McCloskey on Writing

I was never much in to composition theory. Sure, I enjoy teaching, talking about teaching, and learning how to become a better teacher, but early on I wasn’t too interested in the academics of it all. Over the last couple of years I’ve changed, though, and now I admit to being geeked out by the whole thing.

In particular I get geeked out by scholars in fields other than composition that talk about writing. To me it’s interesting to see what they hone in on, what kind of advice they give, and whether or not I agree with what they have to say. Needless to say these are pretty rare, but I’ve come across a few folks in the sciences who put a lot of emphasis on writing. (Though, I’ve also come across some who admit to writing dissertations for their graduate students, but that’s a whole different story).

What I’d like to highlight today is a little book call The Writing of Economics by Donald N. McCloskey. Humanities types who study political economy will know McCloskey (now Deidre) from her outstanding work TheRhetoric of Economics, which is theory-heavy and at times really tough to understand, but worth reading nonetheless.

The Writing of Economics is different. It’s short (54 pages), accessible, and immediately useful. It’s got a Strunk and White feel to it, but with more context (but less complete coverage), and provides the perspective of writing from an Economist.

McCloskey’s observations and instructions are valuable in themselves, and also useful for the writing teacher, because it provides some context on how to teach students outside the humanities. I can’t recommend this book enough, and I think I’m going to make an effort to excerpt it in some future works.