E 314L (Spring 2011)
Schneider
Short Essay: Assessment of a Critical Article
Objectives
To write your research essay, you will need to be able to analyze and assess critical sources.
While we’ve previously read and discussed critical articles in class, for this assignment you
will need to demonstrate research skills by finding an article on the work you’re using for the
research assignment as well as analytical skills by understanding, summarizing, and assessing
the author’s argument.
Specifics
The first step will be to follow up on our class research day by locating several articles on
your research paper topic. Next, you will read those articles to choose which one you will
discuss for this assignment. You will need to look at several because not only will you
sometimes find articles that aren’t related to your essay topic, but also they might be either
unintelligible or uninteresting. Once you’ve decided on an article to analyze, you should read
it closely and take detailed notes as you read. Some questions you should be able to answer
once you’ve finished reading include:
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What is the article’s main claim? What secondary claims does it include?
What key terms does the article use?
What interpretive “lenses” does it use: formal, historical, or cultural?
What kinds of evidence does the author rely on to make his/her argument?
How does the author organize or structure his/her argument?
Once you’ve done this work, you can then begin writing. While you should take some space
in your writing to summarize the author’s claims, this assignment is about analysis, not
summary. Take most of your time discussing how the author makes an argument about the
text in question. You will want to make sure to include your evaluation and assessment of
the article—do you find this argument convincing?—but do not trash the article and its
author. Make sure to be respectful in tone even at the same time you criticize the way the
argument is made. Doing this work should help you, in writing your research essay, to place
yourself in relation to this critic as you include them in your discussion of the work at hand.
This essay should be 2-3 pages double-spaced, with 1 inch margins, in 12-point Times New
Roman or Palatino. You will want to include an MLA style citation of the article you’re
discussing in your Work Cited page. Since the skills I want this assignment to build are
critical reading and writing, I will be focused primarily on your careful assessment of the
article and your ability to analyze how the argument is made. This assignment will be due
Tuesday April 12 in class.