Description
For this assignment, you will closely analyze a peer-reviewed article from a scholarly journal that you expect to be useful for your future research paper (if you later change your mind thats fine). This exercise will give you practice in critically evaluating sources according to specific criteria (discussed below), and will model the type of source summary and critique you should do in any research paper. Moreover, the work you do in this assignment should ideally feed directly into your research paper project later this semester.
Directions
Write a paper (double-spaced text, standard margins) which describes, analyzes, and evaluates a scholarly article that is relevant to your research interest. Organize your paper according to the sections listed below; use the questions below as a starting point for analyzing the articles (but do not hesitate to ask your own questions; you will inevitably think of some); and compare and contrast the sources within your discussion. Naturally, some of the questions below will apply to any given article, and others will not use your judgment about which questions are most relevant and important to your choices.
Style & Format
Follow MLA formatting guidelines.
This essay should be written for an audience that HAS NOT read the original article, and so you will report the major and minor ideas contained in the piece.
Selecting Your Article
Your first step is to identify an interesting article for your analysis. You may pick any article relating to technology. Article guidelines are detailed on the Selecting an Argument assignment.
Organizing your Analysis
Here are the sections you should use to organize your analysis essay. Use the questions as starting points you do not have to address them necessarily in this order, and you may find that some of the questions overlap a bit. Clean up any repetition in your discussion as you revise your essay. Your organization within sections ultimately should be determined by the points you want to make in your analysis, not by my list of prompts. Finally, remember you should support your claims about the source with evidence (i.e., examples) from the article.
Use at least one direct quote from the article. Quotation marks should be used. Introduce the direct quote with a “signal” phrase, such as McMillan-Clifton writes or the article states or this website argues that etc.
Use at least one paraphrase from the article. Put the authors ideas in your own words, but stay true to the original intent. Introduce the paraphrase with a tag phrase, as mentioned above. Remember that, as a general rule, phrases of 4 or more words that are exactly the same as the original text should be treated like a quote, not a paraphrase.
Introduction: Brief Overall Description of the Article
Introduce the author and title of the article. (Article titles are set with quotation marks.
What is the subject matter of the articles? What is their overall purpose (informative? persuasive?) and who is their intended audience? Can you identify the thesis/research question?
Indicate the articles thesis idea, if there is one. This thesis should be contained within your introduction. Be sure to also give the title of the article, the author(s), and where & when it was originally published.
What is the basic structure and format of the sources?
Research Methods / Disciplinary Perspective
Characterize the research and analytic methods used by your author. Are the methods quantitative or qualitative? Describe the approach as best you can, even if you are not familiar with all the technical details.
What kinds of key questions and critical assumptions are evident in the article?
Is the article interdisciplinary in its orientation? If so, to what degree? How can you tell?
Data / Evidence
What kind of data does the author examine primary documents, statistical information, experimental results, anecdotal evidence, interviews of authors, literary or historical texts, etc.? Are the data subjective, objective, or a mix of the two?
What sort of things counts as evidence in this article? How strong and compelling is this evidence? Which article uses evidence/data more effectively; or, do they simply use different kinds of evidence?
How well documented are the data? Does the author provide a way for you to evaluate the accuracy and quality of the evidence used?
Credibility
Who is the author? Is s/he authoritative? Published in the field? Respected among colleagues? What kind of information does the source give, if any?
What is the publishing body of the source? Is it a respected journal or institution? Does the publishing body lend the author credibility?
Does the source seem to be trustworthy? Why or why not?
Rhetoric and Style
Characterize the writing style and rhetoric (persuasive techniques) of your article.
How does the author connect with his/her specified audience? Think here about what kind of tone is adopted (objective, judgmental, reserved, strident, urgent, partisan, etc.), what sorts of examples are used, how the author might frame a particular point or example, what kind of jargon is used (or not used, as the case may be), and anything else you can think of.
How well does the author address the significance of his/her topics? Are you made to care about the issues importance, the implications of the study, etc.? Does the author address and/or define significance in different ways? If so, how?
Conclusion: Overall Usefulness to Your Research
What did you learn from the source? If the article was an argument, were you convinced?
What kinds of data, claims, research methods, and/or background material are relevant to your own research interests?
Works Cited
Give the full bibliographic citation for each of your secondary sources in MLA format
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