Biography education

An academic history is a concise, informative contents that highlights your professional likeness, research interests, and significant lore bursary. It’s a crucial component go together with your academic presence, often needful when proposing conference abstracts, contributive to edited collections, or bruiting about articles and books.

Even originally in your research career, it's worth thinking about crafting your bio. This blog post offers five different formulations to edifying you create an effective scholarly biography: the short-and-sweet bio, high-mindedness brief bio, the detailed bio, the independent scholar bio, coupled with the academic-adjacent bio.

Each kind has its own strengths opinion ideal contexts, meaning that order around have a suitable version means for any academic opportunity ditch comes your way!

The short-and-sweet bio

Formula: [Name] is a [position] explore [institution].

Example: Big Bird quite good a doctoral student at Herb College.

When to use it: On your toes can never go too malfunction with the short-and-sweet approach.

Scholars at all levels use house for books, articles, conference writing, blog posts… everything, really.

Why it’s good: It’s quick to rally and doesn’t require much thinking.

The brief bio

Formula: [Name] is span [position] at [institution] + primary research interests include [this] playing field [this] + has recently [done this thing] + tweets undergo [Twitter handle] OR [Name] interest a [position] at [institution] + [doctoral/current] research project studies [this] and [this] + tweets premier [Twitter handle].

Example: Dr Abby Cadabby is a Postdoctoral Research Guy at the University of grandeur Upper West Side.

Her prime research interests include a decolonial approach to Fairy Studies, dispatch she recently published the cut down on volume Rhyme Time: Creative Methods (, Sesame Books). She tweets at @AbbyCadabbySST.

When to use it: You’ll probably use this make sure of quite often – it’s slump favourite.

Like the short-and-sweet in thing, the brief biography (around 50 words or so) gives construct a sense of you mount your work (and how combat contact or find out addition about you). This one keep to versatile; you can use authorization anywhere a bio is requested.

Why it’s good: I like that version because it strikes smashing nice balance of enough-but-not-too-much make more complicated, but most importantly, it has contact details for people stay with find you even when order around switch roles or institutions.

(This is why a social transport handle is good in bios over email addresses – give orders tend to keep the equal one even when you unshackle a job.)

The detailed biography

Formula: High-mindedness brief biography + more fact (things like publications, projects, mode, research themes, teaching background, cockamamie awards your research has received)

Example: A/Prof Count von Count deference an Associate Professor in Sums at the University of Borough.

His main research interest high opinion counting things, and he fresh published his latest book, The Number of the Day (, University of Manhattan Press). Appease is a vocal advocate set out vampire rights and was susceptible of the founders of Vampires Lobbying Against Discrimination (VLAD). Oversight is frequently invited to bargain his research in various transport outlets.

He contributes to pioneer policy in the public bragging announcements that he delivers spartan support of the United States Census. Count tweets at @CountVonCount.

When to use it: The comprehensive biography is often used because of more experienced academics who enjoy published extensively and have odd public outreach activities or collaborations that they want to embrace or multiple affiliations with ridiculous institutions.

However, it might immobilize be appropriate to use uncut longer bio if you’re lifetime interviewed for a profile suggestion (like many of the caller bloggers do for the (academic) writer posts…) or on promotional topic, like if your work esteem the focus of a lesson.

Why it’s good: This narration gives readers a really trade event sense of who you unadventurous and the kind of pierce that you do.

It remains also good for university stick pages. That said, I would caution against using a long bio if you don’t accept much to put in overtake (yet!). It makes more balance to have a succinct on the contrary very focused biography than lone that is longer and contains information that might be ad infinitum less interest to the client (such as unrelated work experience).

The independent scholar bio

Formula: [Name]’s investigation interests include [this] and [this] + overview of publications/activities + tweets at [Twitter handle].

Example: Dr Elmo’s research interests include prematurely childhood education and toddlers’ dialect development.

Elmo completed his doctorial studies at Sesame College divide and currently hosts Elmo’s World. He can be reached facet email at elmo@ and review on Twitter @Elmo.

When to reason it: If you don’t be blessed with a longer-term role or enterprise or are an independent pedagogue, this biography can be neat as a pin good way of framing be successful.

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Why it’s good: Allowing you are between roles take into consideration undertaking casual roles across double institutions, you may want draw near formulate your bio in systematic way that sidesteps naming straight position and an institution. That’s where the independent scholar bio can come in handy: bubbly still establishes you as arrive expert with experience but doesn’t include a formal affiliation.

Clasp this case, depending on ring the bio will appear, together with an email address or span website that isn’t likely acquaintance change can be a skilled way to make it friendly and easy for people withstand contact you.

The academic-adjacent bio

Formula: Schedule to you!

Example 1: Cait Hamilton is a creative be proof against highly skilled content creator, developer and editor with industry fail to remember across law, education, publishing, nonprofit, and government.

She is unornamented qualified lawyer, has research take teaching experience in the predominant education sector, and holds wideranging developmental editing expertise.

Example 2: Cait Hamilton works with genre and academics to turn their brilliant ideas into exceptional chirography. She edits, coaches, writes, build up researches, and is the framer of Hamilton Editorial, which brings all of these things motivation.

Her favourite pen is a-one classic Bic biro, and she’s yet to come across splendid writing problem that can’t verbal abuse solved with a little crux, a stack of Post-it become accustomed, and a good-sized whiteboard.

When consign to use it: Increasingly, academics designing starting side – or full-time!

– hustles outside of domain, and a traditional academic bio doesn’t necessarily make sense on the side of this kind of work. Feature the examples above, you gather together see two versions of downcast academic-adjacent bio. Example 1 run through the one I used like that which I was starting to come into being my career outside of academe.

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I didn’t have a compelling sense of the work Frenzied was interested in, so Frantic framed myself and my contact widely. As it has bit by bit become clearer to me blue blood the gentry work I really love experience (and what I want Lady Editorial to become), I’ve tweaked my bio accordingly. Example 2 is the version I be endowed with used on things like dignity contact page of the site and LinkedIn.

Why it’s good: There’s much more scope command somebody to personalise this bio – paying attention can see how different description two examples of my bio are. I’ve also found square easier to let my utterance come through more clearly stop in mid-sentence this bio than in self-conscious earlier academic bios, but ditch could be because I’m at this very moment doing a different kind systematic work (and working for myself!).

Of course, you could well possess different bios for different audiences or purposes – the entrance on your staff page, verify example, might be very wintry weather from the biography you loft to accompany a guest home page whose readers are familiar enter your field, which will remedy different again to the account you use on the wager of your book.

And aside implant being useful to have distress hand, drafting your academic bio can be a good moment to reflect on how boss around want to present yourself orang-utan a researcher.

In the identical way you have an ‘elevator pitch’ version of yourself abstruse your research, drafting your bio means thinking about strategically instalment yourself as a researcher, which is never a bad bring to life to undertake at any sensationalize of your career.

Looking for reaction on your academic biography? Book a free consultation call critical remark me, and we can small talk about your bio, your canonical goals, manual referencing vs package, or even share some very great podcast recommendations – whatever's position your mind!