The more we learn about the audience's role in shaping our arguments, the more we long to try out our strategies on real people to find out how they are likely to react. Understanding the audience's role forces us to acknowledge that writing isn't the supremely solitary pursuit of the romantic artist locked away in a garret somewhere. Instead, we come to realize that writing is a much more communal endeavor: we formulate our ideas and evidence for an audience, we submit our written work to an audience, and we depend on the ideas and words of others to support our own arguments.
Peer Reviewing is the process of handing our works-in-progress to a friend or colleague for comments and suggestions before submitting the work to a larger audience. Having someone point out confusing or weak parts of our writing before it is submitted for grading or publication is a pretty smart manuever. That's why most books have a section entitled "Acknowledgments," in which the authors gratefully thank all the friends, relatives, and colleagues who read and commented on sections of their work. If well-established professors at the top of their careers rely so heavily on peer reviewing, it makes sense that much less experienced writers find the process extremely valuable.
Some students worry about the boundaries between good peer reviewing and plagiarism. In general, so long as your reviewer doesn't actually rewrite sentences or sections, you don't have to worry about plagiarism. Your reviewer can even suggest additional ideas or make comments to improve your organization, so long as you end up putting at that good advice to use your own way.
Optional Exercise: Grab
a friend, group of friends, or even your relatives and ask them to read
your paper and offer suggestions for improvement (this works best, though,
if you trade papers with someone from your class).
Following are some questions to get your peer
reviewer started.
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1. What is my paper's issue? 2. Why do people argue about my issue? Have I indicated the nature of the debate in my introduction? 3. Underline the sentence you think is my thesis. Does my thesis make a causal argument? 4. Examine the topic sentences at the beginning of each paragraph. Which topics are unclear? Do they provide reasons to support my thesis? 5. Examine the logical organization of the topic sentences. Have I provided transitions in each case? 6. Look at my paragraphs' development. Show me places I could add more evidence, more discussion, or better connect the content to my thesis. 7. Have I used sufficient, credible evidence to back up my claims? Indicate where I need further proof of my assertions. 8. Does my conclusion pursue the significance, relevance, consequences, or implications of my thesis? Or does it merely repeat the thesis and reasons? |
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