they will find them extremely useful in their future careers, whether for writing internal reports or preparing public documents.  The fifteenth edition of the Chicago Manual of Style (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003) continues a tradition dating back to 1906, and this style manual is one of the most frequently recommended.  Students will find in it advice about how to cite books, articles, newsletters, newspapers, Web sites and other electronic sources, grey literature, government documents, and a host of other sources.  There is also advice in using numbers and mathematical formulas, following copyright restrictions, writing with clarity, and grammar and usage.  Students won’t make a mistake in acquiring a copy of this manual. 

The University of Chicago is probably the leading publisher of advice guides for academic writing.  For example, Jane E. Miller, The Chicago Guide to Writing About Numbers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004) is a basic reference on using statistics in academic essays.  As the author argues, “Writing about numbers is a complex process: it involves finding pertinent numbers, identifying patterns, calculating comparisons, organizing ideas, designing tables or charts, and finally, writing prose. . . .  This book integrates all of these facets into one volume, pointing out how each aspect of the process affects the others. . . “  The book is divided into sections focusing on principles, tools, and “putting it all altogether,” and it is an excellent guide to integrating quantitative material into any aspect of writing.  Or, as another example, Jacques Barzun, Simple & Direct: A Rhetoric for Writers, rev. ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985) provides excellent advice about matters like diction, linking words, tone, meaning, composition, and revising.  Barzun notes that “Rhetoric is the craft of setting down words and marks right; or again: Rhetoric shows you how to put words together so that the reader not simply may but must grasp your meaning.”  Barzun’s title gets to the heart of his message: “The whole world will tell you, if you care to ask, that your words should be simple & direct.”  Such guides can help a student rethink their approach to writing, and since writing is a skill learned by considerable practice, and, as well, lots of failures, any sources helping one re-evaluate his or her approach to writing will be beneficial.  And, other than the full Chicago Manual of Style, students might find Kate Turabian’s A Manual for Writers of Term Papers, Theses, and Dissertations, 6th rev. ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), a shorthand version of the manual, the most useful style reference available to them.

Dictionaries.  Students should have a good dictionary, such as the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000) or the Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster, Inc., 1998).  Students will have access to dictionaries online, but they are just as handy to pull off a shelf close to one’s writing table (and print versions are sometimes easier to use).  Dictionaries are more than dictionaries these days, including abbreviations and symbols, foreign words and phrases, biographical and historical information, atlases, synonyms, advice on usage, word histories, style guides, and other helpful tools.  No matter how advanced a writer a student (or faculty member) might think they are, there always will be an occasion when it will be helpful to have quick access to a dictionary for a last minute check or revision.

Thesaurus.  The student, facing piles of notes (real or virtual) and attempting to craft a coherent essay, will sooner or later face the situation when they need a different word for “book” or something other than “read.”  A thesaurus, coming from the Latin or Greek word for “treasury,” is the needed tool.   Bartlett's Roget's Thesaurus (Boston: Little, Brown, 1996) is as good a thesaurus as one needs, providing ample synonyms grouped by concept and alphabetical, with a detailed index.  Most word processing software packages now include a thesaurus, but these, even while useful, are not as complete as the published versions.  Students will find a thesaurus an oft-used reference.

Grammar.  Brief introductions to good or accurate grammar can be found in dictionaries and other such basic references. The classic volume dedicated to this, one that is so established that it has been parodied, is William Strunk, Jr., E.B. White, and Roger Angell, The Elements of Style, 4th. ed. (New York: Longman, 2000), generally just referred to as “Strunk and White.”  It provides a straightforward examination of English style, emphasizing usage rules and composition principles most often compromised.  Anyone reading this volume comes away with improvements to their writing, and it deserves a prominent place on the personal reference shelf.  It is also compact enough to be carried about in one’s briefcase or purse, for a quick reference or to kill a few minutes waiting to board the airplane; a few minutes with Strunk and White is never a waste of time.

