Article to review – https://drive.google.com/file/d/11JNZ3CMZ_XUGT2GEVB40Qrm4PrhYrmEz/view?usp=sharing
Double Space
1 inch margins
11 or 12 point font
3 to 4 pages in length, or 750 to 1000 words when printed double-spaced and in 12-point font.
Heading with name, date, assignment, etc.
Preparing to Write the Review:
Once you have read the article and found its thesis or purpose, and once you have evaluated it, you are ready to write your review. Having decided on the point your review will make (i.e. this is a sound, well-documented, and carefully written article or this article is so poorly researched and so badly written that the publisher should not have wasted good paper on it or this is a fascinating article but it lacks the evidence to support the thesis-and so on). Write an introductory paragraph containing the title and author of the article, a sentence about the author, a brief description of the article’s contents, and an indication of what your review will say. The following two or three paragraphs (i.e. the body of the review) will probably contain a statement of the author’s argument, an evaluation of its validity, and the answers to such of the above questions as are pertinent to the article. When you have finished the review – an absolute maximum of five typed (or the equivalent in long-hand pages) – write a concluding paragraph in which a summary of your review’s most important points is made.
V. Citation. At the top of the first page of your review, give a full citation for the article read.
VI. A Few Points and Guidelines:
An article review discusses the main themes of an article, states the author’s thesis (main point), describes the author’s sources (evidence), assesses the author’s use of the sources in arguing the thesis, and compares the author’s work with other articles on the same subject. If an article review offers an opinion on the merits of the article, it does so on the basis of the author’s stated objectives, not on the basis of the reviewer’s biases.
The word “critical” in “critical analysis” does not mean that you are obligated to produce an unfavorable review, nor that you should be disparaging in your remarks. It means that you should use critical reading skills to ask yourself what the author’s objective is, what the author’s thesis is, and how the author has used his or her sources to construct an argument using evidence that is persuasive. In the final analysis, has the author persuaded you–the reader–to agree with his or her interpretation of history?
Like every good piece of writing, your article review should be constructed with an introduction, the main body of the text (several paragraphs) in which you develop your analysis, and a conclusion.
When writing a Critical Review paper you should have this general framework:
Introduction (providing a framework and focus for the rest of your paper). Introductions should clearly identify the article and begin the process of explaining the main point in the article. You should also provide a clear transition to your more in-depth analysis/criticisms of the article at the end of this paragraph. It should establish your thesis and objectives in the paper; thus, it should not be a thoughtless formality but rather provide the context for the more detailed explanation and analysis in the main body of your paper. Essentially, it should tell me what the article is doing and what your paper is going to say about the article.
Main Body. The main body of the paper consists of your detailed explanation of the article and overall critical analysis of the work. You should explain, develop, and expand upon the ideas and themes you set up in the introduction.
Summary/conclusion. Summarize and reiteration essentially, tell me what you said about the article and its ideas and give your final assessment of the article.
Tip: You might find it useful to begin in the main body of the paper, write to the end, compose the summary and then write the introduction last – it may make for a stronger opening in many cases if you do it that way.
