Laurier Writing Centre Assignment Planner, Version 1:0: July 2011
Assignment Planner: Glossary of Terms
academic integrity: (noun) refers, broadly, to the self-regulating practice of conducting oneself
with honesty and openness in all aspects of intellectual life; this includes respecting the
originality of scholars‟ ideas and giving intellectual credit where credit is due; this also means
refusing to engage in acts of plagiarism, misrepresentation, or cheating; finally, in the university
context, this demands that the student take responsibility for understanding university and
discipline-specific policies regarding the proper acknowledgement of intellectual sources and the
repercussions of academic misconduct. See ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT, INTELLECTUAL CREDIT,
PLAGIARISM
academic misconduct: (noun) an act, whether committed willfully or in ignorance, that violates
the principles of academic integrity and openness; most often, academic misconduct arises when
intellectual credit goes improperly acknowledged within submitted work. At Laurier, academic
misconduct includes any “act by a student, or by students working on a team project, which may
result in a false evaluation of the student(s), or which represents an attempt to unfairly gain an
academic advantage, where the student either knew or ought reasonably to have known that it
was misconduct” (WLU Student Code of Conduct and Discipline 12.2.II). See ACADEMIC
INTEGRITY, INTELLECTUAL CREDIT, PLAGIARISM
argument: (noun) the prime contention or postulation within a scholarly work; a persuasive
summary of the central claim and/or line of reasoning to be addressed within a work; smaller
supporting arguments, explained using evidence and examples, can clarify and reinforce the
central argument. See CLAIM, MAIN POINT, THESIS
assignment type: (noun) a category of (usually) written task distinguishable by its particular
generic characteristics and rhetorical purpose. Common assignment types at the university level
include the comparative essay, the research paper, the literature review, the response paper, the
book review, etc. Each type of assignment has a specific rhetorical purpose – that is, a persuasive
organizing principle that dictates its form (how the assignment is structured), content (the
substance and scope of the written material), and style (the level of diction, for example).
Different assignment types demand different rhetorical approaches from the writer; this means,
for instance, that while a research paper will certainly need a clearly articulated thesis and a good
deal of solid primary and secondary evidence, a response paper may require that you discuss
your opinion on an issue and cite personal experience as your primary evidence. See AUDIENCE,
CONVENTIONS, FORM, GENRE, ORGANIZING STRUCTURES
audience: (noun) your imagined or intended readers; the people to whom you are addressing
your assignment. At the university level, audience most often refers to your instructors and peers
but also includes a broader academic readership within the immediate and related disciplines.
See DISCIPLINARY COMMUNITY, AUTHORIAL VOICE
authorial voice: (noun) the unique expression of a particular author‟s ideas in written form;
voice refers to the distinctive qualities and rhetorical choices that make an author‟s writing
unique and evident to the reader; voice is intimately linked to tone, which broadly refers to the
writer‟s attitude toward the topic and audience, and mood, which can be understood as an
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affective aspect of tone that works to evoke a particular atmosphere or feeling within a written
work. Establishing your authorial voice is important because it gives your writing credibility and
authority (ethos), sustains the text‟s direction and reason (logos), and appeals to your readers on
an affective or emotional level (pathos). Greek philosopher Aristotle theorized that these three
main forms of rhetoric provide the basis of a persuasive argument. See AUDIENCE
bibliographic entry: (noun) a descriptive notation which records in a consistent, shortened form
the basic identifying information for source materials used within an academic work; the
identifying information for each source usually includes title, author‟s name, place and date of
publication, and publisher; the style of bibliographic entry varies depending on the method of
documentation (i.e., MLA, APA etc.), but entries are generally organized alphabetically at the
end of a text in the form of a bibliography, references, or list of works cited. See CITATION,
DIRECT QUOTATION, DOCUMENTATION, INTEGRATION OF SOURCE MATERIAL, PRIMARY
SOURCE, SECONDARY SOURCE, SOURCE MATERIAL
block quote: (noun) a lengthy direct quotation off-set within the text by indentation on both the
left and right-hand sides; quotation marks are usually omitted. Different styles of documentation
specify different lengths and conventions for block quotation, so check your style guide for
