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Suggested answer: “Winter in the coastal city turned to spring and the Pacific waters taunted the earnest marine biology students with salty spray and soft, slippery swales.”

Springtime is not for academic pursuits, as most any young student will tell you. Other pursuits take precedence, such as courting and similar heart-felt endeavors. Students researching next to rhythmically rolling waters might be particularly distracted. Given all that, it is safe to say the salty, soft waters “taunted” the students. In giving the ocean the capacity for acting with intent, the writer enlivens a serious subject without diminishing it. Other “t” words might be “teased” (a less harsh form of mockery) and “tweaked” in the sense of being annoying.
春天不是讀書天，大多數年輕學子都會這麼告訴你。春天有更重要的任務，比如談情說愛，或其他情深意切的事。在規律起伏的海邊做研究，或許特別容易擾亂學生的思緒。因此，適當的說法是輕柔的海水「taunted」（挑動）學生思緒。作者賦予海水意志力，讓原本正經的主題活潑生動起來，同時不減損其威力。其他以「t」開頭的詞包括「teased」（逗弄，較輕微的嘲弄）或「tweaked」（捉弄），同樣會令人心神不寧。

The sentence below is missing a verb. However, the first letter of the verb is provided. Insert a word that starts with the given first letter and best fits the tenor of the sentence, and then defend your word choice in five or fewer words. The first TPS Fan to respond with the judge’s choice of verb—or the most effective alternate verb— will win a ¬¬¬NTD 200 Starbucks Gift Certificate. The name of the winner will be published tomorrow on this TPS Fans page. Good luck!
以下句子缺少動詞，請加入一個最符合句子意思且符合空格開頭字母的動詞，以及五個字以內的理由，我們將提供7-11／星巴克咖啡禮券兩百元，頒給第一位想出最佳解答或是最佳替代字的第1位粉絲。解答與獲獎粉絲姓名將在明天公布於本 TPS 專頁。請將答案寫在下方，幸運兒可能就是你！

題目Contest Sentence:

“Winter in the coastal city turned to spring and the Pacific waters t______ the earnest marine biology students with salty spray and soft, slippery swales.”

並非所有與學術議題相關的文章，就能稱之為「學術文章」。本篇專欄將節錄不同學術議題的內容，分析常見的寫作錯誤，並分享潤修與寫作的技巧。
Not all articles written on academic topics are written in proper academic English. In this "This is not academic writing" column we examine short excerpts from academic texts to illustrate common writing errors and explain how to correct them.

Unacceptable 不被認可的文章

“Among the explorers of earth a long time ago is Wang Dayuan, whose 14th-century sea wanderings around South Asia and Africa produced fascinating material for modern historians. This includes an account of a 1330 trip to a place now known as Singapore. Dayuan wrote about the city’s Chinese and Malaysian people; he went on to compile descriptions of other people, cultures, and the weather in some 100 coastel cities in the region. Dayuan’s home was Quanzhou, which might have been known in his time as Chinchew, Chinchu, or Zayton.”

This passage about an Asia Pacific explorer is interesting but flawed. A reference to the planet we call home (as did the explorer) should be capitalized—Earth. The first sentence refers to the 14th-century explorer in the present tense, though he has been dead for almost 700 years. To refer to sea expeditions as “wanderings” doesn’t give their planners much credit. The writer incorrectly refers to “Malaysian” people, when he meant Malay. He also gets wordy, saying the explorer managed to “compile descriptions of other people,” which might simply have been stated as, he “described other people.” Do you see other errors?
這段文字討論亞太的探險家，主題有意思，但寫作有些瑕疵。若要指我們居住的星球，英文「Earth」應該要大寫。第一句用現在式，但所描述的十四世紀探險家距今已經將近七百年了；而把海上探險稱為「wanderings」（漫遊）則對規劃這場探險的人有失公允。文中用「Malaysian people」指馬來人，正確說法應該是「Malay」。描述探險家努力「compile descriptions of other people」（編寫對其他人民的描述）也太囉嗦，簡單說「described other people」就可以了。你是否還看到其他問題？

Acceptable 認可的文章

“Among the recorded explorers of Earth in eras long gone was Wang Dayuan, whose 14th-century sea travels around South Asia and Africa produced some valuable material for modern historians. This includes an account of a 1330 expedition to what is now Singapore. Dayuan wrote about the city’s Chinese and Malay residents; he went on to describe people, cultures, and the weather in some 100 coastal cities across the region. Dayuan’s home port was Quanzhou, which in his time might have been called Chinchew, Chinchu, or Zayton.”

