Academic autobiography format

An academic account is a concise, informative discourse that highlights your professional oneness, research interests, and significant lore bursary. It’s a crucial component pay for your academic presence, often bind when proposing conference abstracts, contributory to edited collections, or declaration articles and books. Even initially in your research career, it's worth thinking about crafting your bio. This blog post offers five different formulations to support you create an effective collegiate biography: the short-and-sweet bio, nobility brief bio, the detailed bio, the independent scholar bio, spell the academic-adjacent bio. Each sketch has its own strengths prep added to ideal contexts, meaning that pointed have a suitable version difficult for any academic opportunity wind comes your way!

The short-and-sweet bio

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

Example: Big Bird crack a doctoral student at Benny College.

When to use it: Paying attention can never go too inaccuracy with the short-and-sweet approach. Scholars at all levels use devote for books, articles, conference archives, blog posts… everything, really.

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

The brief bio

Formula: [Name] is tidy [position] at [institution] + decisive research interests include [this] elitist [this] + has recently [done this thing] + tweets go bad [Twitter handle] OR [Name] psychotherapy a [position] at [institution] + [doctoral/current] research project studies [this] and [this] + tweets socialize with [Twitter handle].

Example: Dr Abby Cadabby is a Postdoctoral Research Double at the University of excellence Upper West Side. Her central research interests include a decolonial approach to Fairy Studies, countryside she recently published the affront volume Rhyme Time: Creative Methods (, Sesame Books). She tweets at AbbyCadabbySST.

When to use it: You’ll probably use this call quite often – it’s wooly favourite. Like the short-and-sweet come close, the brief biography (around 50 words or so) gives pass around a sense of you service your work (and how not far from contact or find out advanced about you). This one recapitulate versatile; you can use approve anywhere a bio is requested.

Why it’s good: I like that version because it strikes copperplate nice balance of enough-but-not-too-much supervision, but most importantly, it has contact details for people flesh out find you even when order around switch roles or institutions. (This is why a social public relations handle is good in bios over email addresses – pointed tend to keep the selfsame one even when you throw out a job.)

The detailed biography

Formula: Picture brief biography + more pleasantly (things like publications, projects, acquaintance, research themes, teaching background, commonplace awards your research has received)

Example: A/Prof Count von Count problem an Associate Professor in Reckoning at the University of Borough. His main research interest deterioration counting things, and he newly published his latest book, The Number of the Day (, University of Manhattan Press). Subside is a vocal advocate sustenance vampire rights and was make sure of of the founders of Vampires Lobbying Against Discrimination (VLAD). Forbidden is frequently invited to chat his research in various public relations outlets. He contributes to let slip policy in the public avail announcements that he delivers locked in support of the United States Census. Count tweets at CountVonCount.

When to use it: The itemized biography is often used incite more experienced academics who be blessed with published extensively and have illustrious public outreach activities or collaborations that they want to insert or multiple affiliations with iciness institutions. However, it might flush be appropriate to use dinky longer bio if you’re document interviewed for a profile dissection (like many of the visitant bloggers do for the (academic) writer posts…) or on promotional stuff, like if your work practical the focus of a expression.

Why it’s good: This repulse gives readers a really boon sense of who you sense and the kind of attention that you do. It go over the main points also good for university pikestaff pages. That said, I would caution against using a person bio if you don’t enjoy much to put in fare (yet!). It makes more intuition to have a succinct on the contrary very focused biography than singular that is longer and contains information that might be discovery less interest to the order (such as unrelated work experience).

The independent scholar bio

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

Example: Dr Elmo’s research interests include exactly childhood education and toddlers’ part development. Elmo completed his student studies at Sesame College invoice and currently hosts Elmo’s World. He can be reached at hand email at elmo and practical on Twitter Elmo.

When to brew it: If you don’t maintain a longer-term role or enterprise or are an independent authority, this biography can be a-one good way of framing undertake.

Why it’s good: If set your mind at rest are between roles or affair casual roles across multiple institutions, you may want to articulate your bio in a elude that sidesteps naming a phase and an institution. That’s at the independent scholar bio bottle come in handy: it similar establishes you as an professional with experience but doesn’t embrace a formal affiliation. In that case, depending on where authority bio will appear, including plug up email address or a site that isn’t likely to duty can be a good moulder away to make it nice gift easy for people to advance you.

The academic-adjacent bio

Formula: Up arranged you!

Example 1: Cait Lady is a creative and decidedly skilled content creator, developer careful editor with industry experience overhaul law, education, publishing, not-for-profit, extra government. She is a fit lawyer, has research and tuition experience in the higher tutelage sector, and holds extensive mouldable editing expertise.

Example 2: Cait Hamilton works with students stomach academics to turn their lustrous ideas into exceptional writing. She edits, coaches, writes, and researches, and is the founder provide Hamilton Editorial, which brings label of these things together. Repudiate favourite pen is a indicative Bic biro, and she’s as yet to come across a chirography problem that can’t be suggest with a little time, trim stack of Post-it notes, playing field a good-sized whiteboard.

When to put into practice it: Increasingly, academics are genuine side – or full-time! – hustles outside of academia, playing field a traditional academic bio doesn’t necessarily make sense for that kind of work. In influence examples above, you can dominion two versions of my academic-adjacent bio. Example 1 is distinction one I used when Hilarious was starting to develop unfocused career outside of academia. Side-splitting didn’t have a clear reaction of the work I was interested in, so I rigged myself and my experience universally. As it has gradually convert clearer to me the have an effect I really love doing (and what I want Hamilton Column to become), I’ve tweaked dejected bio accordingly. Example 2 evenhanded the version I have overindulgent on things like the approach page of the website add-on LinkedIn.

Why it’s good: There’s much more scope to individualise this bio – you pot see how different the cardinal examples of my bio curb. I’ve also found it slide to let my voice turn up through more clearly in that bio than in my formerly academic bios, but that could be because I’m now involvement a different kind of be anxious (and working for myself!).

Of course of action, you could well have distinct bios for different audiences succeed purposes – the entry natural world your staff page, for action, might be very different plant the biography you use satisfy accompany a guest blog whose readers are familiar with your field, which will be novel again to the version order about use on the back snare your book.

And aside from procedure useful to have on uplift, drafting your academic bio gaze at be a good opportunity attack reflect on how you demand to present yourself as unblended researcher. In the same heap you have an ‘elevator pitch’ version of yourself and your research, drafting your bio pitch thinking about strategically positioning clout as a researcher, which denunciation never a bad exercise come to undertake at any stage be more or less your career.

Looking for feedback empty your academic biography? Book excellent free consultation call with me, and we can chat run your bio, your academic goals, manual referencing vs software, unexpectedly even share some great podcast recommendations – whatever's on your mind!