details. See BIBLIOGRAPHIC ENTRY, CITATION, DIRECT QUOTATION, SOURCE MATERIAL,
QUOTATION MARKS
citation: (noun) a formal reference embedded within a scholarly text which refers readers to
source material; citations can refer to both primary and secondary material, and print or non-print
sources; the practice of citing source material. See DIRECT QUOTATION, DOCUMENTATION,
INTEGRATION OF SOURCE MATERIAL, SOURCE MATERIAL
claim: (noun) a sentence that asserts something that may or may not be true. Claims form the
basis of arguments and must be supported with evidence. In the context of a question, a claim is
an answer, while in the context of a problem, it is a solution. Booth, Colomb, and Williams write
that a claim is “the sentence that sums up the results of your research” (110). See ARGUMENT,
THESIS, MAIN POINT, RESEARCH QUESTION
compilation or collection: (noun) an edited volume, in book or journal form, of collected
written works on a single topic by several different authors; collected works are usually divided
thematically into individual chapters or articles within the larger volume and an introductory
chapter or essay is often appended by the volume‟s editor(s). Compilations may gather essays on
very broad themes (such as the edited volumes Essays on Shakespeare and The Bioethics Reader)
or on quite specific topics (such as the edited volume, Joy in Mudville: Essays on Baseball and
American Life). See MONOGRAPH
contextualize: (verb) to establish the context for arguments and information presented within a
scholarly work; to situate an idea, concept, or a group of ideas in relation to others; to make
explicit the relationships (concrete and abstract, temporal and spatial) between ideas, events, or
forms of cultural production. The contextualization of primary and secondary source material is
central to the development of a clear and persuasive scholarly text: it explains to the reader why
specific evidence has been selected (what purpose does it serve?) and determines the meaning
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this evidence bears under analysis in the present work (what does it tell us?). See ARGUMENT,
CLAIM, INTEGRATION OF SOURCE MATERIAL, SCHOLARLY CONVERSATION, SYNTHESIS
conventions (in writing): (noun) the established and widespread practice of undertaking a certain
aspect of the academic writing process; the demonstration of this practice in a text. Conventions
may be explicit or implicit. See DISCIPLINARY COMMUNITY
critically evaluate: (verb) to examine and judge with a critical eye; to raise questions, entertain
doubts, and consider alternatives to the information or approach offered; to test authoritative
claims to knowledge against alternative evidence or approaches and interpret the results. See
SIGNIFICANCE
database hit: (noun) refers, in computer use, to a successful match between the search terms you
have entered and the information retrieved by a database search engine (such as an online library
catalogue or Google). See SOURCE MATERIAL
direct quotation: (noun) the word-for-word citing of source material, indicated by use of
quotation marks; the original location (page number, website, etc.) of the quotation within the
source must be clearly noted in your text, and the full source must appear as a bibliographic entry
in your paper‟s list of works cited. See BLOCK QUOTE, BIBLIOGRAPHIC ENTRY, CITATION,
SOURCE MATERIAL, QUOTATION MARKS
disciplinary community: (noun) the scholars and students who study and conduct research
within a certain discipline and are united by a shared interest in and commitment to the
intellectual pursuits and scholarly practices of that discipline. Scholarship within a specific
academic field (such as anthropology, history, biology, or business and economics, etc.) is most
often intended for and addressed to fellow members of the relevant disciplinary community; this
is usually made evident in a scholarly text‟s use of discipline-specific conventions, such as the
choice of genre (the research paper, the case study, etc.), evidence (statistical data, a work of
visual art, etc.), and style of documentation (MLA, APA, etc.). Disciplinary communities are, by
definition, diverse in their membership (encompassing people of varying levels of experience)
and broad in their geographic and institutional scope (reaching beyond national borders and
specific places). See AUDIENCE, CONVENTIONS, DOCUMENTATION, GENRE
documentation: (noun) the practice of referencing, in a consistent form, the basic identifying
information regarding all source materials cited within a scholarly work. Proper academic
documentation is comprised of two parts: an in-text (usually parenthetical) or foot/end-noted
citation within the body of the text, plus a bibliographic entry at the end of the text within a
complete list of all works cited. Academic documentation methods can take several forms
depending upon the disciplinary community, format, and venue in which you are writing.
