Annotated Bibliography

The annotated bibliography is an exercise in collaborative scholarly research that will have the added benefit of creating a useful resource that may benefit later work, both in this class and beyond. This assignment is due on November 28, 2022.

Using Zotero

The work of this assignment will be carried out using Zotero, so if you aren’t already a user, you should create an account and start familiarizing yourself with it. The Zotero website includes a helpful video and quick start guide. Once you’ve installed Zotero and are comfortable working with it in single user-library mode, request to join our ENGL 386 group to start working in its collaborative mode. As a part of our group, you’ll now see a new library icon (folder) in the left pane of your Zotero interface. Click on that library to see items that are now shared among other members of our group. To add items to our group library, simply drag them from your personal library and drop them in the group library. If you’re using the Zotero desktop client, make sure you hit your “sync” button after doing this.

To summarize, here are the first steps you should complete to begin working on this assignment:

  1. Create a Zotero account.
  2. Join the engl386f22 working group.
  3. Install Zotero on your computer.
  4. Configure your Zotero installation to “sync” with the account you’ve just created.

Annotations

For this assignment, your goal is to find 5 scholarly resources that contribute to your understanding to the primary texts we’re reading this semester (or to comics and graphic novels generally speaking). These may be journal articles, scholarly monographs, or book chapters, but they must be high-quality, peer reviewed, scholarly writing. To the greatest extent possible, try and find scholarly writing about specific comics or graphic novels, as opposed to scholarly writing about comics in general.

In addition, the items you contribute should all be unique, so when you find an item you wish to add, make sure that it is not already in our library. Locate items of potential interest by searching the databases available through the UMW Libraries website, or make use of public databases like Google Scholar.

Each of the 5 items you add should include an annotation: a “note” attached to the citation in which you write (in about 200 words)

  1. What is this piece about?
  2. What is its principle argument?
  3. How might it be useful for further study?
  4. Anything else we should know about it

To do this competently, you’ll need to actually read the item in question so that your annotations can be well-informed by your understanding of its author’s argument. Many articles will include an abstract, but reading the abstract alone is not sufficient, and abstract is not the same as an annotation. You must write your annotations in your own words.

And again, the steps for adding each annotation are as follows:

  1. Use a database to locate relevant, scholarly item of interest
  2. Check to see if that item is already in our database. (If it is, repeat step 1.)
  3. Save the items record into our group library, tagging it with your initials (e.g. “znw”)
  4. Read it carefully
  5. Write your annotation (“note”) and attach it to that item.

Logistics

As you add your annotated items, use keyword tags to identify what the item is about. Additionally, tag the items you’ve contributed with your initials (e.g. “znw”) and include your initials at the conclusion of your annotation’s text. You can add and edit tags by switching to the “tags” tab in the right-hand window pane.

The Zotero web interface allows you to construct a URL that will highlight your contributions, according to the following schema:

https://www.zotero.org/groups/4759547/engl386f22/tags/znw

Here, note the “znw” at the end. These are my initials, so you should paste the preceding URL into a browser tab, but replace those letters with the initials you’ve used as your personal tag.

Submit this personalized URL in Canvas.

Evaluation

This assignment is worth 100 points, with 20 points available for each of those 5 items. Those items that are relevant, appropriately scholarly, properly-documented and well-annotated will receive a full 20 points.