Academic writing skills

There are several essential academic writing skills that you need to achieve successful academic writing, including conducting a literature search, writing a critical analysis of evidence, and writing a literature review.

How to conduct a targeted literature search

To achieve an efficient and thorough understanding of the topic and to be able to draw on a range of relevant evidence in your writing, you need to be skilful at searching the literature. You also need to be able to use referencing software to ensure an efficient and accurate use of citations and references.

Learn More about where, how and what to search.

How to write a successful critical analysis

The ability to critically analyze the evidence lies at the heart of successful academic writing. It is also one of the most difficult skills to master.

Learn More about what to critically analyse, the meaning of ‘analyse’ and ‘critical’, and how to successfully critically analyse a theory, concept, argument, methodology or research results and conclusions.

How to write a strong literature review

Too often, literature reviews are overly descriptive and lack sufficient critical analysis of the evidence on a topic.

Learn More about what a literature is and is not, and how to write the introduction, body and conclusion sections of a literature review.