Documentation methods tend, however, to be conventional within particular disciplines: the
humanities, for example, tend to use MLA (Modern Languages Association) format while the
social sciences often use APA (American Psychological Association) or Chicago styles. See
BIBLIOGRAPHIC ENTRY, CITATION, DISCIPLINARY COMMUNITY, INTEGRATION OF SOURCE
MATERIAL, INTELLECTUAL CREDIT, PLAGIARISM, SOURCE MATERIAL
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form: (noun) 1) the structural and functional characteristics of any specific written work – that
is, the way in which a text is „put together‟; this meaning of form encompasses the structure of
the text at the sentence (syntax) and paragraph levels, as well as the logic and organization of
information and argument across the text as a whole, 2) a category or type of written text, in a
similar sense as genre, such as a novel, journal article, position piece, lab report, etc. See
ASSIGNMENT TYPE, CONVENTIONS, GENRE, ORGANIZING STRUCTURES
genre: (noun) a recurring social action involving a literate form (e.g., a review of a book, an
analysis of a policy); a recurring type or category of text; a system of classification applied to
written texts (literature, academic prose, business writing, etc.) and non-written forms of
communication (film, music, television programs, etc.) which is defined by common formal,
thematic, and contextual criteria. Everyday genres in popular culture include, for instance, the
detective novel, the spy film, classical music, and reality TV.
As a genre, academic writing across many disciplines adheres to such generic criteria as:
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the use of non-narrative prose to express ideas and arguments
the organization of the text around a core argument, thesis, main point or question
the aim to persuade the audience using appropriate evidence, presented and/or cited
within the text
the aim to inform the audience using specific data and/or information, presented and/or
cited within the text
a three-part rhetorical appeal to the audience consisting of establishing 1) the credibility
of the writer (ethos), 2) the logic of the argument (logos), and 3) the emotional or
affective aspects of the topic (pathos)
the use of elevated tone (relative formality and absence of slang or familiarity: the author,
situated at a distance from the text, addresses an assumed academic audience)
clear, precise diction (carefully chosen words)
discipline-specific and dense (meaning-laden) terms (referred to, in a pejorative sense, as
“jargon”)
Much academic writing can be generically classified as formal academic prose.
It is important to learn the appropriate generic criteria which define lucid academic writing in
particular disciplines in order to develop and demonstrate the ability to express complex ideas in
clear written form. Learning and exercising generic criteria will also enable you to participate in
the academic community by articulating your ideas via the shared conventions of scholarly
writing.
One way to learn the defining generic features of formal academic prose is to read widely both
within your discipline and across disciplines: Take a look at journal articles and books from
several fields to see what this scholarly writing has in common and on what points it differs; note
the rhetorical moves that make texts clear and accessible; note which moves are permissible or
absent. In your own writing and revision processes, make a point of imitating the rhetorical
strategies that you have admired and appreciated as a reader of academic writing. See
ASSIGNMENT TYPE, CONVENTIONS, FORM, ORGANIZING STRUCTURES
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hypothesis: (noun) a propositional statement laying out an expected outcome or event that is
subsequently tested and evaluated; in the sciences, a hypothesis arises out of a research question
and provides the impetus for an experiment or research study (e.g., We expect that after studying
for six hours, the students will recall most of the lecture material). A null hypothesis proposes
that no difference or outcome is expected to be seen following investigation or that the outcome
seen may be due to chance; it is the default corollary to a hypothesis statement and is necessary
for statistical testing (e.g., There will be no difference in recall between those students who study
for six hours and those who study a typical, shorter time.) See RESEARCH QUESTION.
integration of source material: (noun) the process of using and embedding source material
within a written text in order to provide evidence for points of argument and/or situate your text
in relation to broader scholarly conversations; integration may take the form of a direct
quotation, summary, or paraphrase and is always cited within the text. In addition to providing
evidence, the integration of source material allows you to demonstrate that you have understood,
assimilated and reframed the ideas of others into your own line of thinking and argumentation.
See CITATION, CONTEXTUALIZE, SOURCE MATERIAL, SCHOLARLY CONVERSATION
intellectual credit: (noun) the clearly stated acknowledgement of ideas and intellectual
contributions to their proper author(s); the attribution of scholarship to its creators, usually in the
form of a citation and/or the inclusion of authors‟ names and point of perspective in relation to
the broader scholarly conversation on a certain topic. For example, “In his recent book
Revolution Backwards, Marxist historian Hubert Guillard argues that the French Revolution
offers a dangerous example to present-day political movements.”3 Here the text gives credit to
the scholar‟s idea by naming the individual, the title of his book, and by including a footnote to
cite the page on which this argument is made; this example also contextualizes Guillard‟s
argument by naming his disciplinary perspective (history) and theoretical approach (Marxist).
