Developing a lucid and fluent writing style is one of the most important aspects of your university education. It is essential for your academic assignments and for everything you do beyond and outside academia.

Writing at university level is different from the academic writing most students have done at school: it requires greater intellectual independence, greater complexity and precision, and much less reliance on pre-existing templates and stock phrases. The assignments for History and Textuality are designed to help you develop a sophisticated academic writing technique, focusing initially on the skills of concision and precision (in the précis assignments), and then on articulating and developing an argument over the course of an essay (in the summative assignments).

Additional support for academic writing is provided through online courses offered by the English and History departments, which are available here and which we strongly encourage you to use:

• ECLS Academic Writing Resource
• History Department 'Academic Research and Writing' course

All academic writing should include full, accurate and consistent referencing. The library provides a very useful guide to referencing styles, and the History Department has some helpful guidance on academic integrity, including 'examples to avoid plagiarism' which demonstrate good and bad practice in quotation, attribution, and referencing. Please do not hesitate to speak to the module convenors if you require any assistance or guidance on these issues.