Celebrating academic writing podcast shared by BGU colleagues

Originating in 2022, the Just Writing podcast was launched by Julian Stern and Sheine Peart, colleagues and Professors working at BGU. The subject of the podcast provides a voice and platform for academics to share their experience and advice in relation to academic writing.

---

Julian shared the origins of the podcast: “Myself and Sheine had been talking about academic writing – about our own writing, and about the writing of our doctoral students, for quite a while, over coffee on campus.

“We’d both been inspired by the academic books we’ve read and written, by collaborations, the support offered to us and by us, and the creative process of academic writing itself.

“As we had such interesting conversations, we both wondered whether we could do a podcast about academic writing – for academic writers.”

As a writer himself who has discussed the writing process for many years, Julian regards academic writing as a creative process.

Julian continued: “The podcast enables two different voices to collaborate and help people get a feel for what is a complex, subtle, and messy experience.

“That’s what makes a podcast an interesting resource compared to an official-looking, neat and tidy, textbook on academic writing.”

Across the two years that the podcast has been running, guests have joined episodes from our university and beyond – including BGU Senior Lecturer Helen Bushell-Thornalley.

Helen commented on her time the podcast: “It is important for listeners to remember; writing is a long game that needs practice, trial, and error, but at the end it is often celebratory!

“As an academic writer, the cathartic experience to talk about my past work and how I found the process of becoming better at writing, was wonderful.

“The opportunity to do something like this is quite rare and is something I believe we should do more.”

Sheine shared her thoughts on the podcast and their recent guest: “Some highlights over the last couple of years include detailed discussions of the Bash Street Kids, Virginia Woolf, the role of silence, and of course each of our guests.

“In our recent episode with Helen, she contributed the virtue of persistence, the skill of reading handwritten letters, reading between the lines, and the connections between sport and writing. If only academic writing were an Olympic sport!

“The podcast is for all academic writers, staff or students or those simply writing seriously about academic matters. And when we say ‘seriously’, we also mean that academic writing should be enjoyable – fun, even.

Julian and Sheine are more than happy to hear from potential guests who have a story to tell about their academic writing – both within our university and from anywhere in the world! To get in touch with them, please email: sheine.peart@bishopg.ac.uk

To listen to Helen and other episodes of the podcast, please visit Amazon or Spotify.

---