Unit IV Assignment 1

◼ Distinguish between Popular and Scholarly Sources

To determine the type of information to use, you also need to decide whether you should look for popular or scholarly books and articles. Popular sources of information — newspapers like USA Today and The Chronicle of Higher Education, and large-circulation magazines like Time Magazine and Field & Stream — are written for a general audience. This is not to say that popular sources cannot be specialized: The Chronicle of Higher Education is read mostly by academics; Field & Stream, by people who love the outdoors. But they are written so that any educated reader can understand them. Scholarly sources, by contrast, are written for experts in a particular field. The New England Journal of Medicine may be read by people who are not physicians, but they are not the journal’s primary audience. In a manner of speaking, these readers are eavesdropping on the journal’s conversation of ideas; they are not expected to contribute to it (and in fact would be hard pressed to do so). The articles in scholarly journals undergo peer review. That is, they do not get published until they have been carefully evaluated by the author’s peers, other experts in the academic conversation being conducted in the journal. Reviewers may comment at length about an article’s level of research and writing, and an author may have to revise an article several times before it sees print. And if the reviewers cannot reach a consensus that the research makes an important contribution to the academic conversation, the article will not be published.

When you begin your research, you may find that popular sources provide helpful information about a topic or an issue — the results of a national poll, for example. Later, however, you will want to use scholarly sources to advance your argument. You can see from  Table 7.2  that popular magazines and scholarly journals can be distinguished by a number of characteristics. Does the source contain advertisements? If so, what kinds of advertisements? For commercial products? Or for academic events and resources? How do the advertisements appear? If you find ads and glossy pictures and illustrations, you are probably looking at a popular magazine. This is in contrast to the tables, charts, and diagrams you are likely to find in an education, psychology, or microbiology journal. Given your experience with rhetorical analyses, you should also be able to determine the makeup of your audience — specialists or nonspecialists — and the level of language you need to use in your writing.

TABLE 7.2Popular Magazines versus Scholarly Journals
CRITERIA	POPULAR MAGAZINES	SCHOLARLY JOURNALS
Advertisements	Numerous full-page color ads	Few if any ads
Appearance	Eye-catching; glossy; pictures and illustrations	Plain; black-and-white graphics, tables, charts, and diagrams
Audience	General	Professors, researchers, and college students
Author	Journalists	Professionals in an academic field or discipline
Bibliography	Brief acknowledgment of sources in text, usually without complete citation information	Extensive bibliography at the end of each article; footnotes and other documentation
Content	General articles to inform, update, or introduce a contemporary issue	Research projects, methodology, and theory
Examples	Newsweek, National Review, PC World, Psychology Today	International Journal of Applied Engineering Research, New England Journal of Medicine
Language	Nontechnical, simple vocabulary	Specialized vocabulary
Publisher	Commercial publisher	Professional organization, university, research institute, or scholarly press
Information from materials at the Hesburgh Library, University of Notre Dame.

Again, as you define your task for yourself, it is important to consider why you would use one source or another. Do you want facts? Opinions? News reports? Research studies? Analyses? Personal reflections? The extent to which the information can help you make your argument will serve as your basis for determining whether a source of information is of value.

Steps to Identifying Sources

1. Consult experts who can guide your research. Talk to people who can help you formulate issues and questions.

2. Develop a working knowledge of standard sources. Identify the different kinds of information that different types of sources provide.

3. Distinguish between primary and secondary sources. Decide what type of information can best help you answer your research question.

4. Distinguish between popular and scholarly sources. Determine what kind of information will persuade your readers.

A Practice Sequence: Identifying Sources

We would now like you to practice using some of the strategies we have discussed so far: talking with experts, deciding what sources of information you should use, and determining what types of information can best help you develop your paper and persuade your readers. We assume you have chosen a topic for your paper, identified an issue, and perhaps formulated a working thesis. If not, think back to some of the topics mentioned in earlier chapters. Have any of them piqued your interest? If not, here are five very broad topics you might work with:

· higher education student loans

· the media and gender

· global health

· science and religion

· immigration

Once you’ve decided on a topic, talk to experts and decide which types of sources you should use: primary or secondary, popular or scholarly. Consult with your classmates to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of different sources of information and the appropriateness of using different types of information. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Talk to a librarian about the sources you might use to get information about your topic (for example, databases, abstracts, or bibliographies). Be sure to take notes.

2. Talk to an expert who can provide you with some ideas about current issues in the field of interest. Be sure to take detailed notes.

3. Decide whether you should use primary or secondary sources or some combination of the two. What type of information would help you develop your argument?

4. Decide whether you should use popular or scholarly sources or whether some of each would be appropriate. What type of information would your readers find compelling?