- What is a review?
- Common problems with academic reviews
- Getting started: approaches to reading and notetaking
- Understanding and analyzing the work
- Organizing and writing the review
What Is a Review?
As a review-writer, your objective is to:
- understand a work on its own terms (analyze it)
- bring your own knowledge to bear on a work (respond to it)
- critique the work while considering validity, truth, and slant (evaluate it)
- place the work in context (compare it to other works).
Common Problems with Academic Reviews
A review is not a research paper
A review is not a summary
A review is not an off-the-cuff, unfair personal response
Getting Started: Approaches to Reading and Notetaking
Pre-Reading
Read more about strategies for critical and efficient reading
Reverse outline
A reverse outline helps a reader analyze the content and argument of a work of non-fiction. Read each section of a text carefully and write down two things: 1) the main point or idea, and 2) its function in the text. In other words, write down what each section says and what it does. This will help you to see how the author develops their argument and uses evidence for support.
Double-entry notebook
In its simplest form, the double-entry notebook separates a page into two columns. In one column, you make observations about the work. In the other, you note your responses to the work. This notetaking method has two advantages. It forces you to make both sorts of notes — notes about the work and notes about your reaction to the work — and it helps you to distinguish between the two.
Observations |
Responses |
---|---|
|
Based on reader’s knowledge of the world, the topic, the discipline, associations and connections based on discourse conventions. |
Whatever method of notetaking you choose, do take notes, even if these are scribbles in the margin. If you don’t, you might rely too heavily on the words, argument, or order of what you are reviewing when you come to write your review.
Understand and Analyze the Work
Ask questions to support your understanding of the work.
Questions for Works of Non-Fiction
- What is the subject/topic of the work? What key ideas do you think you should describe in your review?
- What is the thesis, main theme, or main point?
- What major claims or conclusions does the author make? What issues does the work illuminate?
- What is the structure of the work? How does the author build their argument?
- What sources does the author consult? What evidence is used to support claims? Do these sources in any way “predetermine” certain conclusions?
- Is there any claim for which the evidence presented is insufficient or slight? Do any conclusions rest on evidence that may be atypical?
- How is the argument developed? How do the claims relate? What does the conclusion reveal?
Questions for Works of Fiction
- What is the subject/topic of the work? What key ideas do you think you should describe in your review?
- What is the main theme or message? What issues does the book illuminate?
- How does the work proceed? How does the author build their plot?
- What kind of language, descriptions, or sections of plot alert you to the themes and significance of the book?
- What does the conclusion reveal when compared with the beginning?
Read Critically
Think about the Author
- Who is the author? What else has the author written?
- What does the author do? What experiences of the author’s might influence the writing of this book?
- What is the author’s main purpose or goal for the text? Why did they write it and what do they want to achieve?
- Does the author indicate what contribution the text makes to scholarship or literature? What does the author say about their point of view or method of approaching the subject? In other words, what position does the author take?
Think about Yourself
Here are some prompts that might help you generate a personal response to a book:
- I agree that ... because ...
- I disagree that ... because ...
- I don’t understand ...
- This reminds me of …
- I’m surprised by …
- What did I feel when I read this book? Why?
- How did I experience the style or tone of the author? How would I characterize each?
- What questions would I ask this author if I could?
- For me, what are the three best things about this book? The three worst things? Why?
Consider Context
Here are some useful questions:
- What are the connections between this work and others on similar subjects? How does it relate to core concepts in my course or my discipline?
- What is the scholarly or social significance of this work? What contribution does it make to our understanding?
- What, of relevance, is missing from the work: certain kinds of evidence or methods of analysis/development? A particular theoretical approach? The experiences of certain groups?
- What other perspectives or conclusions are possible?
Organizing and Writing the Review
X is an important work because it provides a new perspective on . . .
X’s argument is compelling because . . . ; however, it fails to address . . .
Although X claims to . . ., they make assumptions about . . . , which diminishes the impact . . .
Introduction
- give relevant bibliographic information
- give the reader a clear idea of the nature, scope, and significance of the work
- indicate your evaluation of the work in a clear 1-2 sentence thesis statement
- why the issue examined is of current interest
- other scholarship about this subject
- the author’s perspective, methodology, purpose
- the circumstances under which the book was created
Sample Introduction
What works in this sample introduction:
- The nature of the larger issue, how best to create diversity and equity within educational environments, is clearly laid out.
- The paragraph clearly introduces the authors and study being reviewed and succinctly explains how they have addressed the larger issue of equity and diversity in a unique way.
- The paragraph ends with a clear thesis that outlines the strengths and weaknesses of the work.
Summary of the Work
- the purpose of the work
- the main points of the work
- the ideas, themes, or arguments that you will evaluate or discuss in the review
Analysis and Evaluation
- Does the work do what its author claimed it would?
- Is the work valid and accurate?
- How does the work fit into scholarship in the field?
- What are your reasons for agreeing, disagreeing, liking, disliking, believing, disbelieving?
Note that this section will take up the bulk of your review and should be organized into paragraphs. Because this form of writing typically does not use subheadings, strong paragraphing, particularly the use of clear topic sentences, is essential. Read more on paragraphing.
Reviews are informed by your critical reading or viewing of a work; therefore you need to include specific evidence from the work to support your claims about its message and its impact. Your writing and your assessment of the work will be most effective if you paraphrase or summarize the evidence you use, rather than relying on direct quotations. Be sure to follow the rules for citation in your discipline. Read more on paraphrasing and summarizing.
Sample Body Paragraph
One of the strengths of Carpenter and Diem’s (2015) study was innovative use of and nuanced explanation of discourse analysis. Critiquing much of the research on policy for its positivist promises of “value neutral and empirically objective” (p. 518) findings, Carpenter and Diem (2015) argued that discourse theory can provide an important lens through which to view policy and its relationship to educational outcomes. By interrogating the “inscribed discourses of policy making” (p. 518), they showed how policy language constructs particular social meanings of concepts such as diversity and equity. Significantly, this analysis was not simply about the language used within documents; instead, Carpenter and Diem (2015) argued that the language used was directly related to reality. Their “study examine[d] how dominant discourses related to equity, and their concretization within guiding policy documents, may shape the ways in which states, local school districts, and educational leaders are asked to consider these issues in their everyday practice” (Carpenter & Diem, 2015, p. 519). Thus, through the use of discourse theory, Carpenter and Diem (2015) framed policy language, which some might consider abstract or distant from daily life, as directly connected to the experience of educational leaders.
What works in this sample body paragraph:
- The paragraph begins with a clear topic sentence that connects directly to a strength mentioned in the thesis of the review.
- The paragraph provides specific details and examples to support how and why their methods are innovative.
- The direct quotations used are short and properly integrated into the sentences.
The paragraph concludes by explaining the significance of the innovative methods to the larger work.
Conclusion and Recommendation
Give your overall assessment of the work. Explain the larger significance of your assessment. Consider who would benefit from engaging with this work.