Today I’ll be describing how to evaluate and incorporate sources into your drafts, and answering FAQs concerning Essay 3 Phase 1. The agenda for today consists of the following:

  • Revisiting the Essay 3 Phase 1 guidelines
  • Going over the Vetting Sources handout on D2L
  • Explaining Purdue OWL’s materials on research strategies and synthesizing sources
  • Revisiting Shepherd’s essay with an eye to how he incorporates sources, including his use of signposts

Essay 3 Phase 1

By now you should have a developed set of field notes, in which you pay attention to how the members of the community interact with one another. (You can refer to the General Feedback – Field Notes post for further guidance.) These field notes constitute your primary research, from which you’ll draw a conclusion about the social dynamic of the space, based on the patterns you’ve listed in these notes. In other words, if it’s not in your field notes, or can’t be connected to them, then it’s not a specific enough claim.

Your Phase 1 draft should include your Introduction, which will contain a brief 1-paragraph introduction of your community and your 1-paragraph claim; this claim will come directly from your primary research and will be a research hypothesis about the predominant social dynamics governing interaction in the community. One way to think about it is like the answer to the general question, “How do [insert type of] people behave in [insert type of] conversations? And what in my primary data tells me this?” Good research begins with the ability to flexibly refine these questions to better align with your primary research, so play around with the wording to form questions that “go with” the data you found in your observations. Phase 1 will also include your 1-2 paragraph Methods section, essentially that you’re doing non-participant observation, the length of time you spent on each thread, how you chose your threads, and so on. Finally, it will include your Results section, which will span maybe 3-4 paragraphs if I had to estimate, and which will include the parts of your field notes most relevant to your claim. You’ll obviously have to reorganize and rewrite those notes in a way that fits an academic essay. You will not be doing any analysis in the Results section, so save the interpretation for Phase 2.

Based on some of the field notes I’ve seen, I think it’s worth reminding you that your Essay 3 will not be relying on the same data you used for Units 1 and 2. If you’re simply combining the claims you’re making for the first two essays, you’re not doing what the Field Notes assignment asked you to do, and you won’t be able to proceed successfully with the Essay 3 draft.

Make sure to use subheadings in your draft, as indicated in the Assignment Guidelines and sample student essays. After you share your draft with your workshop groups, you’ll do your usual peer review sessions, using the Essay 3 Phase 1 Peer Review Form in the weekly module on D2L.

Vetting Sources Worksheet

That covers Essay 3 Phase 1. You should also have finished the Ethnographic Research Tutorial by now, which leads into the Vetting Sources Worksheet posted on D2L. Follow the instructions on the worksheet to identify sources for yourself, not for submission to me, but as potential sources you can use in your Analysis section in Phase 2. The first step is locating credible sources. I previously walked you through using the library search engines, but here’s a list of publications that might contain articles relevant to papers on social dynamics on Reddit. The prewriting work for the week is locating (at least) one “B” or background source and one “A” or argument/assertion source. Step 2 is evaluating the sources you find. Apply the CRAAP test to do this: consider currency (when it was published, in the last 5 years ideally), relevance (what makes it important for your essay), authority (what tells you it’s credible), accuracy (what tells you it’s reliable), and purpose (why does the article exist). Finally, Step 3 asks you to list potential sources, including bibliographic information and what makes it a useful source for you. It might be a good idea to list more than a few so you can go back later, after Phase 1, and cut the ones that no longer work.

Purdue OWL Synthesizing Sources

Looking ahead to Phase 2, you’ll eventually engage in the process of incorporating and synthesizing sources. You were likely taught in high school to take an itemized approach to incorporating sources, where you listed sources one after another and summarized each as you went. However, this approach doesn’t really help you synthesize sources or give your reader a sense of the ongoing conversation between them. A better process might involve:

  • Separately summarizing the primary controlling idea(s) in those sources. Think of it like 1 paragraph per source, where you introduce and summarize each source separately.
  • Explaining how those sources relate to your own controlling idea, and in some cases, to each other.
  • Summarizing the sources together. Think of it like 1 paragraph where you discuss two or more sources and explain how the ideas in them overlap or don’t overlap, where they elaborate on each other, where they limit the impact of each other, where a concept they invent or rely on helps or hinders understanding of your claim(s) and evidence.

