International Affairs Summary Analysis Guidelines Due on or before Thursday, November 16 by 11:59pm Upper Division Writing: This writing assignment meets the standards
International Affairs
Summary Analysis Guidelines
Due on or before Thursday, November 16 by 11:59pm
Upper Division Writing:
This writing assignment meets the standards required for the Upper Level Writing Requirement.
By the end of the course, students will:
1) Use appropriate evidence from multiple sources to illustrate how a chosen topic is relevant to a particular field.
2) Employ different resources used to compose in the field.
3) Compose as a process, including drafts, revision, and editing.
4) Convey ideas clearly, coherently, and effectively for a particular purpose, occasion, or audience as appropriate for the field.
In order to fulfill FSU’s Upper Division Writing requirement, the student must earn a
“C-” or higher in the course, and earn at least a “C-” average on the required writing assignments. If the student does not earn a “C-” average or better on the required writing assignments, the student will not earn an overall grade of “C-” or better in the course, no matter how well the student performs in the remaining portion of the course.
What is the Summary Analysis?
- As the name implies, you are expected to provide both summary and analysis in each of your write-ups.
- You will choose 4 of the eligible assigned readings (highlighted in red on the syllabus) and write a 500-800 word Summary Analysis for each.
o Each article should be evaluated individually.
o Do not compare them - this is not a comparison paper.
Purpose of the Paper
- To train you in finding the important points in an article.
- To train you in objectively evaluating the quality of an article.
- To train you in writing in a professional and concise manner.
You may choose from any of the articles that are highlighted in red on the Syllabus. The articles can be found on our Syllabus and on Canvas (see Course Library under Assignments).
- We will not accept articles that are not highlighted in red on the Syllabus. If you choose to ignore this, you will receive a 0 for every unapproved Summary-Analysis submitted. This will likely result in you failing Upper Division Writing.
- This should be your own work and ideas, so do not use outside sources at all.
- Group work is not permitted.
*If you are retaking this course, you must submit an entirely new project.
Summary:
- Every work is written for a reason.
- So, what was the author’s point in writing this work? In other words, what is the work about and what is his/her main argument(s)? Are there sub-arguments included?
- Succinctly identify the author’s key argument and any related sub-arguments
- Thus, your summary section should clearly identify the subject matter, main argument(s), key points, and author’s conclusion.
- The summary section must be a minimum of 250 words, but should be no more than 50% of your write-up.
Analysis:
- Now provide an academic analysis by breaking down the merits of the article.
- In this section, you are critiquing the quality of the article (not the topic or subject matter, but the merits of the article itself).
- Examples of what you might look for are (these are merely suggestions to help you think about analysis - you do not have to include every one of these, nor are you limited to only these. Do not follow these like bullet points in your analysis):
o What are the merits or shortcomings of this article? Explain.
o Does the author make a solid, compelling argument? If yes, how so? If not, then why not?
o Do you find it persuasive? Explain what made it persuasive, or not persuasive.
o Is the author objective in his/her approach? Provide examples of this.
o Does the author adequately support his/her claim with appropriate facts and examples? Or, does the author make bold claims but fail to support them with appropriate evidence? Explain.
o Is he/she selective in the evidence used to support his/her claim? In other words, could the author have used better examples to make his/her point? Did the author omit facts that clearly might challenge his/her theory? Explain.
o Can you identify the perspective the author is coming from? (IF UNSURE, DON’T GUESS).
o Is the work presented professionally? (Do not dwell excessively on typos or other technicalities as that is not analysis).
- The analysis section must be a minimum of 250 words and comprise 50% or more of your write-up.
*For the sake of clarity, separate your summary and analysis sections - just as I have done above. Use headers with word counts to divide the two sections, as follows:
Example: Summary (259 words)
Your written summary here…
Analysis (342 words)
Your written analysis here…
Mandatory Rough Draft Policy:
All students are required to electronically submit a rough draft of one complete Summary-Analysis no later Thursday, October 5 by 11:59 pm - we do not accept these late.
- Only submit one – your TA will only review one. You can have the remainder of your project reviewed at a later date (see below).
