Metadata
- Authors: Wayne C. Booth, Gregory G. Colomb, Joseph M. Williams
- Full Title:: The Craft of Research
- Category:: đź“šBooks
- Finished date:: 2023-02-02
Highlights
1.2.1 Write to Remember (Location 234)
That’s why careful researchers never put off writing until they’ve gathered all the data they need: (Location 241)
the more you write, the better you read.) (Location 246)
the most important reason for learning to report research in ways readers expect is that when you write for others, you demand more of yourself than when you write for yourself alone. By the time you fix your ideas in writing, they are so familiar to you that you need help to see them not for what you (Location 254)
Just tell me something I don’t know so that I can better understand our common interest. (Location 378)
she will have to make an offer better than Here’s some new stuff. (Location 389)
Find a topic (Location 402)
it in the time you have: (Location 403)
- Note: Error que cometimos en el Survey
Resolve to do lots of writing along the way. Much of it will be routine note-taking, but you should also write reflectively, to understand: make outlines; explain why you disagree with a source; draw diagrams to connect disparate facts; summarize sources, (Location 419)
That’s how a lot of research begins-not with a big question that attracts everyone in a field, but with a mental itch about a small one that only a single researcher wants to scratch. If you feel that itch, start scratching. (Location 445)
start with what most interests you. Nothing contributes to the quality of your work more than your commitment to it. (Location 457)
If the topic is general, such as religious masks, you’ll have to do some random reading to narrow it. But read with a plan: (Location 469)
A topic is probably too broad if you can state it in four or five words: (Location 483)
a report falls short if it is seen as just a pastiche of vaguely relatedfacts. If a writer asks no specific question worth asking, he can offer no specific answer worth supporting. (Location 501)
focus on how and why. (Location 507)
Then ask any other question you can think of or find in your sources. Record all the questions, (Location 508)
Ask questions that build on agreement: (Location 525)
If a source makes a claim you think is persuasive, ask questions that might extend its reach. Elias shows that masked balls became popular in eighteenth-century London in response to anxieties about social mobility. Did the same anxieties cause similar developments in Venice?• Ask questions that might support the same claim with new evidence. Elias supports his claim about masked balls with published sources. Is it also supported by letters and diaries?• Ask questions analogous to those that sources have asked about similar topics. Smith analyzes costumes from an economic point of view. What would an economic analysis of masks turn up?Now ask questions that reflect disagreement:• Martinez claims that carnival masks uniquely allow wearers to escape social norms. But could there be a larger pattern of all masks creating a sense of alternative forms of social or spiritual life? (Location 526)
without a research question to answer, with only a topic to guide their work, they gather data aimlessly and endlessly, with no way of knowing when they have enough. (Location 634)
We usually do our best thinking in the last few pages we write. It is often only then that we begin to formulate a final claim that we did not anticipate when we started. (Location 740)
You cant avoid feeling overwhelmed and anxious at times, (Location 755)
dont signal incompetence, only inexperience. (Location 756)
If you have not yet formulated a research question, you may have to spend time reading generally on your topic to find one. (Location 766)
LOOKING BEYOND PREDICTABLE SOURCES (Location 915)
You can minimize the panic by taking every opportunity to organize and summarize what you have gathered by writing as you go and by returning to the central questions: What question am I asking? What problem am I posing? (Location 1103)
Vague claims lead to vague arguments. The more specific your claim, the more it helps you plan your argument (Location 1273)
Although I acknowledge X, (2) 1 claim Y (3) because of reason Z. (Location 1285)
What did you think before you began your research? (Location 1315)
Some new researchers think their claims are most credible when they are stated most forcefully. But nothing damages your ethos more than arrogant certainty. (Location 1317)
As paradoxical as it seems, you make your argument stronger and more credible by modestly acknowledging its limits. (Location 1318)
every claim is subject to countless conditions, so mention only those that readers might plausibly think of. (Location 1322)
Consider mentioning important limiting conditions even if you feel readers would not think of them. (Location 1324)
they hedged the certainty of their claims (Location 1333)
We believe (Location 1335)
Of course, if you hedge too much, you will seem timid or uncertain. But in most fields, readers distrust flatfooted certainty (Location 1339)
Your readers want you to state your evidence precisely. They hear warning bells in words that so hedge your claim that they cannot assess its substance:The Forest Service has spent a great deal of money to prevent forest fires, but there is still a high probability of large, costly ones. (Location 1421)
While you must acknowledge other views, don’t focus on them as you assemble the core of your argument (claim, reasons, and evidence). You may freeze up if you try to imagine every possible alternative. (Location 1448)
If you imagine a question that you cant answer, decide whether you can find the answer before you go on. Don’t go easy on yourself with this one: the time to fix a problem with your argument is when you find it. (Location 1457)
As you take notes, pay as much attention to disagreements and alternatives as to the data that support your claim. Youll not only understand your problem better, but you’ll better anticipate weaknesses in or limits to your argument. (Location 1480)
When readers think that both a warrant and reason are true, and that the specific reason and claim are good examples of the warrant, they are logically obliged at least to consider the claim. If they dorit, no rational argument is likely to change their minds. (Location 1659)
You must distinguish two fundamentally different kinds of arguments, because readers evaluate them differently:• One kind of argument backs up a claim with reasons based on evidence.• The other infers a claim from a reason and warrant. (Location 1698)
a lot of their early drafting will not make it into their final draft, and so they start early enough to leave time for revision. (Location 1721)
Do not organize your report as a narrative of your thinking. (Location 1752)
Few readers care what you found first, then dead ends you hit, then problems you overcame. (Location 1752)
reorganize your report around the core elements of your argument-your claim and the reasons supporting it. (Location 1757)
