Communities of peer practitioners. Experiences from an Academic Writing Group

• Published in: Nordic journal of science and technology studies Vol. 5; no. 1; pp. 30 - 37
• Main Authors: Søraa, Roger Andre, Ingeborgrud, Lina, Suboticki, Ivana, Solbu, Gisle
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Nordic Journal of Science and Technology Studies 10-08-2017
• Subjects: academic writing; community of practice; peer writing group; PhD writing groups; sociomaterial learning
• ISSN: 1894-4647; 1894-4647
• DOI: 10.5324/njsts.v5i1.2243

Learning academic writing is important for communicating research and participating in scholarly debates. This learning is traditionally conceptualized through a hierarchical teacher-student relation or individual accomplishment. However, in this paper we ask how we might understand the development of academic writing skills as a collective practice within a writing community. We draw on experiences from our own departmental writing group of PhD candidates and highlight our specific peer community as a tool and the draft texts we deliver as boundary objects through which we develop and broaden our academic skills.