Essay Writing.  Students in the MLIS program will be asked to write a lot of essays, from the research paper to the personal reflection.  There are a lot of interesting aids to those needing to write an essay, but I will mention just two examples (students, coming from a wide variety of backgrounds, will need to find one that is most suitable to their background and experience levels).  Frank L. Cioffi, The Imaginative Argument: A Practical Manifesto for Writers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005) offers a “manifesto for the protection, for the nurturance, of this endangered species” – the “written argument, which logically explains and defends a controversial idea.” Cioffi, who has taught writing at the college level, describes the process of writing essays, identifying and targeting audiences, planning the writing project, developing a thesis for the essay or monograph, being creative in the research paper or essay, and the importance of style.  This is an excellent primer for graduate students because its focus is the “academic argument,” the prevalent form of nonfiction writing at any university. Scott F. Crider, The Office of Assertion: An Art of Rhetoric for the Academic Essay (Wilmington, Del.: ISI Books, 2005) is a text written for the first-year college student, providing useful advice for anyone writing an academic essay.  Crider discusses the rhetorical nature of the essay, the composing of a thesis, the use and citing of evidence, the structure of the essay, and the importance of style.

Writing as Art and Science.  While it appears that there are considerable differences between professional, scholarly, and creative writing, most acknowledge that there are universal principles underlying good writing.  There are lots of interesting analyses of the craft of writing that might assist students to understand the challenges and hard work facing them in writing anything, whether a memorandum or an essay for publication. Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life (New York: Anchor Books, 1994) is the classic, inspirational guide for those thinking of trying writing or who are looking for advice about it.  In a witty and lively fashion, the author discusses all facets of writing, from planning a project to dealing with multiple rejections of finished pieces.  Lamott provides a lot of excellent advice about the practical aspects of writing, including having others read drafts to working with editors and publishers.  Joyce Carol Oates, The Faith of a Writer: Life, Craft, Art (New York: HarperCollins, 2003) provides personal thoughts on the art of writing by one of America’s most prolific and important writers.  Oates discourses on the act of writing, the relationship between reading and writing, life experiences and writing, the nature of writing and receiving criticism, and the forces compelling one to write.  Richard Rhodes, How to Write: Advice and Reflections (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1995) is an excellent peek into the fact that writing fiction and non-fiction is often not as different as one might think.  Rhodes won a number of awards, including the Pulitzer Prize, for his book on the atomic bomb (The Making of the Atom Bomb).  He connects reading with writing, reviews the tools necessary for writing, the use of different voices and styles for different kinds of writing, planning and organizing writing, the nature of editing, finding support for freelance writing, and what other writers have had to say about the nature of writing.

Reading and the Art of Writing.  Jacques Barzun, like many academics and professional writers, reminds us that writing really can’t be taught but that writers must teach themselves.  Nearly everyone who has discoursed on writing indicates that writers develop their talents by being readers.  For students preparing to be information professionals, following such advice certainly means reading deeply and broadly into the professional and scholarly literature supporting library, archives, and information management and sciences.  Learning to write clearly and cogently also means reading good writers and imitating their styles.  Ben Yagoda, The Sound on the Page: Style and Voice in Writing (New York: HarperCollins, 2004), for example, compares writing styles to fingerprints in their distinctiveness. Yagoda provides a volume of advice about developing and mimicking writing styles.  This journalism professor helps in teaching a writer not only the rudiments of style, but he considers how styles need to change and adapt from one’s beginning stages to their more developed and mature writing phases.  Graduate students and scholars need to go through a similar process, learning the styles of their field and the journals they publish in.

Students are advised to identify and read good writers in areas of interest to them, with the idea that their own writing might improve.  For me, some of my favorite writers are the architectural critic and historian Witold Rybzinski, engineer and social commentator Henry Petroski, and the late communications theorist Neil Postman.  While I cannot claim to write as well as any of them, and this essay ought to be evidence enough, I know that assiduously reading them cannot but have helped my own writing style and effectiveness. 

Every writer commenting on their craft usually devotes considerable attention to the influence of reading on their work.  Indeed, there is certainly something close to universal consensus that one cannot be a good writer or scholar if they are not a committed and astute reader.  The range of writing about reading and its connection to scholarship and writing is quite diverse.  There are some interesting compilations of essays by writers on the act and importance of reading.  J. Peder Zane, ed., Remarkable Reads: 34 Writers and Their Adventures in Reading (New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 2004) is a collection of essays where writers describe one book important to their lives and vocation.  