See ACADEMIC INTEGRITY, ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT, CITATION, DOCUMENTATION,
SCHOLARLY CONVERSATION
journal article: (noun) a work of original scholarship, usually of moderate length, appearing in a
serialized academic journal; most articles can be categorized as 1) descriptions of empirical
research, 2) explorations of theoretical concepts or methodology, or 3) review or opinion (“state
of the field”) pieces. Articles published in the humanities and many social sciences tend to have
single or dual authors, while those published in the sciences will often have multiple authors.
Many journal articles are peer-reviewed – that is, vetted by experts in the field to ensure the
rigour of the research – before being published and can therefore provide an assurance of quality
material on a specific topic. A thorough database, such as Scholars Portal, notes if a journal
article has been peer-reviewed, and many journals are ranked for their levels of influence as
demonstrated by citation frequencies of their published articles. See MONOGRAPH,
DISCIPLINARY COMMUNITY
main point: (noun) the organizing point of discussion about a topic to which all provided
information and evidence in a text relates; it differs from a CLAIM, THESIS and an ARGUMENT in
its level: i.e., it is not simply a major point, nor does it necessarily offer a postulation or
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summarize the key elements of the case in point. Rather, the main point can be regarded as the
response to the question, why has this text on topic X been written? See also ORGANIZING
STRUCTURES
monograph: (noun) a substantial scholarly text written on a single topic by a sole author. See
COMPILATION OR COLLECTION
organizing structures: (noun) the overarching or guiding rhetorical approaches and framework
that give a written text its particular form (e.g. an argument, a laboratory report); the „themes‟ or
recurring rhetorical strategies which characterize a work at both the formal and conceptual
levels. The organizing structures of a scholarly work are often dictated by genre or assignment
type (what sort of text is it?) as well as a work‟s objective in argument or presentation of
information (why has it been written?). See FORM, GENRE, MAIN POINT, STRUCTURE
outline: (noun) a written plan that summarizes in shorthand the broad trajectory of your paper‟s
argument, including its anticipated key supporting points and evidence. See RESEARCH
STRATEGY
paraphrase: (verb) to restate ideas and information in your own words; to reproduce the
contents of source material while demonstrating your understanding of the ideas being
paraphrased. See DIRECT QUOTATION, INTEGRATION OF SOURCE MATERIAL, SUMMARY
plagiarism: (noun) the unacknowledged appropriation of another‟s work; the willful or ignorant
representation of someone else‟s words, ideas, or images as one‟s own work. See ACADEMIC
INTEGRITY, ACADEMIC MISCONDUCT
primary source: (noun) source material that is closest to the ideas, concepts, people, places, and
time periods under study; for historians, a primary source is, for example, a first-hand account of
an actual historical event (such as an aristocrat‟s diary from the French Revolution); for literary
and film scholars, primary sources include the text of a novel and the images of a film; for
scientists, primary sources include experimental and empirical data reports. See SECONDARY
SOURCE
quotation marks: (noun) punctuation marks used in pairs to signal a direct quotation from
source material ( “such as this”). See BLOCK QUOTE, CITATION
research question: (noun) a statement in question form that concisely identifies the main
point(s) which you will aim to examine or address in the assignment. See ARGUMENT, CLAIM,
MAIN POINT, THESIS
research strategy: (noun) a kind of blueprint or map that guides you in the collection and
evaluation of relevant sources and evidence to answer your research question; useful in
indicating the foundations for an outline of your paper. See OUTLINE, RESEARCH QUESTION
scholarly conversation: (noun) a perspective towards academic writing in which the
understanding and presentation of an academic argument is seen as “a lively conversation with
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amiable colleagues […] in which you and your imagined readers cooperatively explore an issue
that you both think is important to resolve” (Booth, Colomb, Williams 106). The job of the
academic writer in this context is to demonstrate the ways in which new ideas and arguments
participate in the existing scholarly discourse on a given topic – that is, the writer must join the
conversation by acknowledging what has already been said and now demonstrating what remains
to be done. See DISCIPLINARY COMMUNITY
secondary source: (noun) a document (such as a book or article) that considers, interprets, and
