IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - July 2016 - 13

sentence or two. Care should be exercised in the use of idiomatic expressions in technical writing. Figures 2-4
illustrate the gap between Eastern and
Western languages and cultures. Figure 3
reveals concern and depth of care of a
typical Japanese speaker. Figure 4
brings imperfection to life as content
and beauty. None of these common
words translates into English technical
writing in a straightforward manner. To
prevent these problems, Asian students
should avoid using those words bearing excessive and unspoken cultural
burdens before preparing their technical papers in English.
Adherence to logic and simplicity
in writing seems intuitive, but it can
present unexpected challenges to nonEnglish speaking engineers. Engineering schools teach sophisticated math
techniques requiring rigorous application of logic; nevertheless, application
of logical thinking to the preparation
of technical papers is often overlooked. Simplicity does not warrant
much respect from engineers with
advanced degrees. Some consider
complexity to be a hallmark of the
educated, but the truly skilled writer
foregoes it in favor of simplicity even
though it may require more effort to
do so. Do not burden the reader with
unneeded complexity. A preference
for complex writing is not limited to
Asian engineers. Simplicity sometimes clashes with clarity; the latter
should be the top priority in any technical writing.

Although these words are not technical terms, they can cause a Chinese
engineer's writing in English to appear strange to native English readers.
FIGURE 2. Some Chinese words cannot be translated because of their deep historical meanings.

It is used to let someone know that
you recognize his/her hard work and
that you are thankful for it.

"Kintsukuroi" is the art of repairing
pottery with gold or silver joining
the pieces and understanding that
the piece is more beautiful for
having been broken.

FIGURE 3. Untranslatable words from
Japan, "Otsukaresama"-"You're tired."
(Source: Marie Sugio, Lifestyle, 16 November 2015.)

FIGURE 4. Untranslatable words from Japan,
"Kintsukuroi"-"Art of repairing broken
pottery to make it more beautiful." (Source:
Marie Sugio, Lifestyle, 16 November 2015.)

THE ONE-ON-ONE TUTORING
After exposure to the general principles and shortfalls of technical writing, one-on-one tutoring sessions
(Figure 5) allow students to bring
their papers for personal critique.
These sessions can be totally private
so that students will not feel embarrassed. Some students volunteer to
use their papers a s examples so that
mistakes can be identified and suggestions for their correction can be
openly discussed. It was discovered
during these sessions that many engineers commit certain types of errors
regardless of their major areas of

FIGURE 5. A small, private tutorial at National Central University has a proven 90% success rating among participants.

study. Inclusion of the student's
classmates and advisors in the private
tutoring sessions accelerated writing
improvement.
To keep the tutoring sessions to a
manageable length, detailed comments

were offered for no more than two
pages of a student's technical paper.
Given clear markups and discussions,
students can then revisit their papers for
self-corrections. I found the students to
be humble and eager to learn when the
JULY 2016

IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine

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