Many writers have written memoirs about and commentaries on their work and any number of these can be consulted by the graduate student or beginning scholar or professional. Fiction and creative writers are generally most useful for comments on style, creativity, the task of writing, working with agents, getting published, and other aspects of the writing life.  A convenient compilation of writers discussing the act of writing and publishing, Marie Arana, ed., The Writing Life: Writers on How They Think and Work: A Collection from the Washington Post Book World (New York: Public Affairs, 2003), featuring the reflections of many prominent writers such as Joyce Carol Oates, James Michener, David McCullough, Michael Korda, Reynolds Price, and Tracy Kidder, is a good place to start for students looking for a writer of their own to follow and emulate.  These essays are arranged thematically, including becoming a writer, the raw material that goes into writing, the act of writing (“hunkering down”), translating and reuse of old material, researching and writing nonfiction, and evaluating finished, published work. There are also many other useful compilations of essays on writing, offering in a single volume a multiplicity of views on the craft.  Kevin Smokler, ed., Bookmark Now: Writing in Unreaderly Times (New York: Basic Books, 2005), collects a group who have become successful writers in the last decade or so of the 20th century and who relate their writing to their reading interests and who all focus on how they decided to become writers.

Writing for Publication.  Although most MLIS students do not prepare writing assignments with an eye towards publication, some do prepare essays ultimately going into print in a journal.  Faculty members are always on the lookout for essays with publishing potential, and they are happy to provide advice.  From time to time, faculty members also will undertake joint publishing projects with students.

There are guides for students to move from course projects to publication.  Walter W. Powell, Getting into Print: The Decision-Making Process in Scholarly Publishing (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985) provides a useful book on the characteristics of scholarly history, including its history, the nature of editorial work, the selection processes in both scholarly journal and book publishing, and the financial and administrative aspects of academic book publishing.  A lot has happened in the twenty years since this book was published, but it still offers a convenient benchmark analysis of how the scholarly publishing industry works.

While not aimed at masters-level students, William Germano, From Dissertation to Book (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005) is nevertheless a thorough introduction to scholarly publishing. Since graduate schools and advisors spend little energy in explaining what to do with a dissertation once it is done, Germano wrote this book.  He offers advice on figuring out the marketplace, identifying what a broader readership means and revising for it, working with an editor and publisher, helping the beginning scholar understand why the dissertation is not yet a book, determining whether a dissertation should be expanded into a book, the basic common weaknesses to revising dissertations into books (audience, voice, structure. length), and planning and carrying out the revision.  Germano offers this general advice and commentary about the nature of scholarly writing and publishing: “Scholars who write and publish are probably happier than those who don’t.  This is a completely impressionistic take, I admit, and there are doubtless deeply depressed academics who nonetheless publish furiously.  But like physical exercise, writing is the tiring thing that gives you more energy after you’ve done it.  Writing is a risk, and risk is exciting, and excitement is something you will fight to sustain in your professional life as you age and your students don’t.”  Also, “Writing is a lifelong occupation, an avocation, a battle, and in it we find out what we think and who we are.  Learn to practice the habit of writing.  Set aside daily writing time and make the lined pad or the desktop screen your regular companion.  Let it become your devotional exercise, even if it is the only devotional practice in your life.  Your career as an employed scholar depends on it, though I think the rewards – for you, for the rest of us – are more important than that.  What you write is a part of who you are, and in that sense every volume of your writing is a piece of autobiography.” And, of course, this is not bad advice for anyone taking on any kind of writing project.

Mentoring.  Students in the MLIS program will have the opportunity to work with faculty members who are engaged in research and writing projects of many kinds, from professional articles to research reports to scholarly monographs.  Students interested in gaining additional experience in developing their writing skills will have ample opportunities to work with faculty, and they should not be shy in seeking advice and additional help.  As part of this, as they take various courses, students should seek advice for additions to their professional library of research and writing tools.  There are numerous manuals, for example, on research methods (historical, anthropological, literary and cultural studies, behavioral, etc.) applicable to the work of information professionals that could be added to such libraries.

Conclusion.  Learning to write is a life-long activity.  Learning how to conduct research in the library and information professions starts with study in graduate programs such as the one at our School.  MLIS students should pursue every opportunity they have to learn about the art and science of researching and writing.  If nothing else, it is a lot of fun.