A writer peering ahead at an academic writing project should respect the task. It not only will require research and writing abilities, it will tax the writer’s endurance and concentration. Learning to become efficient and self-regulating as a researcher and writer is the reason for this series, “7 Ways to Pace Yourself through a Paper.” Each of the suggestions will be presented on the TPS Fan page before being compiled.
若您即將致力於學術寫作專題，應該好好重視這項工作。這不僅需要研究與寫作技巧，也仰賴毅力與專注。「按部就班寫作論文的七大步驟」將教您學會如何自律，提高研究與寫作的效率。每項建議都會刊登在 TPS 粉絲專頁，並在最後集結於 TPS 學術電子報中。

Way # 5 – Anticipate: Learn to avoid surprises
建議五：防範未然，臨事不亂

It is said the best laid plans of mice and men come to naught when the unexpected circumstance intrudes. The moral is, all the careful planning in the world will not guarantee that a writing project will come together without incident. That’s what makes life interesting! Even so, there is no joy in running into an obstacle with a paper’s deadline looming. The best way to avoid such crises is to anticipate them and to build into your schedule time to respond to them.
曾有人說，人鼠之間擬定的計畫再如何周詳，意外攪局時，仍將化為泡影。其中教訓是，世事難料，儘管仔細規劃，寫論文難保不會有意外。人生因此而精采，但論文截止在即，遇到這種麻煩可就不精彩了。要預防這類問題，最好的方法就是事先防範，安排時間以備處理問題。

Example: When compiling a list of sources and citations, look at each one’s potential for rejection. Sometimes a cited source is deemed to be irrelevant to subject matter, perhaps because his authority and credentials have been superseded by more recent research. Or a citation from a document might be discounted because the document lacks academic standing. Be critical of source material so that your professor can’t shock you late in the day by rejecting parts of it.
舉例來說，整理資料來源和引用文獻清單時，應該檢查每一項資料是否可能遭到否決。有時一項資料的威信與可靠度可能遭到最近的研究推翻，因此不再適合引用；或者引用的來源文章學術價值不高，而使效果打折扣。整理引用文獻時要仔細檢查，以免教授事到臨頭不贊同某些引用，讓你手足無措。

Also, be an editor as well as a writer. Not only examine your paper for grammar and similar writing issues, examine it for content. Ask yourself tough questions: Is this section weak because I have tried to stretch research material too far? Does the conclusion really work, reflecting the introduction and accurately summarizing the body of the paper? Is that illustration effective or just pretty? If you are tough on yourself along the way, a professor can’t surprise you at the end.
此外，除了寫論文，也要從編輯的角度觀察論文，除了檢查文法一類的寫作問題，也應該注意文章內容。嚴格自問：這一段是否因為推論過度而使說服力薄弱？結論是否與引言首尾呼應，確實總結全文？舉證是否有助理解，或僅為妝點之用？如果寫論文時從頭至尾嚴以律己，就不必擔心最後有什麼事會出乎意料了。

Corrected sentence:
“The conundrum, which is undisputed among scholars, is that none of the writers of that period were faithful to the strict, traditional rules governing Latin-based syntax.”

This sentence contains four punctuation errors. The dependent clause near the front of the sentence—“which is undisputed among scholars—requires a comma at the front and rear of it. One way to identify the need for a comma is the word “which.” A phrase beginning with “which” always must be separated from the rest of the sentence, as opposed to a similar phrase beginning with the word “that.” The third error is the lack of a comma between “strict” and “traditional.” Combinations of adjectives must be separated. The final error is the absence of hyphenation for the compound adjective “Latin-based.” With the proper punctuation in place, the eye races through the sentence.
本句標點有四個錯誤。首先，句子前半的從屬子句－「which is undisputed among scholars」（學者均認為無庸置疑）前後應該加逗號。要知道是否需加逗號，可以從「which」這個字判斷，以「which」開頭的詞組必須和句子其他部分分開，相較之下，以「that」為首的類似詞組就沒有這個必要。第三個錯誤是「strict」和「traditional」之間也少了逗號；兩相鄰的形容詞也一定要分開。最後則是複合形容詞「Latin-based」之間少了連字號。標點符號用得好，句子讀起來就流暢了。

Words, like motor vehicles, need signposts and signals to keep them from running together. Punctuation frees words to move readers, to instruct and inspire them. The following example of writing either contains inappropriate punctuation or lacks marks that are needed. Note: The example may contain more than one punctuation error. The first TPS Fan to correct the writing sample as we believe it should be corrected will win a NTD200 eslite bookstore and shopping mall Gift Certificate.
文字就像汽車，需要交通標誌與燈號才不會打結，標點符號可以釋放文字，讓字句能打動、指引、啟發讀者。以下範例可能標點符號不正確，或少了必需的標點符號。注意，句中可能不只有一個標點符號錯誤。最先改正錯誤，並寫出最佳解答的一位 TPS 粉絲，將能贏得兩百元誠品圖書商場購物禮卷。

題目Contest Sentence:

“The conundrum which is undisputed among scholars is that none of the great writers of that period were faithful to the strict traditional rules governing Latin based syntax.”

