“I” Was Wrong, Until “I” Wasn’t

“I” Was Forbidden

Starting as early as elementary school, I remember being taught to keep first person point of view out of my essays. I was told that saying “I” weakened the arguments I made, that I should just present my claims and evidence objectively. This sentiment was parroted and maintained throughout middle school, high school, and even my first two years of college. Most of time, it went unsaid. Until earlier this week, early on a Thursday morning in my “Intro to Writing” class, this idea went completely unchallenged.

Suddenly, this unspoken rule, this absolute truth of higher level writing, was being rewritten. One assigned reading later, a new perspective was there to recontextualize this truth. Kate McKinney Maddalena posits that there are times in these writings where the use of personal “I” voice is appropriate, and can even add to the text.

So When Can “I” be Used?

Depending on what type of writing you’re doing, you may be less hesitant to use “I”. Something like this blog post, for example, practically begs for the use of “I” voice. My own personal perspective and reflection on the reading is being asked for by the prompt, so the most effective way to convey that is through the use of “I”. This creates a very personal response. I may be reacting to the same text as my classmates, but my interpretation of and feelings on the words I have taken in are my own. Comparing my post to ChatGPT’s, you can see the difference. The AI regurgitates what was given to it by the prompt and the reading without really adding of substance. The human touch is missing, something that the use of “I” voice helps to create in certain circumstances.

However, academic papers are not blog posts. The expectations for these two forms of writing are different. Essays and scientific papers are expected to be a bit less personal, and a bit more objective. This is where we were practically conditioned to avoid “I” at all costs. In spite of this, Maddalena proposes that certain conditions allow for “I” voice in these forms of writing. The ways “I” voice improve these writings, according to Maddalena, are:

1. Objectivity and Integrity
2. Clarifying Who’s Saying What
3. Ownership, Intellectual Involvement, and Exigency
4. Rhetorical Sophistication

I was a bit skeptical at first, but the examples that Maddalena provides show that it is possible for “I” voice to achieve these goals, and even strengthen a paper in certain cases. It’s something I had never considered, having learned those simplified ideas of the “correct” way to write academically. I’m not sure how often I will make use of “I” voice in my academic papers going forward. This sort of thing is up to the discretion of my individual professors, after all. Still, it was important for me to hear Maddalena’s perspective in order to broaden my understanding of writing. Some rules are made to be broken.