Week Two Assignment 1: Mini Annotated Bibliography

Mini Annotated Bibliography

The Conversation

At this point, you have entered a pre-existing conversation about a subject. What

sources would help you prove the point? For instance, if I were writing a paper about

the difference between college level and high school level writing, I might need to find

some scholarly sources that have discussed this subject. Particularly, I would like to

find sources that support my thesis.

Think about what parts of the conversation are left out and need to be

represented. Perhaps, I realize that I (and others writing on the subject) have only

included the voices of college professors and no high school teachers. The readers of my

essay might think I am being unfair, so I reason that I should find an article written by a

high school teacher. This might lead me to research in journals that focus on secondary

education.

Information vs. Conversation

Oftentimes when research is required in papers, students take the easy way out

and use their research to establish facts. This may be necessary in a paper, to a certain

extent, as most papers will have facts, and facts should come from solid sources.

However, real academic research is more about finding other articles that add to the

conversation so readers understand where they are in the broader conversation. A huge

portion of your college career will be about finding who is talking to whom about what.

To some extent, you must recreate the conversation to discover what you can add to the

conversation or to find a research niche for yourself. I would like you to try to find

sources that do more than just define a term or establish a fact.

Using Popular Sources

Most of the papers you write in college will be strictly academic papers, but the

thematic readings you've been assigned are a mix of popular and scholarly articles. In

our final paper, only one of your required outside sources must be a scholarly paper.

Because the issues covered in thematic readings are topical subjects, you may find

articles about your subject in popular magazines, in newspaper stories, editorials, or in

full-length books (of the electronic or old-fashioned variety). The same rules apply. If

you choose to use a popular source, make sure the popular source is one that is relevant

to the conversation you are entering.

Reliable and Current Sources

With scholarly articles, you are assured to some extent of their reliability and

credibility because the journals are peer-reviewed. This means that other scholars in

that field have discussed the article and its sources. With popular sources, the issue is

more complicated. Specifically, you should be very careful in choosing reliable media

sources when using them to support your own points. For instance, many websites can

lack credibility or impartiality. Be careful quoting any information from a source that

might have a reason to distort. Check their sources if possible and refer to the source

itself. Scrutinize the credentials of the writer and the source to make sure it is reliable.

In other words, you can generally trust the conclusions and facts in scholarly

sources more than popular sources, but you should make sure any source you use is

current and relevant.

For example, if I were writing a paper on cyber security, I might wonder if a

paper published in 1990 would still be relevant to the conversation, as this is a subject

that moves quickly and changes often. In other subjects, what people have said a long

time ago may well be relevant to the conversation, but just make sure you use your

judgment. If there is a more current and relevant source, use that source instead.

So, for both popular and academic sources consider the following questions

when doing your research:

1. Does this source add something vital to the conversation?

2. Does the source support my thesis? How does the source fit in the

conversation?

3. Am I using the source for more than just information or definition?

4. Is the source current enough to be relevant?

5. If the source is a popular source, is it trustworthy?

First, you should review the NU Library Tutorial embedded below this

document. This tutorial explains peer-reviewed articles and shows how to find them in

NU's virtual library. As noted in the tutorial, the librarians can be contacted by phone or

email to answer questions and provide further assistance with your research.

National University Library Hours and Contact Information

http://library.nu.edu/

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Mini Annotated Bibliography: Instructions

In many courses in your college career, you may be asked to write an annotated

bibliography. Annotated bibliographies help you sort out the conversation about your

subject. They are a way to summarize and then evaluate whether the source is relevant

for your paper. They also help you build your paper when it comes time to write.

Step 1: State your thesis.

Step 2: Find three sources that address the subject you are studying, one must be

from a scholarly journal. Cite the source in MLA citation style.

Step 3: Choose two quotes from each text that might be useful in your paper and

write them down. The quotes may be as short as a sentence or as long as a

paragraph. You will have time to be more selective in the paper itself.

Step 4: For each source (with its corresponding pair of quotes), explain how the

source fits in the conversation and how you might use it to support your claims

(100 words minimum).

Example (follow this example for all three sources you find)

Thesis: "Writing classes in high school do not prepare students for college level

writing because they do not put writing assignments in the context of larger

conversations."

Bartholomae, David. "Inventing the University." When a Writer Can’t Write:

Studies in Writer’s Block and Other Composing Process Problems. Ed. Mike

Rose. New York: Guilford, 1985. 134-165. Rpt. in Cross-Talk in Comp Theory: A

Reader. Ed. Victor Villanueva, Jr. Urbana, IL: NCTE, 1997. 589-619.

Quote #1: "Every time a student sits down to write for us, he has to invent the

university for the occasion--invent the university, that is, or a branch of it, like

history or anthropology or economics or English. The student has to learn to

speak our language, to speak as we do, to try on the peculiar ways of knowing,

selecting, evaluating, reporting, concluding, and arguing that define the

discourse of our community."

Quote #2: "There is, to be sure, an important distinction to be made between

learning history, say, and learning to write as a historian."

Evaluative Annotation:

This source will be vital in my argument because it was the seminal article that

recognized the need for students to understand that they are entering academic

conversations in college-level writing. It establishes that college-level writers are

learning the specific discourse patterns of their fields. This shift in theory, I will

postulate, has still yet to trickle down to high school level pedagogy. This article

provides the theoretical backing that supports my entire argument.