 很多字詞並非表面所見的意思，字詞的組合會產生不同的解釋。這樣的慣用法，我們稱之為「比喻」。一個成功的比喻，作者本身必須相當瞭解字詞的源起。以下的句子為讀者介紹一個比喻及其來源。
Imagery buries itself in language and takes on new meaning. The transplanted and transformed sets of words are called “figures of speech.” For a figure of speech to be effective, however, a writer must first understand the original meaning of the phrase. The following sentence contains a common figure of speech. Its original meaning is explained.

“The war hardened those who survived it, with any actual hero an accidental one and The Grim Reaper seemingly everywhere, grimly harvesting his exhausted crop of souls.”
「從真正的英雄到無名英雄，戰爭讓倖存者變得無動於衷，死神似乎無處不在，冷酷地收割筋疲力竭的靈魂。」

The Grim Reaper image of death dates from the bubonic plague of the 14th century that killed millions of people around the world. In dealing with such an enormous loss of human life, some artists turned death into a sinister, skeletal presence in a loose-fitting robe that employed a scythe as a weapon to end the lives of human beings. It was a more gruesome representation of the macabre than was practiced by, say, the Norse culture, which portrayed death as beautiful women. Some other cultures speak of angels appearing to call home the souls of people.
死神的形象源自十四世紀的鼠疫，那場瘟疫奪去數百萬人的生命。有些藝術家在描述這場死亡浩劫時，將死亡轉化為一個陰森凶險的骷髏架，披著寬鬆的長袍，手持鐮刀為武器，奪走人命。斯堪地納維亞將死亡描述為美女，有些文化則將死亡描述為天使出現，將人的靈魂召喚回家，相較之下這個死亡的表徵則相當可怕。

It is not surprising that the writer of this passage called upon the image of The Grim Reaper to illustrate the wholesale death of the battlefield. After awhile, war carnage becomes impersonal to those who are in close proximity to it and The Grim Reaper is anything but personal. Also, it is appropriate to use this image because war is fought with weapons and the scythe is a wicked one and can be utilized to “grimly harvest” victims in bunches, just as modern weapons of war do. The Grim Reaper is cliché, of course; an original allusion or image would have been better yet.
以死神的意象形容戰場大規模的死亡，並不令人意外。對親臨戰場上大屠殺的人來說，過了一陣子看待死亡就能不帶感情，而死神卻似乎如影隨形。此外，由於戰爭是武器間的爭鬥，鐮刀就是邪惡的武器，能用來冷酷地收穫許多受難者的靈魂，就像現代戰爭中的武器，因此死神在此是個適切的意象。當然，死神這個形容缺乏新意，更原創的比喻或意象會更好。

 TPS的編輯教授在此歡迎關於學術文章的所有詢問，當然，其實他並沒有足夠的時間給你。他擁有終身教職的教授身份，也是著名的學術巨作作者。即便如此，他仍大方地接受你們的詢問。將關於學術方面的詢問寫在下方，你將獲得教授的親自指導，陶冶對學術的探索與啟發。
The professor awaits your query on academic writing, though in all honesty, he doesn’t have a lot of time for you. He is a tenured full professor and working on yet another magnificent academic tome. Even so, he has graciously consented to entertain your question. Submit it and prepare to be edified.

QUESTION: I usually pick an off-the-wall topic for a paper when none is assigned, or choose an edgy variation of an assigned theme. My professor generally approves them, but she has suggested that I not try so hard to be different. Isn’t originality a plus in a paper?
寫論文時如果沒有指定主題，我通常挑選特立獨行的題目，如果有指定主題，我會定出最前衛的題目。教授通常會讚許我的題目，但她也建議我不要刻意追求不同。原創性對論文有加分效果嗎？

