The Language Paradox: English as a Constraint in Research Writing
Academic writing is commonly referred to as scientific writing which is characterized as structured research practiced and used by researchers at higher educational level. English is the main language for global communication and also for disseminating scholarly works. Writing is the heart of academic life which is always seen as an integral part of science used to document and communicate ideas, activities and findings to others. The use of proper language is an essential element in writing scientific papers.
In research , success is based on the number and impact of ones publications. Rejection of papers not for the quality of the research but for the quality of the English is a common problem faced by the non-native English researchers . The dominance of English has created a considerable bias in the scientific research community. Language barriers are causing critical scientific findings to go unnoticed because of decrease knowledge of English. There are so many people who want to contribute to science but can’t because they don’t have enough English. Some researchers are more successful than others in writing scientific papers than non English speaking societies.
Researchers should have academic writing competence to produce a quality text in order to express their ideas, hypothesis and insights. The fact that only 5% of the world’s population speaks English as a native language poses a huge problem for many researchers. Most of them face many challenges to get their work published internationally as they have to struggle various aspects of scientific writing . The need of English proficiency in writing has reduced the research information in the world of scientific publication.
Research in the dental field is progressing at mightier speed worldwide in India. There are definitely certain barriers for the growth of dental science and scientific publications in India . Researchers are more interested in conducting their studies than in writing the papers. Many researchers view writing as a necessary evil and the least enjoyable part of the research process. The postgraduates do scientific research, but hardly very few students get success to get their work published. It is also important to mention those faculties who supervise students themselves perform research and often fail to get their work published. English becomes a factor to succeed in publishing internationally.
Apart from general academic writing skills, writing in English is perceived as difficult(because you don’t write as easily as in your first language). One seems to pay attention to rules more than ideas. “You don’t say what you know, you only say what you can “-when you write in English. This causes anxiety and loss of interest. When such professionals can’t write a papersuccessfully or when their paper is rejected they are discouraged by it and quit the efforts.
Most of them face many challenges to get their work published internationally as they have to struggle various aspects of scientific writing. With no prior training on scientific writing and not possessing any published research paper significantly decreases to pursue career in research and academic writing.
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