Australian Economic History Review, Vol. 37, No. 3 ISSN 0004-8992 November 1997 Surveys in the Economic History of Australia CAPITAL MARKETS AND...
Need help with a critical summary and review of the article. Your paper thus has two main sections, the first part provides a summary of the article , the second part provides a critical review of the article (explained below in more detail)
Assignment:Select one of the articles posted on MyUni in the Replacement paper module.Write a critical summary and review of the article. Your paper thus has two main sections, the firstpart provides a summary of the article (guidance length 1000-1500 words), the second part providesa critical review of the article (explained below in more detail)Total length between 2500 and 5000 words (inclusive references, etc) Explanation:You should think of this assignment as a “reaction essay” or “referee report.” The point is to explainthe journal article to another person and then to analyze it in a reasoned, critical fashion. Onepotential reader is a journal editor, who has to decide whether to publish this paper. • • •••• Your paper should assume that the reader knows nothing about the journal article inquestion. Your first task is to explain the article to the reader. What is the basic point of thearticle? What are the larger stakes; why would anyone care about the topic of the article?What are the methods and data used by the author? What are the conclusions?The second talk is to provide a critical review of the article. Your paper can and should becritical, but in a reasoned way. Students often think they have to have a PhD to say anythingabout an academic work. Wrong. You can always ask whether arguments are consistent, dataare relevant, etc. Focus on the parts of the argument that you are most comfortable with.Also if you find that the article does something well, you should say so as well.On the other hand, there is no expectation that you find the paper good or bad in general.Everything has its strong and weak points.Make sure you give reasons for what you say. People who say “I just don’t find thatpersuasive” are not doing anyone a favour. Tell us why you did not find it persuasive.Because you are trying to explain a single article, it will be especially important to paraphraseand use analogies (it would not make sense to just quote big blocks of the text). This is notjust a matter of avoiding plagiarism, although that is something you need to be careful toavoid. The fundamental task here is to enrich my understanding of the paper. It might helpto think of the first 1000-1500 words of the paper as a “just the facts” approach, and the restas explaining your views about it. Some hints: You may want to read some of the material cited by the journal article. Sometimesthis is a good way to figure out the author’s own viewpoint. This is not necessary,however.Be careful about explaining your points; students often allude to a point rather thanexplain it. (If I say “the author does not worry about the Martians problem” then Iam alluding to a point. If I say “the author does not worry about the Martiansproblem. This was a mistake, because it is clear that under certain circumstances Martians can cause the Adelaide Crows to lose the Grand Final” then I am explainingthe point.)When you explain data, analytical methods, etc., don’t try to bluster your waythrough something you do not understand yourself.It often makes sense to explain the entire paper, but focus your critical reactions onone aspect. For example, you might think that the data used are not really suited tothe task, and focus on that problem alone. Focusing on a single problem in a shortessay is entirely respectable. Just make sure you signal your strategy in the paper. Agood way to do so is a transition sentence that says something like “Although thereare several aspects of this article worthy of extended discussion, the rest of my essayfocuses on the suitability of the empirical sources.”Students tend to make vague critiques of papers. For example, a standard claim isthat the paper under discussion needs more data. This is absolutely true – virtuallyall papers could profit from additional data, especially in economic history – butunless you say more, the comment is useless. Say what kind of data would be useful,or what specific aspects of the argument would be more convincing with more data.Many economic history papers either pose an explicit counter-factual, or should.When writing your essay be careful to say what is factual and what is counter-factual.Don’t forget your economics. These are papers in Economic History, the consistentuse of an economic framework is absolutely relevant. If the paper is about thedemand for X, for example, just remember that the demand for X is a function of itsprice, incomes, and the prices of all substitutes. This can be a big help in structuringa discussion. Forgetting the economics can be a large problem in such papers.
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