Is originality of theme and expression a good thing? Absolutely. I suspect this is why your professor doesn’t push too hard to get you to fall more in line with other writers. Kudos to the prof for encouraging fresh thinking! Still, her suggestion that you “not try so hard” is a valid one. It boils down to the difference between serious originality and novelty. The former has real substance, while the latter is more of a veneer of thinking; its shallowness can’t withstand much examination. In a topic search, look for a solid body of material needing fresh presentation.
原創的主題或表達是好的嗎？當然。或許你的教授也因此沒有強迫你做和其他人相同的事。鼓勵創新的教授，給你們拍拍手！不過，她建議你不要「刻意」求異，說得也有道理。歸根究柢，經過深思熟慮的原創性，與單純的新奇並不同。前者有紮實內涵，後者比較像是繡花枕頭，內容膚淺，禁不起檢驗。找題目的時候，應該選擇有充足資料佐證的題目，以獨創性的方式表達。

Another good guide in choosing a topic, which your professor undoubtedly would endorse, is that the material you present actually be useful. Some academic papers are so esoteric that they admittedly are of minimal use to a general readership. Yet to a narrow slice of academia or to a research community, even such papers are wonderfully useful. The utility of a paper is a genuine consideration because a useful paper is a practical one as opposed to a merely academic, or theoretical, one. When scholarship produces material of real-world application, it contributes.
挑選題目還有一個好方法，你的教授無疑也會贊成，那就是判斷你寫出的文章是否有效用。有些學術文章非常深奧，確實對一般讀者來說用處不高；但對某一小群學術人士或研究團體來說，這樣的論文依然極有幫助。論文的效用相當重要，有用的論文不僅是純粹的學術或理論文章，同時也是實用的論文。學者的文章若能應用於現實世界，就有了貢獻。

So by all means, look for topics and themes that are unusual, unpredictable, and even unique. The desire to think for oneself and to examine a topic that has been overlooked or under-reported shows good scholarly instincts. However, an academic paper is not an entertainment venue. The idea is not to surprise or otherwise impress someone with a gimmicky topic. The purpose of a paper is to engage in scholarly conversation, to add to a body of scholarship, to learn and then share what you have learned. If by so doing you introduce a brand new topic, so be it.
因此切記，要尋找與眾不同、出人意表、甚至獨一無二的題目或主題。自己思考、檢驗受忽略或研究不足的題目，這份想法就展現出了學術天份。然而，學術文章並非娛樂，重點不是用噱頭讓人吃驚或譁眾取寵。論文的目的是開啟學術對話，增進學術知識，去學習並分享所學。如果因此引介了全新的主題，就欣然接受吧。

Correct best answer: Replace “tracts” with “tracks.”

“Thailand’s rural music tradition dates only to the 20th century, when Latin American melodies were fused with Western movie sound tracks to create a style called Luk Thung.”

What a difference single letter can make. Sometimes the letter can turn a word into gibberish, which is embarrassing enough. Other times it turns a word into another word, which is embarrassing and confusing. A sound track is the part of a videotape that carries the sound of a movie, whereas a sound tract is a fertile or stable area of land. The words are not pronounced exactly alike but are close enough for verbal confusion. Written, the two words can easily pass for one another in the eyes of a skimming reader. Professors and other academic paper readers do not skim, however, so it is important that “almost-correct” words not be subbed for correct ones.
一字之差，差之千里。有時候只差一個字母，原來的詞彙就會變得毫無意義，這已經很窘了，有時候是甚至把原來的詞彙變成另一個詞彙，不僅尷尬還令人費解。「Sound track」（音軌）是電影錄像磁帶中帶有聲音的部分，「sound tract」則是肥沃或堅實的土地。兩字發音不大相同，但是拼法卻很像，容易混淆。掃讀時很容易忽略這兩個字的差別，但教授或閱讀學術文章的人，可不僅是匆匆瀏覽；所以要小心，可別讓「差不多」的字混充正確的字。

 撰寫學術文章時，每字每句都需要謹慎著墨。改變幾個字就會使完整的一句話變得令人摸不著頭緒。下列的句子中，為使這句話能完整且有意義的表達，請選出你認為會令人感到困惑的字，我們將提供7-11/星巴克咖啡NTD200元禮券，給予挑出混淆字，並寫出最佳替代字的第1位粉絲，最適的解答與獲獎的粉絲姓名，將於明天公佈於本TPS的專頁。請將你的答案寫在下方，獲得免費購物禮券的幸運兒可能就是你哦!
Every word is important in a well-written academic paper. Changing just a word or two can turn a clear sentence into a confusing one. Tell us what word you would change in the following puzzling sentence to render it more meaningful. The first best answer will receive a NTD200 7-11/Starbucks Gift Certificate.

題目Contest Sentence:
“Thailand’s rural music tradition dates only to the 20th century, when Latin American melodies were fused with Western movie sound tracts to create a style called Luk Thung.”