ENGL 2A - BEAM-ing Your Research (Swenson)

What is an Annotated Bibliography?

An annotated bibliography is a list of citations to books, articles, and documents. Each citation is followed by a brief (usually about 150 words) descriptive and evaluative paragraph, the annotation. The purpose of the annotation is to inform the reader of the relevance, accuracy, and quality of the sources cited.

Annotations vs. Abstracts

Abstracts are the purely descriptive summaries often found at the beginning of scholarly journal articles or in periodical indexes. Annotations are descriptive and critical; they may describe the author's point of view, authority, or clarity and appropriateness of expression.

Begin with a complete bibliographic citation using the style manual (e.g. APA, MLA, Chicago) of your or your instructor's choice.  The citation is followed by the annotation. The annotation should answer the questions below. Answers will be found in the item itself and in introductory pages, table of contents, etc.
FACTS

• What kind of work is it: book? chapter? scholarly journal article? popular magazine article? webpage?
• Who is/are the author(s)? What are their qualifications?
• Who is the intended audience: scholars? general public? industry professionals? political groups? etc.
• Who is the publisher or sponsor?
• Does the work include significant appendices, statistics, data, images, web links, etc.?
• How well documented is the research/writing?

CRITICAL COMMENTS
Answering the following questions requires critical thinking on your part. Comparing your information sources helps. 

• What was the author's purpose in researching or presenting this material?
• What conclusions are drawn? Issues raised? Are the conclusions/issues adequately substantiated?
• Can you detect any biases or fallacies in the arguments or conclusions?
• Is anything lacking? Do you still have questions about the material?
• How effectively is the information presented? Well written or not? Well organized or not? Good supporting material, such as graphics?
• How does this information source compare with others you have read on the topic?
• How useful was this work to you in your research? What role did it play?

The following examples uses the APA format:

Craig, R. S. (1992). The effect of day part on gender portrayals in television commercials: a content analysis. Sex Roles: A Journal of Research, 26 (5-6), 197-213.

Gender portrayals in 2,209 network television commercials from 1990 were content analyzed. To compare differences between three day parts, the sample was chosen from three time periods: daytime, evening prime time, and weekend afternoon sportscasts. The gender of the characters, their roles, the product advertised, setting and gender of primary narrator was noted. The results indicate large and consistent differences in the way men and women are portrayed in these three day parts, with almost all comparisons reaching significance at the .05 level. Although ads in all day parts tended to portray men in stereotypical roles of authority and dominance, those on weekends tended to emphasize escape from home and family. The findings of earlier studies which did not consider day part differences may now have to be reevaluated for they may have either overestimated or underestimated certain types of gender differences.

Esherick, J. W. & Wasserstron, J. N. (1990, November). "Acting out democracy: political theater in modern China." Journal of Asian Studies, 49, 835-865. 

This scholarly journal article provides an uncommon interpretation of the events of April-June, 1989 in  Beijing. The authors are history professors at American universities with recent firsthand experience in China. They base their article on research, personal observation and the written and pictorial records of events. Their stated goal is to create a framework in which to interpret the events that will place them within the context of Chinese political history and permit comparison with recent similar events in Eastern Europe. The conclusion drawn is that the events of April-June, 1989, in Beijing were not related to Western participatory democracy but rather to traditional Chinese forms and ideas and are characterized as political theater. As such, they are full of symbols and scripts with unique Chinese historical bases.
 

CNN. (2001). Tiananmen Revisited 1989-2001. Retrieved February 14, 2006, from http://edition.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/tiananmen/index.html
This site was created by CNN to commemorate the June, 1989 massacre of student protestors by the Chinese Army in Tiananmen Square. It provides links to news stories about the controversial “Tiananmen papers”, a Who’s Who of Chinese government officials involved at the time, access to a few relevant news stories since 1989, and, most significantly, several videos, available in different media formats, photos and audios that constitute eyewitness accounts of the events at the time.

Some material adapted from the UC Santa Cruz Library website, http://library.ucsc.edu