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Research is a fundamental part of the collegiate experience. To become a successful scholar, we must participate in a global conversation concerning our own research interests. Faculty and researchers publish fascinating discoveries every single day in scholarly academic journals; none of it is published by accident. Research is a deliberate process that ensures the steady advancement of knowledge within our respective fields of study. For this assignment, you will be tasked with the following:
• Coming up with a research topic
• Locating and annotating at least fifteen credible physical and/or digital sources relevant to that scholarship
• Summarizing, evaluating, and reflecting on aspects of that scholarship in first, an annotated bibliography, and then in a response essay
• Exploring and interrogating controversies surrounding your field of research. Ex: Discourse (Gee) vs. Discourse Community (Swales)
• Formulating an argument (what do you think?) and writing a response essay to the research you found most intriguing
• Developing a thesis statement for your essay to be included in the introductory paragraph
• Identifying a counterclaim which will immediately follow the thesis in your essay
• Supporting your argument with at least four sources (what do the experts think?) including the source to which you are responding.
Audience& Purpose: As this assignment is twofold, so your audience and purpose for this assignment are twofold. First, your audience for the annotated bibliography is your future self, both near future and more distant future. This document is meant to serve as a tool to aid you in your search for an intriguing idea within your field of interest about which, in the short term, to write a response essay. If you’ve chosen your research topic well, the bibliography also has the potential to serve you in the long term, on future research projects beyond this semester.
Secondly, for the response essay, you are tasked with responding to an idea you found intriguing, and developing your own thoughts on the subject. For this essay, your audience will be someone unfamiliar with academic writing in your field of study.
Significance: Now that you have completed the Analysis of a Discourse Community assignment, you have done close reading and analysis, and have conducted primary research which you incorporated into your writing about the field of socio-linguistics.For this new assignment you will be learning how to conduct scholarly, secondary research. First, you will learn to identify and analyze credible sources, both scholarly and popular. Secondly, you will write an essay in response to the article/argument/source you found most intriguing. In completing these tasks, you will continue to expand your scholarly research skills, as well as your close reading, analysis, and arguing skills. Many of you work in research settings already, but for those of who do not, this paper will serve as an introduction to the genre of research. This class would not be Writing Your Way Into Purdue if we didn’t begin now to focus on the academic aspect of your writing.
Word Count: The word count for the annotated bibliography is 1,500-3,000 words (at least 100, and no more than 200 words, per source.) The response essay has its own word count of 700-1000 words.
Annotated Bibliography: We will discuss annotated bibliographies in class and conferences. For this project, you will annotate a total of fifteen sources and integrate at least three of these into your response essay. Of the fifteen sources, five may be from popular, but credible websites (BBC, NPR, CNN, National Geographic, Time Magazine, etc.), and the other ten must be from scholarly sources from Purdue Libraries online databases or physical libraries. Two of the library sources must be print sources, i.e. the chapter of a book or an article from a physical journal you found in any Purdue Library. Note: Your print sources must be from a Purdue Library.
For each of these sources you will write at least 100, but no more than 200 words, of summary (what information does the source contain?), evaluation (is it biased, unbiased? how credible is the author?), and reflection (how will this source be useful to you either in your response essay, or in a future research paper?)
Response Essay: While compiling your annotated bibliography, you will have discovered a variety of research that includes vastly differing conclusions. In this essay, you will respond to one of these ideas. “Sometimes we write to say what we think. Other times, however, we write in order to figure out what we think” (NFG 281). If you’ve chosen a subject about which you’re curious and excited, then writing a response to one of these ideas, and supporting your response with information from that article and three other articles you read, will give you the opportunity to discover what you think about the subject. It will also give you a chance to “enter the great conversation” in your field of interest, something that will be expected of you for the rest of your college career and beyond.
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For this essay, you will start with the questions outlined in NFG pp. 282 – 284 to help you formulate your argument. As you did in the Discourse Analysis, you will create a thesis statement and argue your position. You will use ethos and logos to make your appeals, however, unlike the Discourse Analysis paper, pathos may also be employed to make your appeal. Also unlike the Discourse Analysis paper, the first draft of this essay should be full length, 700-1000 words. This relatively low word count will require you to make well-considered, pithy, succinct arguments, another skill that will serve you well as a scholar and during your post-college career. You will also, of course, create the appropriate in-text and Works Cited citations for this essay.
Library Selfie: Have a little fun and earn five points! Take a picture of yourself in your major’s library (even if you are not researching within your major) to document your visit there (i.e. HSSE Library, Aviation Technology Library, Mathematical Sciences Library, Black Cultural Center, or the new Wilmuth Active Learning Center (WALC) which houses the Chemistry; Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS); Engineering; Life Sciences; Pharmacy, Nursing and Health Sciences; and Physics collections,etc.) Post the picture on Blackboard.
Format: MLA format. Times New Roman or Garamond, 12 pt. font, 1″ margins, double-spaced, and bearing the appropriate headings.You are required to document and cite your sources using MLA 8th edition guidelines which were new in 2016. Please familiarize yourself with these guidelines on the Purdue OWL website. You will create in-text citations and a Works Cited page. In the 2016 version of MLA, the DOI (digital object identifier) or URL of each web-based source must be included in the Works Cited entry.