English

Essay #1 – Discipline Review (1,100 word minimum) 20%

Purpose: The purpose of this assignment is to familiarize yourself with the practice of writing and research in your individual discipline, including the authoritative resources and techniques of writing and research within your specific field, as done by professionals and academics. You will be required to find, examine, and review one of each of the following in your field: A scholarly journal, a trade publication, an institution/organization, and an electronic source/database. You are seeking to discover what publications/sources people read in your field and why (and what groups/organizations people in your field join and why). You should investigate several sources for each category and choose to write about only the leading sources in your field. You will also discuss the function/purpose of research within your discipline as well as any ethical issues/practices in your field.

Three Major Sections:

Introduction to Research and Writing in the Discipline --You should begin with a detailed introduction which acts as a discussion of the role that research and writing plays in your field . Be specific and make sure to discuss how/why writing and research in your field are unique/distinct from other related or unrelated disciplines, or just “writing/research” in general. For example, if you are a Psychology major, what makes Psych research and writing any different from that of what an Accounting or Events Management major/professional might do?

Ongoing Problems in the Discipline -- Following the introduction, you should list and discuss TWO current (on-going) problems related to your field/discipline. An example of this, for a Criminology Major, might be “overcrowding in privatized prison systems,” or for a Nursing Major “understaffing caused by low Nursing School enrollments.” Areas for potential discussion include how/why this problem is related (if the connection is unclear or indirect) to your discipline, the effect this has/is having on academics and/or professionals in your discipline, and large-scale repercussions/consequences (that is, how does/can this problem affect even those outside your field?).

Analysis of Sources – Then, you should find and describe each of the four (Scholarly Journal, Trade Magazine/journal, Scholarly Research Database, and Research Organization) authoritative sources in your field (who publishes it, who funds or sponsors it, who contributes to it, its location/affiliation, and any other relevant information which establishes its relevance/credibility/importance, etc) and must argue why/for what reason each source is the leader or standard in your field. You should not only use claims/evidence from the source itself in order to corroborate that the source is the most authoritative in the field. Rather you should collect independent research, and/or use your own logic or justifications, to help you argue/prove that the sources you’ve chosen are the top/most authoritative for someone working/studying in your discipline. Note: You may use subheadings here for each source (“Scholarly Journal”, “Trade Publication”, etc.).

This should not simply be a series of facts or statistics (we all have google! But only you will be spending time examining and analyzing these particular sources) – we are looking for convincing arguments as to how and why the chosen sources are valuable and useful for your discipline. What are they used for? By whom/in what way(s)? This is meant to be an analysis, so consider how or why you chose these sources over similar competing sources.

For Scholarly Journal and Trade Publication (each), discuss how/in what way you could envision using the resource (the journal or magazine itself, not necessarily just an individual article/essay) as a resource in narrowing your “problem” or topic idea into a research question or questions. This is to say, how or why would you return to these sources as resources for your own individual research?

You must do independent research (you may start with the INFO guides and writing guides from GMU, but may also find it useful to use Google to further your search or talk to a research librarian) in order to ascertain upon what criteria you should base your judgments. That is to say, in order to determine which sources are most authoritative, you must first learn what people in your discipline look for in a source. You should also search for circulation statistics (how widely read/distributed a publication is) for your print/text sources and membership statistics (how many people belong, what is required to join) for your organization. All sources MUST be academic in value and purpose. This means no blogs, YouTube, or commercial organizations (businesses).

This is a thesis driven report – your thesis must contain a claim that states which sources are most authoritative as well as a reason why this is so . You should also consider and discuss the (potential) role that these sources and source types might or do play in your discipline’s research discourse. These are the most important goals of this assignment and thus should be the focus of each paragraph/section, not just listing of facts.

Audience: Academic peers that are interested in your discipline, but are also new to it. This is a specific audience and should inform not only the information included but also the diction, syntax, and degree of jargon/technical language appropriate.

Formatting: You should compose this assignment using relevant headings and subheadings such as those which appear above (“Introduction…”, “Ongoing Problems…” etc.). The paper should be cited accurately in MLA or APA style. ALL sources used/chosen should be cited in-text and at the end of the assignment under a Works Cited heading. All sources consulted/used for comparison must be cited at the end under the heading Works Consulted.

A title page is required. The font should be Times New Roman, or comparable, with 1 inch margins and your word count should be clearly listed on your title page. Failure to meet the required word count will result in a significantly reduced grade. Note: There is a difference between a JOURNAL (a publication which comes out X amount of times per year, with anywhere from 5-20 articles per issue) and a SINGLE ARTICLE. We do not want analysis or summary of a single article here. You should investigate a journal, trade publication, database, institution, etc AS A WHOLE. Finally, this should not simply be a series of cut/pasted information (“boiler plate”) from the web page’s of your chosen sources. The criteria, choice and defense of sources should be original.

Useful Links: These links might be useful places to begin your research. These are only suggestions to get you started, not the only possibilities. GMU Library – Help with Research http://library.gmu.edu/research/

GMU Writing Center – Writing in Your Major http://writingcenter.gmu.edu/?page_id=12 GMU Subject Librarians – http://library.gmu.edu/liaisons GMU INFOguides – http://infoguides.gmu.edu/