# Academic / scholarly

Apply [`core.md`](./core.md) first. This file is the genre overlay for
journal articles, working papers, methods sections, literature reviews,
and dissertation chapters that are papers.

It is not the file for essays or talks ([`essays.md`](./essays.md)),
filings ([`civic.md`](./civic.md)), or product pages. Reference docs
and textbooks that are really manuals still get core only.

The colleague voice is close. Precision and citations are the shift.
Do not put on the academic costume.

---

## Register

Write for a peer who already knows the field. Say what you did, what
you found, and where the claim stops. Full forms more often than the
default. Contractions are rare, not banned. One is not a finding.

First person is allowed when the field or the overlay uses it ("we
measured," "I argue"). Passive is not required. Do not convert every
sentence to "it was found that."

Hedging is earned when it names a limit, a method bound, or a claim
the data cannot support. "In this sample," "we did not observe,"
"suggests" stay when they are true. "It could perhaps be argued that"
is hiding.

The read-aloud test is a careful colleague in the field, not a tired
product person and not a quarterly from 1987.

Pronouns follow the overlay or the journal. Do not invent "the authors"
to sound impersonal if the venue uses we.

Hard bans still hold. Insight theater does not become allowed because
the bibliography is long. Earn the word: "robust," "novel," and
"seminal" need a measurement, a contrast, or a cite that actually
carries that weight.

---

## What earns its place

- Citations, operational definitions, method, limitations
- Field terms of art (applicability heuristic)
- The journal's sections (IMRaD or whatever they print)
- An abstract that states the finding, not a teaser

Repeating a defined term is not hand-holding. Numbered hypotheses and
result rows are not triad packing.

---

## The costume (do not reach for it)

These are the stereotypical academic tells. Ban them as furniture.
Leave a word if it is doing a real job in the sentence.

- "Moreover," "Thus," "Furthermore," "Indeed" opening clause after
  clause
- "This paper seeks to" / "this study aims to" / "the present work"
- "It has been shown that" with no cite, or with a cite that does not
  show it
- "The extant literature," "a growing body of work," "little attention
  has been paid"
- "It is worth noting that" / "it is important to note"
- Nominalization stacks ("the utilization of the implementation")
- Forced passive when the actor is known and the field allows we
- A literature review that only announces a gap
- A last sentence that winks or mic-drops

Do not inject an essay scene to "humanize" the paper. A worked example
or a named dataset is an instance, not a memoir. Do not apply essay
law here.

Do not apply civic captions or landing pain lists.

---

## Claims

This genre lives on citations. Run [`claims.md`](./claims.md) when the
paper asserts effects, magnitudes, or what prior work showed.

A clean-smelling wrong paper is still wrong. Do not cologne a missing
cite or an overclaim in the abstract.

---

## Audit extras for this genre

On top of `core.md` and `audit.md`:

- Costume density (Moreover / Thus / seeks to / extant literature)
- Hedging that hides a claim instead of naming a limit
- Forced impersonal voice against the overlay or the venue
- Abstract that teases and never states the finding
- Essay anecdote or landing structure
- A claim that needs a cite and has none

---

## Acceptance criteria

1. Overlay or venue named the speaker (we, I, or the paper's convention).
2. Abstract states the finding.
3. Hedging names a limit or is cut.
4. No costume furniture in the open or the close.
5. Claims that need cites have them, or `claims.md` already flagged
   the gaps.
6. No essay scene. No civic caption. No landing pain list.
7. Hard bans still hold.