ENG

As Behrens and Rosen note, we must be willing and able to evaluate critically any and all potential source materials.  The following is an elaboration of the criteria they discuss in Chapter 7.

• Accuracy
  • How can we ascertain whether a source is accurate?
    • Verify! Do other sources affirm the accuracy of the information?
    • Where is the source published? Is it a credible publication?
• Authority
  • How can we determine whether a source is authoritative?
    • Who is the author?
      • Check credentials
        • What are the author’s affiliations (professional/academic)?
      • Can you contact the author?
        • Does the source include contact information?
          • Email address
          • Phone
    • Does the source have certain elements which identify it as authoritative?
      • Books
        • Table of Contents
        • Preface/Introduction
        • Index
        • Glossary
        • Appendices
        • Bibliography
      • Articles
        • Abstract
        • Bibliography
• Objectivity
  • How can we determine whether a source is objective?
  • One key truth: we must accept that all things have bias: even what appears to be neutral, such as objective reporting, is as a result of conscious decisions such as what to report and what not to report
• Currency
  • What does "current" mean?
  • For different fields, what is current will differ greatly
    • Fast-moving bodies of knowledge (i.e. technology)
      • Maybe something a year old is already too old
    • Slower-moving bodies of knowledge (e.g. literature or some social issues)
      • the range of what might be current will be larger and dependent on the subject matter
      • for instance, an article written 50 years about a poem by Robert Frost may still be current
• Coverage
  • How can we determine a source's coverage?
  • The extent of coverage will naturally differ according to the type of publication
    • Books clearly will cover more ground (broader focus)
    • Articles less so (narrower focus)

Your goal in this assignment is to apply these five criteria to the following three articles about Chief Wahoo:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_Wahoo

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1015/p09s01-coop.html

frybergmarkusoysermanstone2008_1_.pdf 

For each article, assess its accuracy, authority, objectivity, currency, and coverage, according to the above; then, based on your assessment of the criteria, make an evaluation of the article's overall credibility. For your convenience, I am attaching a handy table into which you can write your assessments; it is in Microsoft Word format.  Open it, write your assessments, save your changes, and then submit the file here as an attachment before 11:59 p.m. on 3/25.

IWA 5 Table.docx