The challenge of writing in English

01 Feb, 2014

By Natália de Santana Revi

Writing is an important exercise which should always be practised by students. This does not necessarily mean that writing is easy. In fact, it is the opposite. Writing goes far beyond the simple exercise of gathering words. The task of uniting words in a logical and cohesive way can be difficult for us Brazilians, even when writing in our mother tongue. However, when it comes to writing an essay or a letter in English the challenge doubles. The students who have difficulty writing in English probably have similar problems with writing in Portuguese, so perhaps the problem lies not in writing in English, but simply in writing.

Writing well requires a lot of reading because reading reinforces grammatical structures and develops the reader’s vocabulary. Yet reading is still a major issue in Brazil. In general, Brazilians read very little and consequently, they find it difficult to differentiate between written language and oral language. This way, mistakes in oral language are transferred into written language.
Reading a wide range of material is also fundamental. One way you can improve your writing skills is to read a wide range of materials such as, books, newspapers, articles and magazines. It is also important to vary the style of your reading material e.g. fiction, fact-based, literature, novels etc… There are different genres in writing such as, CV cover letters, reports, articles, stories and emails to friends. The rules and conventions differ significantly between these genres and without an understanding of these conventions, your writing will appear unnatural.

Another common error made by students is the tendency to write first in Portuguese and then translate into English, usually translating sentence-by-sentence, or even word-by-word. The resulting text does not always make sense. Each language uses different grammatical structures and this type of translation does not take into account idiomatic expressions and collocations. Also, when writing in their native language, students tend to use much more elaborate structures and vocabulary than they can use in the target language. This makes it even harder to translate their writing directly.

Challenging situations

One of the most challenging situations for writing in a foreign language is the written exam. For English teacher and Cambridge examiner, Veronica Izon, Brazilian students have similar problems to South Americans when it comes to exams.

“They often do not answer the question. They write about what they want to write about rather than addressing the task”.

In the CPE exam students are expected to be able to assess and evaluate information and opinions, which most students find difficult. She highlights the fact that Brazilian students have a tendency to ramble in their writing, perhaps focusing on their word count rather than their arguments. She also points out that in academic writing Brazilian students are not usually familiar with the American/English conventions e.g. they have difficulty with planning introductions with a main thesis statement and writing topic sentences in each paragraph.

“However, I don’t think this is a particular Brazilian problem” she adds. “Lots of English students do not know how to write an academic essay”. Veronica also highlights the fact that Brazilian students commonly have problems with spelling, punctuation and grammar, including word order and the misuse or lack of use of ‘it’ as a subject.

Michel Colaço de Andrade

For Michel Colaco de Andrade, former student at the Chelsea College of Art and Design, academic writing in English has always been a challenge.

“In Portuguese we are used to writing long sentences adding several commas, while in English you have to be more direct and to the point and this is something that my teacher always pointed out. It is better to write less and well by being more direct than writing just for the sake of filling up space in the word count”. This is the same point that Veronica made earlier.

It seems, then, that there are a number of challenges which Brazilians face when writing in English. Firstly, there is the question of their writing proficiency in their native language. Writing is intimately linked to reading and reading is still not a common pastime in Brazil. Then there is the difficulty of unfamiliar ‘English’ conventions and styles of writing, which the student has to learn, not to mention the grammar, punctuation and spelling.

Zé da Flauta

My advice to Brazilian students is this: read much as you can and acknowledge that writing well is a matter of practice. Never fear the blank sheet or the empty computer screen: the ideas will always come. Take the time to organize your thoughts and get them down in an appropriate and consistent way on paper. A friend of mine, Zé da Flauta, used to say that writing well is the act of editing what you have written to make it better. Perhaps this is a lesson for us Brazilians who tend to ramble.

If you are thinking about starting to write more, why not enter an essay competition? This could be a good way to start off. Several organizations provide essays competitions in a range of subjects and if you are not sure about writing in English there is also the option to enter Portuguese essay writing competitions. Have a look at the links below and get writing!

Links:

http://www.jctltd.co.uk/student-competition.aspx
http://www.pet.cam.ac.uk/prospective-students/essay-prizes