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Getting started: two general paper structures

IMRAD (intro, methods / materials, results, and discussion): common for scientific journal articles
IBC (intro, body, conclusion)

→ Still lots of variation across papers and disciplines, but this covers about 99% of them. You still need to break down what “body” means!

→ Even if it feels counter-intuitive, sometimes it’s useful to write the intro and conclusion last.

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Reverse outlining / summarizing the reading

It’s a little easier for some academic papers because they have ready-made headings — but are they effective?
Major components of a paper

What are the problems / questions that the authors are trying to solve / answer?
How do the authors begin answering these questions?
How are these questions related to other research or writing about the topic?
Why should we care about this topic and / or these conclusions?
How should a reader do or think differently after reading the paper?

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Why reverse-outline a reading?

You don’t always have to do it explicitly, but learning how to exercise this muscle will be helpful for getting through readings more quickly
Good for reading comprehension: read strategically. What does the author want you to get out of this?

This is sometimes tricky, especially if the writing is bad 🙈

For drafts of papers, this helps you follow your argument throughout the paper and triage where you’re spending too much (or too little) time.

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Three approaches to reverse-outlining the reading

By topic sentence: does each paragraph (or small cluster of paragraphs) have a succinct version of the paragraph’s argument?

Copypasta topic sentences in order to see the general throughline of the argument

Idea-by-idea: what are the “units of thought” in each paragraph?

More than one idea per paragraph is fine!
Try to express those thoughts in complete sentences rather than bullet points

Answering major components of paper: does the paper answer the questions from previous slide succinctly?

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Create Google / Word doc + reverse-outline one of the readings from class

(you’ll submit the doc to Canvas for attendance points)

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Exchange paper with your partner and repeat the same exercise

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Meeting people where they are …

Principle of charitability: what is the paper trying to do and how?

Should you hold a Disney movie (for example) to the same criteria / standards as Parasite?
The New Yorker film critic column ❌

Goal of the paper + what it does well
What is the stated goal and what actually transpires in the reading?

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Writing feedback

Ask your partner: what kind of feedback would you like?
Start with some factual statements / summarization

What is the paper about and what are its major questions?
How does the paper propose to answer the question?

Briefly state what contribution the submission makes. What are the strengths of this piece?

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Step by step process…

Triage the content:

Are any needed sections missing? Are any sections expendable?

Review each section:

How well does it advance the main goal?
How well does it meet the criteria for the section type?
Are any necessary details or implications missing?

Draft alternate sentences:

Perform copy-editing and verbiage reduction

Bring everything together, make passes to adjust for length.

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