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POL 120: Native American Politics: Class Exercise

Exercise

In our time together, we are practicing how to effectively summarize a source's argument and find related sources. This will help you explore the scholarly conversations within your course. Although you are not required to do external research for your course, this process models approaches to understand texts and explore how those texts talk to each other. 

Working in pairs (groups of two):

1.  Begin with the Yirush reading: "Since We Came Out of This Ground." Do a quick skim/reread if you need to before moving onto the second step.

2. Answer the following questions for your source. (Use the information on this guide if you need help answering some of the questions):

  • What are the main points of the reading? What is the author's central argument?
    • Be sure to identify at least three main points of the reading.
  • Is your sources scholarly or not? How do you know?
  • What are the author's credentials? Can you tell if they are qualified to speak on the topic?
  • Finally, what questions does this source raise for you? What would you like to learn more about? What did you find interesting that you would like to pursue further? 

3. Now find a scholarly article (full text) that addresses one of your questions from above. Use the directions on the Finding Sources tab to search and find sources using library databases or Google Scholar.

4. Retrieve the source and skim it. Use the resources in the box below for tips on how to quickly and accurately determine a source's main points. Answer these questions: 

  • Is your source scholarly? How do you know?
  • What are the author's credentials? Can you tell if they are qualified to speak on the topic?
  • What are the main points of the reading? What is the author's central argument?
  • How is this source in conversation with your first source? How do they both shed light on the course content? What additional questions do they raise?

5. Practice citing your second source using the APA style guide.

6. Check your work. Exchange your second source (share the link or help them find it online) with one other group. Ask them to share their second source. Repeat steps 4-5 using the other group's source and then compare your findings with the other group.

  • Did you both reach similar conclusions to the bullet points in #4?
  • If not, where did you diverge? What do you think accounts for that? How would you further explore and try to resolve those differences?

7. If there is enough time, repeat steps 3-6.

Scholarly Sources

Quite often you will be expected to use "scholarly" or "peer reviewed" or "academic" sources. Here's what that means: 

  • The author is a scientist or scholar, not a journalist. The author usually has the highest degree in their field (like a Ph. D.) and works at a college or university. 
  • The audience is other researchers, scientists, or scholar. The language is fairly complex and assumes prior knowledge of the topic.
  • The source references the work of other researchers. Look for bibliographic notes, references, or works cited.  
  • Scholarly sources are usually published by academic publishers (like Oxford University Press); articles appear in scholarly journals, often with titles like Journal of ....

Though many databases let you limit a search to scholarly or peer reviewed articles, those limiters aren't foolproof. As an example, they will include book reviews, which are not reporting original research. Take a look at "Anatomy of a Scholarly Article" from North Carolina State University Library.

Peer review means the source has been reviewed prior to publication (usually without the reviewers knowing who wrote the source and vice versa); reviewers will then recommend if the work should be published. Many - but not all - scholarly sources have been peer reviewed. To check if your scholarly article has been peer reviewed, you can visit the journal's website.

Summarizing Sources Effectively

Articles

While articles are a little easier to skim than books, thanks to their shorter length, some scholarly articles can be dense. Fortunately, there are built-in features within articles to help you comprehend their main arguments.

Nonscholarly articles, including newspaper and magazine articles are usually easier to comprehend quickly, as they are written for a general audience and do not usually assume that readers have a lot of background knowledge on a topic. Look for these features:

  • Read the first and last paragraphs to see the author's main points and conclusions
  • Look for any mention of experts, organizations , legislation or studies mentioned. If you want to expand your knowledge of the topic, you can then track some of these down.

Scholarly articles are written by experts in a field for other experts (and students). Use these features and techniques to explore their main points:

  • Read the abstract, which normally appears at the very beginning of the article and summarizes the entire source
  • Read the introduction and conclusion; pay attention to what the author is trying to prove or analyze, as well as any conclusions they reach
  • Authors will often include a discussion of questions their research raises at the end of the source; use these to help identify questions that you would like to further explore

Books 

Sometimes people shy away from books because they are longer to read than a journal article. Many disciplines still publish current research in books, so you don't want to miss out on key resources by ignoring books. There are some tricks you can use to understand a book's structure and argument, so you DON'T have to read the whole thing.

  • Browse the table of contents at the front of the book.
  • Read the book's introduction/first chapter AND conclusion/last chapter - these present and highlight the main arguments
  • The end of chapter one will often provide a roadmap for the rest of the book
  • Skim chapter headings
  • Browse the index at the back of the book to look at the topics discussed and identify where they are discussed within the text.

Once you have a good idea of the book's structure and argument through skimming, you can narrow in on the portions of the text most useful for your research.

This work is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0