APPROACHES TO THE READING ASSIGNMENTS IN AMERICAN STUDIES,

LEADING TO EXAM TOPICS

M. Katsarska In order to be able to write your essays competently, coherently and to best results you first need to develop as competent, critical and skillful readers of texts. Stage One: Reading and understanding the text. (Annotating & Summarizing) A. First reading: getting familiar with the text in its entirety. (Impressions) B. Second reading: working with language. (Vocabulary) C. Third reading: working with syntax and meaning. (Translation) D. Fourth reading: working with concepts, proper names and references in the text. (Basic research) E. Fifth reading: working towards extracting core ideas form the text. (Making texts structure visible. Recognizing and summarizing its thesis, line of presentation and argumentation, evidence, examples and illustrations) Stage Two: Positioning the text. (More research) Any text may be understood as a product or a succession of products and as the result of a number of processes. These processes involve three basic elements: producers (authors, etc), receivers (audiences, etc) and relations to the rest of the world (i.e. everything else to which the work can be taken to refer). To position the text will mean to identify how the text relates to any or all of the three core influences presented in the diagram on the next page. Basic questions to put to a text 1. Texts as products: In what recorded versions has this text existed? What is its genre? 2. Re/production and reception: Who has been involved in making and responding to this text at various moments? 3. Relations to the rest of the world: What are the various frames of reference and contexts (historical, political, religious, social etc.) within which the text has been realized historically? What world-views may it be reckoned to uphold?

RELATIONS TO THE REST OF THE WORLD (everything else the text refers or relates to) Texts are ABOUT things

TEXT AS PRODUCT/S (versions of the text as notes, drafts, publications, performances, etc.) Texts ARE things

PRODUCER/S (author, artist, director, performer, etc.) Texts are MADE

RECEIVERS (readers, audiences, viewers, etc) Texts are RESPONDED TO

Stage three: Choosing the main points of your commentary and taking stock of your ideas. Relevant phrases and quotations which might be useful for your exam essays. Stage four: Re-reading, in view of the exam questions list for your final exam essay in American Studies. Q to consider: How can you incorporate the text into the exposition and the argumentation of the exam topic. Stage five: Revision.

CITATION & REFERENCE (MLA STYLE) Plagiarism Plagiarism is the copying of someone elses work without acknowledging the fact and presenting it as your own. This is a serious academic misdemeanour and all such cases will be severely penalised in terms of grading. The assignment which you submit for assessment should be the result of your own work and efforts. If you wish to adopt or otherwise use the ideas, theories and research of other people you should conform to recognised standards of good academic practice. Please, observe the following mode for citation, reference and bibliography listing. Quotations Type quotations which are more than two lines long in a marked by a new paragraph text which is single spaced and visibly indented from the main margin of the text body. Put short quotations in single quotation marks and integrate them into the main body. Reference When you refer to or quote from someone elses work, indicate the source in the main body of your text by writing in brackets in the following succession: a) the authors surname; b) the page number(s) of the quotation. Please note also the appropriate punctuation as in the example (Williams 66). It is also possible to integrate the name within the text, like as is indicated by Williams (66). Useful phrases for integrated reference might be according to, in view of , the research carried out by established that, in compliance with work etc. Bibliography In your bibliography at the end of the written work you should give full details of ALL the works referred to. Every reference in the text must be accompanied by a complete reference in the bibliography. List references by alphabetical order of the authors surnames and each authors works by year of publication ending with the most recent one. Use the following convention for a reference to a book: Author(s). Title of Book. Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publication. For example: Lodge, D. After Bakhtin. New York and London: Routledge. 1990. Use the following convention for reference to an article or a chapter in an edited book which consists of a collection of articles: Author(s). "Title of Article." Title of Collection. Ed. Editor's Name(s). Place of Publication: Publisher, Year. Pages. Example: Harris, Muriel. "Talk to Me: Engaging Reluctant Writers." A Tutor's Guide: Helping Writers One to One. Ed. Ben Rafoth. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2000. 24-34. Please use the following convention for reference to a film: The Usual Suspects. Dir. Bryan Singer. Perf. Kevin Spacey, Gabriel Byrne, Chazz Palminteri, Stephen Baldwin, and Benecio del Toro. Polygram, 1995. Please follow the example for reference to a television or radio programme: "The Blessing Way." The X-Files. Fox. WXIA, Atlanta. 19 Jul. 1998. Please use the following standard for reference to a newspaper or magazine article: Author(s). "Title of Article." Title of Journal Vol (Year): pages. Poniewozik, James. "TV Makes a Too-Close Call." Time 20 Nov. 2000: 70-71. For websites, please use the following reference style: Author(s). Name of Page. Date of Posting/Revision. Name of institution/organization affiliated with the site. Date of Access <electronic address>. Example: Felluga, Dino. Undergraduate Guide to Literary Theory. 17 Dec. 1999. Purdue University. 15 Nov. 2000 <http://omni.cc.purdue.edu %7Efelluga/theory2.html>. Purdue Online Writing Lab. 2003. Purdue University. 10 Feb. 2003 <http://owl.english.purdue.edu>. For further details on citation and referencing visit: <http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/research/r_mla.html#Handling> 15 Feb. 2007