- Your TA will read through your completed draft and suggest corrections/revisions. We expect you to follow the TA’s advice and apply their corrections to your final Summary-Analysis project. The purpose of the mandatory rough draft is to help you learn and grow as a writer. Writing is a process, and as the best writers know, editing, proofreading, and revising are all crucial steps in the process of good writing.
- While your rough draft will not be graded, submitting a partial/incomplete draft or failure to submit the rough draft will result in an automatic 10 point deduction from your overall paper grade.
- If you are repeating the course, your submission must be new – otherwise you will not receive credit for the draft, resulting in -10 off the final paper grade.
o Submitting previously submitted work is self-plagiarism.
- Make sure you have read the Paper Guidelines thoroughly to ensure that your paper meets the requirements and the standards of writing that we expect. If it is obvious that you did not read the Guidelines or put any effort into your draft, you will not receive credit for submitting the draft.
Late and partial/incomplete rough drafts will not be accepted, so plan ahead. Early submission is encouraged!
Discretionary Draft: The TAs are happy to review your remaining drafts after you have reviewed your Mandatory Draft feedback. If you would like to have your revised draft or remaining project reviewed, provide a copy to your assigned TA no later than Monday, November 6 (but the sooner the better!).
Table:
As an appendix to your paper, you will be required to fill in a Table that identifies the authors and articles you have chosen, the thesis of each article, and a simple yes/no declaration identifying whether or not you agree with the thesis. Identifying the thesis is a crucial element of the Summary process, and defending whether or not you agree with the thesis should form an integral part of your Analysis section.
The inclusion of the Table fulfills an additional component of the Upper Division Writing process – “utilizing visual evidence to simplify and/or clarify your work.” The Table should be added as an appendix.
The Table Template is available on Canvas under Assignments.
Final Submission:
You will need to combine all 4 write-ups and the Table into 1 document and then submit the single document to the Assignment link on our course page (this will be run through Turnitin - Turnitin is a plagiarism software).
- So that your organization is clear, begin each summary-analysis on a new page – provide a bibliographic citation clearly identifying the article/chapter title and author at the beginning of each.
- You must provide a total word count for each summary-analysis (place at the end of each individual write-up).
- Finally, make sure to include page numbers.
We expect your project to be well-written. So, double-check your spelling, punctuation, and grammar:
- Do NOT turn in a sloppy or poorly written project (I strongly suggest visiting the Writing Center on campus).
o Free tutoring with the Reading/Writing Center is available at several locations. Appointments can be made at https://fsu.mywconline.com
o This is a great resource for all of your writing as they specialize in helping students become better writers.
- You must use academic language. Never use conversational language, text lingo, street terms, slang, colloquialisms, or contractions in an academic paper.
- Be objective in your language, no matter how strongly you feel about the material.
- Write in the objective 3rd person view.
o Do not use first person (I, me, myself, we, us) – simply state your opinion as a fact in a professional/academic tone.
- Be consistent in your use of tenses – switching between past and present is poor writing.
- Use strong, assertive, and straightforward language. Avoid weak words like “a lot” “kind of” “big”, etc., and do not use the same words repeatedly.
*Reminder: separate the summary and analysis & include the word count!
Style – it does not matter which Style you use, but be accurate and consistent.
This paper should be typed in black ink, double-spaced, 12 font (Times New Roman), with 1 inch margins.
- A title page is optional.
Citations: Do not forget to provide proper citations – this gives the author credit for his/her ideas, as well as points your reader to the location of that idea/material.
- Avoid using quotes. We already know what the author said, we want to hear your voice.
o Block quotes should not be used at all.
- When you are paraphrasing the author’s arguments in the summary, provide citations with page numbers so your reader can find exactly where your information is coming from. Since that idea is not your own, it must be cited.
- Citation format depends on the Style. While some styles, such as APA, may not require page numbers, we ask that you provide them since we already know what article you are referring to and instead need to know where to locate that material within the article.
