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Youyue Tian

17/2/2020

Writing2

Write an Academic Geography Paper Like a Jigsaw Puzzle

1. Introduction

Do you still remember the jigsaw puzzle that your parents bought you when you were

little? You unpacked the package, carefully disguised different colors, and distributed all the

small squares excitedly according to the color. Then you selected the small squares of the

same color to put them together, or first built the frame of the puzzle based on the shape of

squares and then slowly filled the puzzle layer by layer. Perhaps, you did not know that you

were playing a game, like literacy practice with the geographic discipline at the time.

As an all-encompassing science discipline, geography involves different research

directions, including human techniques and physics, which together constitute the geography

discipline, like a jigsaw puzzle. In addition to a common research goal, rigorous literacy

practice which is supported by the materials and methods, jargon, and equation, is also shared

in the articles in this field. More specifically, the goal of Geography can be realized with

these three literacy practices.

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In this article, I will attempt to use the structure and citation of geographical articles

rather than the traditional Chicago citation, hoping that this quote will facilitate the reader’s

understanding of the formation of geographical articles.

2.1 Material and methods

In order to ensure the accuracy and preciseness of the data, prior to conducting

experiments, scholars will work out the materials and instruments they will use as well as the

specific test methods in advance. Generally speaking, materials and methods are always

followed by specific introductions in academic papers on geography, making it a prerequisite

to know the specific materials and methods of researches before reading an academic paper.

Scholars will elaborate what instruments they use, such as Landsat, quick bird or Radar

which are all satellites used to determine a specific area or object.

Here is how they describe materials and methods. “Plants were sampled at

pseudorandom locations (n=21) identified with the help of a Geographic Information System

(GIS). Using a GIS, polygons were generated over a geodatabase depicting vegetation

physiognomies for the region. Sampling locations were limited to the Cerrado sensu stricto,

Cerradao, and Rupestrian Grassland physiognomies.” (Aaron et al.) “The received signal is

delayed by a time duration proportional to the signal time of flight Tdel. The signals are
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transferred to baseband by frequency mixing with f0. The range compressed signal is found

by determining the cross-correlation between the baseband versions of the transmitted and

received signal.” (Mihai et al.)

Have you already noticed that the passive voice is used in the description of materials

and methods in all these papers? To be more specific, the passive voice is employed when the

author wants to emphasize the object of a sentence, rather than the subject. For example, the

subject of the object or instrument is used by the author in this part to emphasize its

importance. Without these specific materials and methods, it will be impossible for scholars

to get so much data. If such a situation occurs in another article of the same author, we can

reckon it as the author’s personal preference. However, the same writing technique is

employed in the two articles on the same academic field by different authors, so we can

confirm that the employment of passive voice in this section is a literacy practice of

geography discipline.

2.2 Jargon

As long as we are focusing on the peer viewed paper in the geography discipline, the

authors hope their readers to be equipped with certain basic understanding of the jargon in
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this discipline before going deeper to the paper. Therefore, they resort to a literacy practice to

define the jargon and introduce the abbreviated words when these terms firstly appear in their

papers. They show the full form of the phrase, with the indication of the abbreviation of the

phrase in parentheses, and resort to the abbreviation in subsequent papers to keep the paper

concise.

Here is how the literacy practice is reflected in their peer viewed papers. “In the visible

spectrum (VIS, between 400 and 700 nm), reflectance depends mainly on the presence of

photosynthetic pigments such as chlorophyll. In the near-infrared domain (NIR, between 700

and 13000 nm).” (Department of Signal Theory et al.) However, more than one author

chooses to use this type of literacy practice in their paper. “Alternative floating algae index

(AFAI) was calculated by surface reflectance corresponding to Moderate Resolution Imaging

Spectroradiometer (MODIS) bands.” (Mengqiu et al.)

It is not hard to perform an analysis based on these two examples. In geography

discipline, abbreviations for phrases are applied mainly to some professional terms, such as

MODIS, NIR and so on. Frequently used in daily teaching and research, these abbreviations

are concise and clear for those who are familiar with geography. However, for readers who
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have never taken a course related to geography, these abbreviations may seem like

cuneiform, almost unreadable. Therefore, in order to facilitate readers’ understanding of the

meaning of these abbreviations, all the authors will explain the abbreviations when they are

first mentioned before using them in the following sections. Otherwise, an excessive use of

jargon without explanation in an article will make the whole article artificial, restricting

readers’ understanding of the article, since some articles are not just published for

professionals. Therefore, this literacy practice has kindly expanded the reader scope of the

article by making it less obscure and difficult to understand.

2.3 Equation

In addition to the two literacy practices mentioned earlier, the equation also serves as an

extremely important literacy practice in geography discipline. To be more specific, the

relationship between the two variables by an equal sign is demonstrated in the equation.

Extremely logical, equations are able to express a paragraph of logic which cannot be shown

with words. However, these constants and unknown are not as well-known as π (3.1415926)

or x. In addition, a lot of the constants or unknown are shown in Greek letters like σ/ ∑, λ,

and most of the time, same Greek letters can represent different constants which are less
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common in everyday life. Such equations are bound to mislead and confuse readers, helping

explain that scholars choose to explain the constants and assumed unknowns they use at the

bottom.

Figure 1. Correction of carotenoid absorptive effects in chlorophyll feature regions

Figure 2. Explanation of Stefan-Boltzmann law

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The equation makes papers hard to understand as they interrupt the flow of text, but they

play an essential role in any numerical research and with proofs. Hence, this literacy practice

is involved in the geography article to address this problem. A timely explanation of these

obscure data, constants, and equations will facilitate the reader’s understanding of the logic of

the article, making it important to explain this in such a professional and concise way.

Without doubt, this is a very reader-friendly literacy practice.

3．Conclusion

In short, according to my review of many peer viewed articles in the field of geography,

most of these articles, even though belonging to different branches, resort to the three literacy

practices I mentioned in this paper. The employment of passive voice for laboratory

equipment and subjects helps highlight their absolute importance in the field of geography.

Besides, the article becomes more concise and easier to understand based on the explanation

and simplification of proper nouns, and it is both logical and reader-friendly through the

interpretation of the equation. Overall, the ingenious employment of these three literacy

practices allows the author to present the reader with a geography puzzle that has been put

together.

Reference
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1. Aaron Ball, Arturo Sanchez-Azofeifa, Carlos Portillo-Quintero, Benoit Rivard, Saulo

Castro-Contreras, Geraldo Fernandes. http://europepmc.org/backend/ptpmcrender.fcgi?

accid=PMC4333119&blobtype=pdf

2. Mihai-Liviu Tudose, Andrei Anghel, Remus Cacoveanu and Mihai Datcu.

https://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/19/1/82/htm

3. 1 Department of Signal Theory, Communications and Telematics Engineering, University

of Valladolid, Valladolid, Spain, 2 Departamento de Pesquisa, Empresa de Pesquisa

Agropecua ́ria de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil, 3 Departamento de

Engenharia Agr ́ıcola, Universidade Federal de Vic ̧osa, Vic ̧osa, Minas Gerais, Brazil.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?

id=10.1371/journal.pone.0196072&type=printable

4. Mengqiu Wang, Chuanmin Hu, Jennifer Cannizzaro, David English, Xingxing Han,

David Naar, Brian Lapointe, Rachel Brewton, Frank Hernandez.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2018GL078858

5. “Tutorial.” Laws of Radiation, www.newport.com/t/laws-of-radiation.