in academic writing it is often necessary to refer to other people’s research direct quotations...
TRANSCRIPT
In academic writing it is often necessary to refer to other people’s research
Direct quotations and paraphrasing Paraphrasing means using your own words
to report someone else’ writing, but maintaining academic style
She examined the difficulties that… She investigated the problems that…
Rewrite the following: Smith and Jones (1991) found that the
circumstances had…
Johns (1991) analysed the students’ difficulties and…
The students’ difficulties were analysed by Johns (1991) and…
Rewrite the following: Brown (1994) observed the problems
caused by seminars…
The reports were completed in April… The completion of the reports in April
ensured that…
Rewrite the following: James (2004) concluded that there was a
need for note-taking practice.
Combining two or more viewpoints or pieces of information from other writers
References may support one another, but there may be opposing views as well
giving a brief account of the main points of some writing
An effective summary should be complete, concise, clear and creative (4 Cs)
Complete: it includes all the main ideas, but not supporting details or examples
Concise: it is as brief as possible, and shorter than the original text
Clear: it is easy to understand Creative: it uses some key terms from the
text, but mainly uses the summary writer’s own language
At the beginnning write the title, the author and article, publisher and date
Quickly skim the text to get an overall idea of it
Make brief notes of the main points Underline important sentences or phrases Remove examples and details
Ensure that your summary is neutral and accurate (do not add your ideas)
As far as possible condense the points into straightforward statements
Rewrite statements in your own words where possible
Write clearly, concisely and logically
In their text on class and status, Fulcher and Scott (2011, p. 746) report the work of Weber. They state that Weber’s theory of social stratification is brief but highly influential, with his disctinction of class, status, and partly being widely accepted. Weber proposed three key aspects of power in society: economic, communal, and authoritarian.
Evaluate this summary using the ‘4Cs’ criteria!