Writing is a craft. It is something you learn to do well by doing it often. Writing allows you to learn how words function. It makes you a better communicator. When writing becomes habitual you are bound to see improvement. You become a better writer by writing.
Blogging can be a great way to practice writing. If you blog daily it can make you a better writer. The fact of the matter is this: students don’t have something that needs to be written every day, but students do need to write every day. Blogging can be a way of maintaining the discipline necessary for daily writing.
That said, there are people who dislike blogs in and of themselves. This series has been my way of warning students in the fields of biblical, theological, and religious studies of the risk you take when you blog. Many people in these guilds find blogging to be a waste of time, child’s play. Even if blogging is how you “warm up” as a writer, or how you make sure you write every day even when a paper is not due or you are not working on a project at the moment, there will be those who do not understand this.
Why write twenty blog posts this month when all that time could have been writing a journal article?!
Well, if you are like me, you process things and build your knowledge by writing about what you’re reading, about what you’re researching, about what you’re pondering. You can’t sit down cold turkey and produce an insightful, full-length chapter for a book or article for a journal without writing small chunks first here and there. V.A. Howard and J.H. Barton co-authored a book titled Thinking on Paper: Refine, Express, and Actually Generate Ideas by Understanding the Process of the Mind wherein they advocated for people to use writing as a way of forming, solidifying, clarifying, and visualizing your thought process. This book is why I have kept blogging. For example, I will be presenting a paper titled “The Dangers of Blogging as a Student” at the 2013 SBL Annual Meeting in Baltimore, MD. You know what this blog series has been? It has been me thinking, processing, forming, solidifying, clarifying, and visualizing my paper and my presentation.
I’ve done a couple other conference presentations in my short career and both times I discussed the evolving content of my paper on this blog. That is why I blog. Personally, while I need a lot of time alone to think about things it is equally true that before I feel comfortable with the final results I like to receive feedback. Sometimes this means contacting someone I respect in private (e.g., Marc Cortez has read my initial first draft of the aforementioned presentation and he gave me helpful feedback), but for smaller chunks of thought I like to “test drive” them on this blog. Many times the readers of this blog have proven very helpful, very insightful. It has helped shape my thinking while it is in process.
This final point may be the weakest one I’ll make because I think blogging is prioritized writing, just like taking and sharing notes are prioritized writing. Why? Because writing is a process. The final version of a writing projects comes into being through many, many short writing sessions resulting in small blocks of writing.
Students don’t often get their writings accepted to journals until they enter a doctoral program. Even at that stage one is usually writing papers and building toward a dissertation. It is rare for a Master’s level student or a doctoral student to write a book of which they’ll be proud in a few years. Yet some people who have a bias against blogging might see your blog as evidence that you are not a serious writer. They may prefer that you don’t share your thoughts in public, but store them privately, refining them until they day they may be ready for peer reviewed publication. There is nothing wrong with blogging as a way to exercise your writing skills. That isn’t my concern here. What you need to know is whether the people examining your application to study or teach at their institution think the same way. Do they dislike blogging and do they prefer you store notes privately to be used for future, “real” publications? If so, then blogging may be bad, not because it doesn’t help you become a better writer—it does—but because your future is in other’s hands and it is how they perceive your blogging habit that matters most.
See Also:
– #1, ruining your public reputation
the archives near Emmaus 
I know your taking the ‘negative’ approach with this series Brian, but the subtext here makes a pretty compelling case for blogging!
I do find value in blogging. That said, I think it is relative to one’s goals, to one’s personality, to how one manages time, to one’s network, etc. So, I wouldn’t encourage or discourage someone from blogging in a vacuum. I’d want to know their plans, their goals, their priorities, and where they want their studies to lead them. Those are the things that should determine whether or not one blogs.
Guilds have too much power, I think they repress (in general) instead of encourage emerging scholars from writing for others as a service and edification for the church. Nobody, but other scholars (in general) reads theological journals, and scholarly books; so to me guilds usually represent the good ole’ boys club, and reduce to a theology of glory. I do think peer accountability with ideas is important, I just see the range of peers as more expansive and inclusive than guilds usually allow for.
But I write to learn–apparently like you, Brian–so I will always probably blog.
@Bobby, how do you see blogs fitting into the mix? Do you see blogs as a way to re-enforce the guilt mentality or to circumvent it?
Sorry – ‘guild‘ not ‘guilt’ mentality …
An interesting thing happened in my Old Testament class last week. My professor handed out a printed copy of a blog from Peter Enns. The sheer fact that it was a blog and not an excerpt from one of his books or journal articles completely surprised me. And after discussing the content of the blog, we talked for a brief moment on scholars who blog. My professor concluded that blogs are a great way to bridge the gap between the academic and the average church goer. I thought it was interesting timing given between his words and your posts.
With all that said, I would agree with Andrew; discussing the negative aspects to blogging through seminary actually seems to make a positive case for blogging through seminary. The more I think about it, the more I realize Peter Enns’ blog (and other scholars who blog) is a great example of how they can fit in harmony should the environment allow it. At Eastern University, where he teaches, they don’t seem to mind him saying what he says on his own time, which is a conducive environment for him to continue blogging. Not all schools and seminaries are like that, though, which means, as you’ve pointed out in these posts, we must be aware of how our overseeing institutions view blogging – whether it’s a negative or positive opinion.
Yet it almost sounds as though those who have a negative view of blogging might actually have an elitist view of “good scholarship”; meaning, blogging is a negative thing because it isn’t “good scholarship.” And yet I would still say that blogging one’s thoughts can produce better scholarship because what is good scholarship? Isn’t it an honest search in response to a question or several questions wherein one’s answer, based upon what was researched, changes gradually over time? And as you’ve outlined here, blogging is simply a more frequent publication of one’s thoughts as they develop over the course of one’s research.
My OT professor summed it up quite well after our class last week. Although he was discussing beliefs and doctrines, he said that in our response to them, we should respect the traditions of those to whom we’re speaking or writing, which is what I think you’re getting at here. My only critique would be what if those traditions suffocate theological development?
@Bobby and @Jeremy
It is a complicated situation. In part, there are those who hate blogging. I don’t know all their motives and what it has to do with their vision of the academic guild. Then there are those who like blogging and advocate for student participation. Then there are those in the middle: they may like it, but they have heard stories of how blogging can derail a student’s plans because they misused their blog or their blog was misunderstood. So, not everyone is against blogging for the same reason. When Robert Holmstedt commented earlier this year he said to go for it once you have tenure. There are many who echo this “wait until your career has some security” approach.
As far as Enns is concerned, well, I don’t know if he has tenure at Eastern, but I imagine he’s fairly secure at this point. I think many of those who discourage students from blogging would respond with that observation. It is not the tenured professor who needs to worry (well, even then there are exceptions like C. Rollston), but those who are still trying to prove themselves in a crowded and competitive field.
Also, for those who don’t want to be professors, and those who don’t care about thriving in academia, most of these warnings don’t apply.
Also, for those who don’t want to be professors, and those who don’t care about thriving in academia, most of these warnings don’t apply.
Indeed. Although there are sub-cultures within niches of academia who have thicker skin than others, and aren’t as “snooty” about their craft and such things; in my experience.