analyzes information, evidence, and arguments relating to an original or primary source. For
example, a secondary source in the field of writing studies is an edited book entitled The
Handbook of Writing Research (2006) because the scholars in this book have compiled data,
reports, and articles from the existing scholarship in the field in order to draw new and timely
conclusions on various topics of interest. See PRIMARY SOURCE, SOURCE MATERIAL
seminal work: (noun) a scholarly or critical contribution regarded as groundbreaking in its
findings and/or methodology; in subsequent scholarly works, it is cited frequently and
represented as central to the critical discourse within a specific field and/or a cluster of
disciplines. Seminal scholarship reveals itself most markedly through citation practices within
ensuing scholarship: examine footnotes, endnotes, and bibliographies for those scholars and
works consistently cited over a significant period of time. See CITATION, DISCIPLINARY
COMMUNITY, SCHOLARLY CONVERSATION
significance: (noun) an evaluation or account of the broad disciplinary and, more widely,
intellectual, social, cultural or political implications of a particular claim, topic, or line of
argument. By discussing the larger impact of your topic, you provide readers with motivation
and reason to continue reading your text and consider your points. That is, demonstrating
significance motivates critical readers to care about the topic and to think about its intellectual
and everyday implications. Note that in the sciences and social sciences, significance carries an
additional and specific meaning related to statistical testing (statistical significance), so students
in these faculties should exercise caution in using this term. See ARGUMENT, MAIN POINT
source material: (noun) the primary and secondary evidence collected and examined through
research in order to construct and support an evidence-based scholarly work; depending on the
nature of the discipline and the research project, source material may take several forms: primary
evidence may include, for instance, a particular literary text, archival documents, a report of an
experiment, or a film, while secondary evidence may include scholarly publications such as
research reviews, critical articles and books, or a newspaper editorial. Tertiary sources (which
are used most often in the initial phases of research and infrequently included as source
materials) include textbooks, encyclopedias, and reference catalogues. See COMPILATION OR
COLLECTION, EDITORIAL, JOURNAL ARTICLE, MONOGRAPH, PRIMARY SOURCE, SECONDARY
SOURCE, SEMINAL WORK
structure: (noun) refers, broadly, to the ways in which a text is „put together‟ at both the macro
and micro levels: „macro‟ here means the organization of the entire text, of sections, of
paragraphs, of large points of discussion, while „micro‟ refers to the construction of and
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relationship between sentences. Structure is closely related to FORM. See also ASSIGNMENT
TYPE, CONVENTIONS, GENRE, ORGANIZING STRUCTURES
subordination : (noun) 1) (in argument) to establish a hierarchal relationship between ideas; to
place ideas in hierarchal relation to each other based on importance; 2) (grammatical) to establish
a hierarchal relationship between a main clause and a subordinate or dependent clause in order to
convey the relative importance of ideas. Use different subordinating conjunctions (e.g.,
although, because, if, when) like the ones listed below in order to indicate this relationship, and
move from obvious or established statements to new and more complex ideas. See ARGUMENT,
STRUCTURE
Although [self-evident statement] , new point/idea
Because…………………………….., …….
If………………………………………, ……
When…………………………………, ……
summary: (noun) a condensed account of a specific primary or secondary source which
identifies the main points, explains the logic that connects the core ideas of that source, and/or
evaluates its contribution ; a summary maintains the emphases of the original source and avoids
distorting or misrepresenting ideas. See DIRECT QUOTATION, INTEGRATION OF SOURCE
MATERIAL, PARAPHRASE, SOURCE MATERIAL
synthesis: (noun) (verb: to synthesize) the act of combining evidence to generate revealing
results; this means testing a thesis or postulation against contradictory or complicating evidence
(the anti-thesis) and analyzing the outcome (synthesis). More broadly, synthesis refers to the
process of uniting and analyzing large amounts of information and/or evidence within organizing
concepts or themes. See ARGUMENT, CONTEXTUALIZE, THESIS
thesis: (noun) a postulation or argument, in the form of a sentence, that offers a contestable
claim in response to a specific research topic or question and indicates reasons for its feasibility.
See ARGUMENT, CLAIM, MAIN POINT, RESEARCH QUESTION
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