43 why the pledge of allegiance should be revised by gwen wilde, current issues, pg. Tackle the issue dealt with in your chosen text in a general way, but make the text the central focus of your essay. You will only be officially required to submit the final draft of this essay, although there will be exercises related to the essay that will be used to evaluate your process. however, if the draft you submit requires more polish, you will be given feedback and an opportunity to submit a second draft for an improved grade. this will apply to essays that fall below an a or b. all work you submit must be your own. if you consult any sources, whether oral or written, copyrighted or not, you must clearly distinguish between your words and ideas or line of thought and theirs at all times. What to do: choose one of the topics below and write a critical essay about the play.

Each essay offers the opportunity to explore an aspect of the history behind the trials and the play. Choose one character from the play and compare/contrast miller’s portrayal with the historical account of this person. What lasting effects have the salem witch trials had on the american justice system? have the changes been positive or negative? 3. How effective is the the crucible as an analogy to the mccarthy trials? you may be asked to write a critical review of a book or a book chapter. Although this may be an unfamiliar exercise, it is not as complex a task as writing an essay requiring a lot of library research. It is, however, not the same as a book review in the canberra times which is written for the general reader.

Your book review is written for a reader your lecturer, tutor or fellow student who is knowledgeable in the discipline and is interested not just in the coverage and content of the book being reviewed, but also in your critical assessment of the ideas and argument that are being presented by the author. As the above examples indicate, the lecturer will give you advice on what they want you to critique.

get to know the book you are reviewing

look at the title, the table of contents and any preface or introduction.

These should give you some idea of the central focus and the coverage of the book and, if the preface is useful, also the author's reasons for writing the book. Skim quickly through the whole book, running your eye over opening sentences of paragraphs and glancing at any tables, illustrations or other graphic materials. Read more closely the first chapter, which should tell you the main issues to be discussed and indicate the theoretical or conceptual framework within which the author proposes to work. Read closely the final chapter, which should cover the author's conclusions and summarise the main reasons why these conclusions have been reached.

Now that you are familiar with the text, read the whole text thoroughly to develop a basis on which to critically review it.

decide which aspects of the book you wish to discuss in detail in your review

do you need to critically evaluate the theoretical approach, the content or case studies, the selection and interpretation of evidence, the range of coverage, and/or the style of presentation? usually you will discuss the main issues which the author has specifically examined. Sometimes you may choose a particular issue because it has importance for you and the course you are studying, even if it is not the main issue for the author.

deepen your understanding of the issues that you will be focusing on

now, on the basis of your overall knowledge of the book and your decision about which issues you will discuss, read in closer detail the sections of the book which are relevant to these issues. If necessary, read other articles or books which are relevant to your topic, possibly to provide supporting evidence or alternative theoretical models or interpretations of data. You may also want to glance at other reviews of the book in recent academic journals in order to get a feel for the way the book has been received within the discipline. To search for other reviews in academic journals, use the library's e resources and databases. However, only use these reviews to support your own evaluation do not merely copy or imitate them.

Depending on the advice given to you by your lecturer, the structure of your review should allow you to address the assessment criteria and the questions posed by the lecturer. Initially, identify the book author, title, date of publication and other details that seem important, eg, it is originally a french edition, etc , indicate the major aspects of the book that will be discussed, and state the purpose of the review. Occasionally you may summarise chapter by chapter, but in a short review 10 1500 words you usually pick up the main themes only. Next, and most significant, critically discuss 2 3 key issues raised in the book.

Legal Drinking Age In Australia Essay

You may also want to indicate gaps in the author's treatment of a topic, but it is seldom useful to criticise a writer for not doing something they never intended to do. For the conclusion, evaluate the overall contribution that the book has made to your understanding of the topic and maybe its importance to the development of knowledge in this particular area or discipline, setting it in the context of other writings in the field. Finally, provide a reference list or bibliography of the sources that you have referred to. Notice how the questions to be considered can help shape the structure of the review. Instead it should state what the book sets out to do and assess how well the author achieves that goal. I would like all students to prepare a short critical book review, length 1,0 words.

To lsquo critically discuss rsquo a work is not an instruction either to agree or disagree with the author. The aim of this assignment is to:

Kennedy and dana gioia 146 s literature: an introduction to fiction, poetry, and drama. formalist criticism: this approach regards literature as 147 a unique form of human knowledge that needs to be examined on its own terms. 148 all the elements necessary for understanding the work are contained within the work itself. Of particular interest to the formalist critic are the elements of form 151 style, structure, tone, imagery, etc. A primary goal for formalist critics is to determine how such elements work together with the text 146 s content to shape its effects upon readers. biographical criticism: this approach 147 begins with the simple but central insight that literature is written by actual people and that understanding an author 146 s life can help readers more thoroughly comprehend the work.

Karnataka Sslc Midterm Question Papers 2012

148 hence, it often affords a practical method by which readers can better understand a text. However, a biographical critic must be careful not to take the biographical facts of a writer 146 s life too far in criticizing the works of that writer: the biographical critic 147 focuses on explicating the literary work by using the insight provided by knowledge of the author 146 s life. B iographical data should amplify the meaning of the text, not drown it out with irrelevant material.