Do not assemble your report as a patchwork of your sources. Readers want your analysis, (Location 1758)
Writers are often advised to write their introduction last. A few writers can wait until they’ve written their last words before they write their first ones, but most of us need a working introduction to start us on the right track. Expect to write your introduction twice, a sketchy one for yourself right now, then later a final one for your readers. (Location 1771)
After your summary of sources, rephrase your question as a statement about a flaw or gap that you see in them: (Location 1778)
Identify Key Concepts That Will Run Through Your Whole Report (Location 1801)
On the introduction page, circle four or five words that express those concepts. (Location 1803)
START DRAFTING AS SOON AS YOU CAN (Location 1846)
Once they have a plan, many writers draft quickly: they let the words flow, omitting quotations and data that they can plug in later, skipping ahead when they get stuck. If they dorit remember a detail, they insert a ”[?]” and keep writing (Location 1857)
Even if reports in your field dont use headings and subheadings, we suggest that you do when you draft. Create each heading out of the words that are unique to the section or subsection it heads: (Location 1865)
evidence never speaks for itself, especially not long quotations or complex sets of numbers. You must speak for such evidence by introducing it with a sentence stating what you want your readers to get out of it. (Location 1889)
some cases of writer’s block may really be opportunities to let your ideas simmer in your subconscious while they combine and recombine into something new and surprising. If you’re stuck but have time (another reason to start early), let your unconscious work on the problem while you do something else for a day or two. Then return to the task to see if you can get back on track. (Location 1983)
If you have a choice, state the point of a section at the end of its introduction. (Location 2066)
Do not give background information or characterize what the data imply. (Location 2135)
Keep the visual impact simple. (Location 2150)
Never use both horizontal and vertical dark lines to divide columns and rows. Use light gray lines only if the table is complex (Location 2151)
Use background grid lines only if the graphic is complex or readers need to see precise numbers. (Location 2153)
Never use iconic bars (for example, images of cars to represent automobile production) or add a third dimension merely for effect. Both look amateurish and can distort how readers judge values. (Location 2155)
Plot data on three dimensions only when your readers are familiar with such graphs and you cannot display the data in any other way. (Location 2156)
Use a legend only if labels would make the image too complex to read. (Location 2159)
Choose the variable that makes the line go in the direction, up or down, that supports your point. If the good news is a reduction (down) in high school dropouts, you can more effectively represent the same data as a rising line indicating increase in retention (up). If you want to emphasize bad news, find a way to represent your data as a falling line. (Location 2186)
opening to most fairy tales, this one establishes an unproblematic, even happy context, just so that it can be disrupted with a problem: (Location 2244)
Some research suggests that readers are more motivated by a real cost than by a potential benefit. (Location 2272)
more important about our national identity. To be sure, some readers will ask again, So what? I don’t care about (Location 2299)
To which you can think only, Wrong audience. Successful researchers know how to find and solve interesting problems, but a skill no less important is knowing how to find (or create) an audience interested in the problems they solve. (Location 2300)
If you’re sure your readers know the consequences of yourproblem, you might decide not to spell them out. (Location 2301)
you take a big step in that direction when you can state your own incomplete knowledge or flawed understanding in a way that shows you are committed to improving it. (Location 2305)
If you have reason to save your point for the end of your paper, your launching point must do more than just announce a general topic. It should suggest the conceptual outlines of your solution or announce a plan (or both). (Location 2316)
When you open quickly, you imply an audience of peers; (Location 2327)
Context+ Problem + ResponseYou don’t need all three in every report:• If the problem is well known, omit the common ground.• If the consequences of the problem are well known, omit them.• If you want readers to follow your thinking before they know your answer, offer a launching point at the end of your introduction and state your main point in your conclusion, (Location 2330)
you can write your conclusion using the same elements in your introduction, in reverse order. (Location 2336)
If you already stated it in your introduction, repeat it here but more fully; do not simply repeat it word-for-word. (Location 2337)
Add a New Significance or Application (Location 2338)
your conclusion can call for research still to do: (Location 2345)
your subjects will be short, specific, and concrete. (Location 2424)
When you express actions not with verbs but with abstract nouns, you also clutter a sentence with articles and prepositions. (Location 2432)
So here are two principles of a clear style:• Express crucial actions in verbs.• Make your central characters the subjects of those verbs; keep those subjects short, concrete, and specific. (Location 2443)
underlined verbs name specific actions, not general ones like have, make, do, be, and so on? (Location 2446)
Dont change every abstract noun into a verb. (Location 2475)
Make the first six or seven words refer to familiar information, usually something you have mentioned before (typically your main characters).2. Put at the ends of sentences information that your readers will find unpredictable or complex and therefore harder to understand. (Location 2500)
old-new principle (Location 2502)
the passive allowed us to move the older, more familiar information from the end of its sentence to its beginning, where it belongs. And that’s the main function of the passive: to build sentences that begin with older information. If we dont use the passive when we should, our sentences wont flow as well as they could. (Location 2513)
The active (and therefore first person) is appropriate when authors refer to actions that only the writer/researcher can perform-not only rhetorical actions, such as suggest, conclude, argue, or show, but also those for which they get credit as scientists, such as design experiments, solve problems, or prove results. Everyone can measure, but only author/researchers are entitled to claim what their research means. (Location 2524)
Put complex bundles of ideas that require long phrases or clauses at the end of a sentence, never at the beginning. (Location 2536)
you cant distinguish what is for your readers old and simple from what’s new and complex. (Location 2544)