Some other tips for incorporating sources include the following.

  1. Account for the differences. First of all, sources almost never agree or disagree about everything. Usually, they overlap in some areas and diverge in others. Some might expand on a point or limit the validity of that point. So don’t think of synthesis as just summarizing sources or comparing/contrasting sources, but as summarizing what the sources tell us about the subject they’re addressing, and how they get there. For instance, if two sources arrive at the same conclusion using similar but not the same evidence, you can’t summarize them by saying they’ve done the same thing. Always account for the differences by describing what’s different about how they support the same conclusion. This will actually strengthen your paper, not weaken it, because it shows that you are a thoughtful, attentive writer who isn’t erasing the careful work done by the sources you’re engaging with.
  2. Organize your sources by topic. Instead of adopting the listing approach described above, incorporate sources where they are topically relevant. Using a source with a claim about partial anonymity and shared interests on Tumblr? Incorporate it after your own musings about partial anonymity and shared interests on Reddit, and make sure to account for the differences—that is, Tumblr is not Reddit, and its interest-based communities look different, even if it is a space where you follow based on interests, not identity.

A practical way to summarize sources before you incorporate them is to follow a template like the following:

  • Sentence 1 – Introduce relevant bibliographic information: author and title, at minimum, and a one-sentence paraphrasing of what the controlling idea of the whole article is.
  • Sentences 2-3 – Further explanation of the controlling idea, plus any sub-claims relevant to your controlling idea.
  • Sentences 4-5 – Explanation of how the information in the source explains or builds on your controlling idea. Avoid looking for sources that just “support” or “agree/disagree” with, as discussed in our last class.

Additionally, here are some procedures for synthesizing sources!

  1. Read sources actively, closely, and critically. Identify the controlling idea and any sub-claims that are important for your purposes.
  2. Paraphrase the claim in your own words (~3-5 sentences). Take notes on any other sub-claims that seem relevant.
  3. ALWAYS make sure to write down the title, author, publication year, and page ranges of the article or book chapter you’re working with!
  4. Once you’ve done this, you can more easily see how each source interacts with your controlling idea.
  5. Deal with disagreement. When sources disagree, determine if that disagreement is relevant and important and whether it’s worth introducing into your text. What you don’t want to do is omit a disagreement that is important to the conversation and thus mislead your readers. You can blend two sources, combining the most valid information from each to form a synthesis of information without misleading your readers.
  6. Plan how you’ll introduce each item. You could introduce the information with signposts such as, “According to NAME and NAME,” or “NAME notes/suggests/indicates/demonstrates,” and then include a quotation or paraphrasing of what the text says.

Remember not to force a source to fit your needs, and don’t get frustrated if you have to search over and over again!

Revisiting Shepherd’s Essay

As an example of how published authors work with sources, let’s go back to Shepherd’s article for a minute. Notice how he includes secondary research in his essay, with signposts like the ones I just mentioned, like “AUTHOR further breaks down XYZ” or “AUTHOR noted” or “Scholars such as NAME say” or “Scholars like NAME suggest” or “QUOTE” (parenthetical citation). He includes himself in the conversation by saying things like, “If I were to define/describe XYZ” or “Like/unlike AUTHOR, I suggest” or “The criticisms of XYZ are valid/invalid because of XYZ.” You might also incorporate research into your essay by combining it with a half-sentence of your own devising. You might benefit from re-reading Shepherd’s essay and paying attention to where he includes other sources and how he responds to them with his own thinking, stitching them into the weave of his own ideas.

Finally, I encourage you to review the sample student essays with an eye to how they use subheadings and how they incorporate and synthesize secondary research. The sample work might help you figure out how to organize your own material for Phase 1 and later for Phase 2.

That’s a wrap for this week’s content. As always, if you have any questions, feel free to reach out via Slack or email, and you can always schedule an appointment to meet with me one-on-one.