*Plagiarism:
- If you copy a sentence directly from the chapter/article, you must put quotation marks around it and then cite where that quote came from (again, we strongly discourage the use of quotes). Also, if you paraphrase or borrow an idea from any source, you must provide a citation because that material/idea is not your own. Your work must be 100% your own. Anything else is considered plagiarism and is taken very seriously by both the University and myself. You can review the University’s Academic Honesty policies and guidelines at: http://academichonor.fsu.edu/policy/policy.html.
- Use of AI writing tools is strictly forbidden and will result in failure of the
course.
Reminders: Each student is required to submit an electronic copy to the course Assignment/Turnitin site (do not submit it by email or in hard copy form).
- This is due by 11:59pm - at midnight it will be counted as late.
- Do not wait until the last minute to submit.
- For every calendar day that the project is late, you will lose 5 points. (This includes weekends).
o Make sure that you have combined all 4 write-ups and Table into one document before you submit.
IMPORTANT – Double-check that your Turnitin submission was successful. I cannot verify an attempt to submit. It is 100% your responsibility to verify the submission.
- Turnitin provides receipts – always request your receipt.
- After you submit, click to download your submission. You will be able to verify that your paper went through and that it was the correct version of your paper.
o If you submit a draft or the wrong file, that is what we will grade.
- Do NOT submit a .pages file. Canvas cannot open it and it will not be accepted. It is your responsibility to ensure that you submit a file type we can open.
*A corrupted or unreadable file will receive an automatic 0.
NOTE – If you are a student retaking this course, you cannot turn in the same Summary-Analysis project as you did previously. Doing so is self-plagiarism and is a violation of the Academic Honor Policy. This policy is strictly enforced.
TA Information:
All TA office hours are held in Bellamy 211
If you need to schedule an alternate meeting time or request a Zoom meeting, please contact your TA directly to schedule that.
Alyssa Sharp (asharp@fsu.edu) will grade the papers for all students by last name as follows: A – Destine
Office Hours – Mondays 2:00 – 4:30; Wednesdays 8:30 – 12:00
Elizabeth Chidester (emc23f@fsu.edu) will grade the papers for all students whose last names begin with: Diaz - Ibarra
Office Hours – Mondays 8:30 – 11:00; Fridays 1:00 – 4:30
Celeste Clause (pclause@fsu.edu) will grade the papers for all students by last name as follows: Jeanty – Patton-Roark
Office Hours – Thursdays 2:00 – 4:30; Fridays 8:30 – 1:00
Kyle Stevenson (kws19a@fsu.edu) will grade the papers for all students by last name as follows: Pelayo - Z
Office Hours – Tuesdays 8:30 – 12:00; Thursdays 8:30 – 11:00
*The TAs are available in class most days to answer questions.
See the Grading Rubric on following page…
Summary/Analysis Paper Grading Rubric
Following Directions – 5 points total
Followed all directions
- proper formatting (Times New Roman, 12 Font, double-spaced, 1 inch margins, proper paragraph formatting)
- proper citations (must be consistent)
- page numbers on document
Table Included – 5 points total
Accurately identifies author, article/chapter, thesis, and whether you agree or disagree with the author’s thesis. The table should be filled in for all 4 write-ups.
Summary: Identifies the Main Points – 40 points total (10 points each)
250-400 words in length. Addresses main arguments, key points, and author’s conclusions. Do not define key terms.
Analysis: Presents and Defends Solid Arguments – 40 points total (10 points each)
250-400 words in length. Provides a quality analysis. Examples of good analytical questions to discuss: 1. What are the merits or shortcomings of this article? 2. Do you agree with the author’s argument? Do you find it persuasive? 3. Does the author adequately support his/her claim with appropriate facts and examples? Or, does the author make bold claims but not support them with evidence?
Executes Proper Grammar – 10 points total
Correct use of grammar and punctuation. Do not use fragments of sentences or run-on sentences.
Use academic/scholarly language. Conversational language, text lingo, street terms, colloquialisms, contractions, and slang should never be used in an academic paper.
*Quotes should be avoided. When summarizing an author’s argument, paraphrase by putting the author’s ideas into your own words. We want to hear your voice!
*Total = 100 points
Reminder: 10 points will be deducted from the final paper grade for partial/incomplete drafts, or failure to submit a rough draft, by October 5.