Can you identify a single colleague who has not had a
manuscript returned with the comment ‘‘needs to be
reviewed by a native English speaker’’? Many researchers
receive this response even after translation or revision by
an official translator or a native English-speaking coauthor.
Over the past four years, while conducting my doctoral, and
now my postdoctoral, work here in Brazil, I have been asked
to both translate and help revise numerous manuscripts for
my fellow Brazilian researchers. However, despite being a
native English speaker and a researcher, I have found these
tasks to be quite stressful at times. The truth is, just like it is
one thing to write in Portuguese and another to write well in
Portuguese, the same applies to writing well in English.
Furthermore, not every native English speaker who writes
well in English can write well for the scientific literature.
Scientific English writing has its own style and rhythm, such
as the use of passive voice. Passive voice is considered poor
English in most forms of writing (news, novels, blogs, etc.)
outside of science. The most recent version of Microsoft
Office Word will even highlight passive voice as poor
grammar and ask you if you want to rephrase. However, the
use of passive voice is acceptable and even encouraged in
some scientific writing.
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