English Assignment

Unit 1 Assignment Sheet

The Natural Sciences: Popular Science Article

Background:

             For many complicated reasons, there is a rift in our culture between scientific research and popular understanding. Whether one considers the hyper-politicization of climate change findings or simply the way in which many researchers struggle to explain the social relevance of their work, it is clear that scientific research does not always travel seamlessly from the laboratory to the public. With this in mind, we will take on the task of synthesizing and translating scientific research into a concise and accessible article. Apart from allowing us each to explore an area of current scientific research, this assignment will develop valuable communication skills that are sorely lacking both inside and outside of academic communities.

Because we’re concerned with making science relevant to a popular audience, we will focus on scientific research that is directly related to people and their surroundings—namely, the broad and diverse field of environmental science. As we will explore, environmental science includes (but is not limited to) earth sciences, ecology, biology, chemistry, and physics, and it has numerous applications and purposes. As research on issues such as global warming and pollution of the North Carolina coast suggest, environmental science is one discipline that the public cannot afford to ignore, which is why it's the perfect place to practice our skills of scientific communication.

Rhetorical Chart:

Genre	Audience	Purpose	Role	Rhetorical Situation
Popular science blogpost.	Since we’ll be reading each other’s posts in class, your peers in ENGL 105 constitute your primary audience.	Translate scientific research about environmental science into engaging and accessible terms for a popular audience. As we’ll discuss, this translation of science often entails a specific message or thesis.	Popular science correspondent or journalist for website.	Readers wish to know about current research being done on an environmental science issue. You’re tasked to familiarize yourself with the research in order to inform them through a concise and multimedia blogpost.

1. familiarize yourself with the conventions of scientific writing

2. familiarize yourself with current research on an environmental science topic of your choice

3. understand the differences between scientific research article and popular science article/blogpost genres

4. translate key ideas from scientific research articles into a contextualized, accessible and popular science article

5. craft a carefully edited and multimedia popular science blogpost

Choosing a topic and finding research: We will spend time together in class (and with a guest from the library) so that each of you can select a topic. An appropriate topic will address current research being down within the broad field of environmental science. Your source selection should be informed by discussions we have in class regarding invaluable research concepts such as reliability, validity, peer-review, etc. After choosing a topic, you will each find and read five sources (articles) of research. The sources should all relate topically/thematically to a central concern or issue in environmental science.

Feeder 1.1: Annotated Bibliography—5 Annotations

After finding and reading five sources of scientific research, you will each compose an annotated bibliography, a document which summarizes and evaluates each source. With one 150-200 word entry per source, you should provide a concise summary overview of the key points of each article (4-5 sentences) as well as your own critical take on the article and its relevance to your main topic (2-3 sentences).

For each entry in your bibliography, think about these kinds of questions:

· What are the key points of the research?

· What is the history and/or context for the research?

· Why was the study or research done?

· What are the implications (for scientists and society more generally)?

· What were the problems with the study, whether these problems are stated or you’ve identified them yourself?

· How does the article relate to the other four articles that you’ve found?

The annotated bibliography will make you comfortable with your topic and prepare you for Feeder 1.2, the rough draft of the blog article. Be sure to use proper APA citation to cite your sources.

Do not worry if a particular source does not perfectly address the environmental science topic that you picked at the beginning. If you discover that an article is not as useful as you originally thought, use your annotation to explain why this is the case and keep that source in mind as you continue to consider what makes it “not useful.” What makes it different than you other sources? Are there logical fallacies in the primary research question? Do the key points of the source not directly relate to the primary research question? Are there elements that are either missing or could be expanded upon?

Feeder 1.2: Plain Text Pop Sci. Draft (800-1000 words)

Because the final project for this unit will be a blogpost on a website (complete with hyperlinks, multimedia display, and carefully edited prose), our Feeder 1.2 will be a rough draft done in plain text (i.e., a Word Document). Compose a two to three page, double-spaced (i.e., 800-1000 word) popular science article on the environmental science issue that you selected for Feeder 1.1.

Your article should adhere to the properties of the popular science genre that we will discuss in class (such as the eye-catching title and “hook,” the contextualized scientific content, and the suggestive conclusion), and your article should directly reference and cite at least three of the sources included in your annotated bibliography. Beyond those three, you are welcome to cite and sources that you find helpful or necessary.

Refer to the rhetorical chart to recall the audience, purpose, role, and rhetorical situation for your article: you are a popular science journalist for a website, and your task is to translate current scientific research into an accessible form for popular audience readers. With this in mind, a successful popular science article should concisely introduce readers to an element of scientific research such that readers understand the context, scope, and implications of the research in question. As we will discuss in class, this kind of writing has implicit political implications. That is to say, while most scientific writing and research is praised for being objective, popular science writing often involves moral or subjective messages; we’ll do our best to understand and accommodate this important oddity in our own work. Cite all sources in APA style.