What we know threshold concepts of writing studies
In an annotated bibliography, you compile a list of the sources you consulted, providing full citations according to some documentation system (MLA, APA, Chicago, etc.) and including for each cited work a summary and an evaluation of the work. The sources should be listed in alphabetical order by author.
On the back of this assignment sheet you’ll find an example of an entry in an annotated bibliography (I’m using MLA documentation style; I suggest you do the same for your bibliographies). Use this sample as a template for your own entries.
But what will you include in your bibliography?
There are different types of annotated bibliographies. All include a summary of each source. Yours will also include an evaluation. You’ll select four texts we read in this class this semester, which you’ll choose yourself from among the list below. You don’t need to go and find additional sources; you only need to go back and review with some care the texts we’ve already read.
I’m dividing our assigned texts into two categories according to length and complexity.
I.
• Deborah Brandt: “Sponsors of Literacy”
• Keith Grant-Davie: “Rhetorical Situations and Their Constituents”
• Margaret Kantz: “Helping Students Use Textual Sources Persuasively”
• Charles Bazerman and Bill Hart-Davidson: ” Writing Speaks to Situations through Recognizable Forms” and “Genres Are Enacted by Writers and Readers.” From Linda Adler-Kassner and Elizabeth Wardle, eds. Naming What We Know: Theshold Concepts of Writing Studies. Logan: Utah UP, 2015.
II.
• Wardle & Downs: “Literacies: Where Do Your Ideas About Reading and Writing Come From?” from Elizabeth Wardle & Doug Downs, Writing about Writing: A College Reader. Boston: Bedford/St Martin’s 2014. 40 – 42.
• Wardle & Downs: “Rhetoric: How Is Meaning Constructed in Context?” from Elizabeth Wardle & Doug Downs, Writing about Writing: A College Reader. Boston: Bedford/St Martin’s 2014. 318 -324.
• Karen Rosenberg: “Reading Games: Strategies for Reading Scholarly Sources”
• Richard Straub: “Responding-Really Responding-to Other Students’ Writing”
• Kerry Dirk: “Navigating Genres”
• Laura Bolin Carroll: “Backpacks Vs. Briefcases: Steps Towards Rhetorical Analysis”
• Donald Murray: “The Maker’s Eye: Revising Your Own Manuscripts”
For your annotated bibliography, you’ll choose two titles from the first list and two titles from the second. For each of those texts you’ll produce an accurate, appropriately formatted Works Cited entry according to MLA documentation conventions; one single-spaced paragraph that summarizes the text; and another single-spaced paragraph that evaluates the text’s usefulness for students in a first-year writing class. As you review these texts, keep in mind how they’ve changed your understanding of reading and producing written texts.
