ENG1102 Troy University Preliminary Thesis Statement Annotated Bibliography

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The purpose of this assignment is to summarize what scholarship you have read and to begin thinking about how you can use that scholarship in your argument. A successful annotated bibliography will demonstrate both your familiarity with your secondary texts and your ability to put sources in conversation with one another. You must use a minimum of five to seven secondary sources; secondary sources must be scholarlycriticism or analysis, not summaries, reviews, or “analysis” from sites such as Wikipedia, 123HelpMe, or Gradesaver.com; instead, use the library or the available databases such as EBSCOHost, JSTOR, or Lexis-Nexis to locate appropriate sources.

Part I

Begin your annotated bibliography by writing a preliminary thesis. Although the thesis statement you provide at this point does not have to be exactly the same one that you will use in your research paper, it should be focused enough so that you would be proud to use it in your final paper. This means that your preliminary thesis statement should be 1-4 sentences and should give your readers a precise sense of what you intend to argue about your research topic.

Part II

Write MLA citations for each of your five secondary sources and summarize and evaluate those sources. You must arrange your sources in alphabetical order, as determined by the authors’ last names.

All entries must include the following two elements:

  1. The full citation for the source. All citations must be written in standard MLA style.
  2. A summary and evaluation of the source. This must be one formally written, fully developed paragraph. Begin the paragraph one line below your citation; indent the first sentence of the paragraph. Summarize the major points of each source, focusing on those elements that relate to your thesis. Following your summaries, evaluate the source. Will it help you prove your thesis (some sources may not)? Discuss what aspect of the source will be most useful to you in your argument and why. What parts do you plan to use? Where do you plan to use them in your argument? Conclude your paragraph by discussing how this source compares and contrasts with your other sources. Do they complement one another? Reach different conclusions?

Part III

After your bibliography entries, write one fully developed paragraph in which you assess the current state of your research. Consider the following: What questions do you still have about your topic? Has anything in your research surprised you? Are there any kinds of sources you really want to find or still hope to find? Do you feel there are any gaps in your research?

Part IV

On a separate line underneath your Part III paragraph, list all databases you used in your research. Then, write down all the search terms that you used to find sources.

(Note: This assignment does not necessarily have to represent all the sources you will use in your research paper. Thus, feel free to use additional sources when you draft your research paper or to not use some of the sources you discussed here.)

I’m sending a link with the thesis statement and the the sources you’ll need to use.