5584Summer Session 2020Professor Oscar Grossmont
History 115-5584
Summer Session 2020
Professor Oscar Cañedo
Guidelines for JSTOR Review Assignment
For this assignment, you are to read a journal article about a topic related to a regional topic within the context of the class, and you are asked to use articles from the JSTOR database. Unfortunately, Grossmont College does not have JSTOR available from its library, but some of you may have used JSTOR from institutions like Mesa, Palomar and Southwestern Colleges, in addition to San Diego State or Cal State San Marcos. Therefore I will provide you with an ample selection of articles that I have downloaded from Palomar College’s JSTOR database. All you need to do is pick any of the articles for your review. Just click the “Files” section from the Canvas class menu, and open the folder that says “115_JSTOR articles.” In the folder are several subfolders with topics arranged by nation, in alphabetical order. The articles are in PDF format and labeled by the topic of the article, so just browse the collection of articles before you make your final selection. You do not need to notify me of your article choice, just pick any one of the articles in any of those subfolders, and you’re ready to roll!
The due date for this review is Tuesday, July 28 at 11:59 PM. No late papers will be accepted, all reviews must be submitted by July 28. The report is to be 5-6 pages in length. Please be sure to use both a title page and works cited page. (title and works cited pages do not count toward the overall page count of your review) You are also encouraged to follow the MLA or Chicago formats to develop this report. Please double-space your review. This review will count as 20% toward your final grade. And in your works cited page, please list the name of the article that you will be summarizing and analyzing. This an example of the type of the format you should follow:
“Argentina in 1983: Reflections on the Language of the Military and George Orwell,” by Alberto Ciria. Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, Vol. 11, No. 21 (1986), pp. 57-69.
In terms of the content of the report, I am looking for two main points of discussion. First, you should devote the first half of the report to a summary of the main points that the author is trying to convey to the reader. To help you to address this issue, consider some of these questions: What type of article is this? Is the author presenting an original feature, or is he/she conducting a book review? If this is a book review, what book (or books) is being reviewed? What is the author’s purpose for writing this article? What is the author’s academic or professional background?
As for the second point of discussion, this is where you provide your opinion or perceptions of the article. In other words, what did you think about it? What were the strengths or weaknesses of the article? How did the article relate to the class? You are definitely encouraged to write in first person singular (I feel that…, I think..) as you provide your opinions. As a general rule of thumb, your JSTOR review should be about 60% summary and 40% commentary. Thus a 5-page review with about 3 & 1⁄2 pages summary and 1 & 1⁄2 pages commentary is an ideal proportion.
