Depending on the class you are enrolled in, your oral presentation and annotated bibliography will together count for 15%-20% of your final grade. Click here for the Schedule of Presentations for your class.

All students should meet with me as early as possible in the quarter, after having read through their primary texts, to discuss possible angles for the research presentation and report any problems they are having with research assignments. This initial meeting must take place by the end of week 3 at the latest!  Failure to do so will cause an "F" to be averaged into the Oral Presentation component of your final course grade.

Starting in week 3 or 4, assigned readings will be presented by individuals (or if needed, a panel of two students, working together to avoid repetition).  Sign-ups for specific topics will take place the first week of class. This ORAL PRESENTATION (15-20 minutes for an individual, or approximately 30 minutes total if their are two panelists) will be the starting point for class discussion, led jointly by presenter(s) and professor. Please note: you are NOT expected to become a world expert on your assigned text; you are merely responsible for helping to introduce it to your classmates!

Focus of the Oral Presentation:  after a brief overview of background information on your text (e.g. genre, noteworthy formal characteristics, date of composition and primary sources if known), you will present to your classmates an aspect of or an approach to your text that you find particularly interesting or helpful, referring liberally to SPECIFIC PASSAGES from the primary text to illustrate your points (be sure to note the page and line numbers so that your classmates can locate cited passages easily).  The presentation should further our understanding of a significant aspect of the assigned primary reading by offering a thematic, contextual, intertextual, stylistic, structural or other approach to the work as a whole, or to one or more of its key themes, episodes, motifs or characters. While you may choose to refer to secondary sources on your Annotated Bibliography which you have found particularly interesting or helpful, be sure to keep your focus firmly on the way in which the secondary source helps us better understand the primary text -- don't let your presentation degenerate into a book report on the scholarly work.

You are encouraged (but not required) to develop your presentation topic more fully in your final research paper. For this reason, students should meet with me as early as possible in the quarter, after having read through your primary text, to discuss approaches that may prove particularly fruitful and to point you toward promising paper topics.

Note for ENGL 430 students ONLY:  In the course of your presentation, you must read aloud at least 20 lines from the primary text in the original Middle English, using reasonably correct pronunciation and inflections.  Typically, you will meet the 20-line target by reading several shorter passages, but if you are doing a close reading of the text, a single longer passage may be appropriate.  Be sure that you practice reading your passages aloud, aiming for correct pronunciation and inflections, before walking in to class on the day of your presentation.  Failure to incorporate at least 20 lines of Middle English reading into your oral presentation will result in an F being averaged into the Participation component of your final course grade (see the class homepage for more on the read-aloud requirement). 

On the day of the presentation, you will distribute an Annotated Bibliography (no more than one double-sided page in length).  Make enough copies to give one to every classmate and two copies to Prof. Schwartz.  If two or more students are working on the same primary text, each will compile his/her own annotated bibliography.  Presenters should collaborate to ensure that their bibliographies list different secondary works.

The annotated bibliography should include at least five reputable secondary sources that discuss or focus on the work you are researching.  Sources chosen should be from reputable scholarly publications (which you may have accessed electronically through a subscription database); do not include websites.  Arrange the bibliographic entries alphabetically by author's last name as you would on a list of Works Cited.  An annotated bibliography entry consists of a complete and correctly formatted bibliographic citation, followed by parenthetical notation of the mode of access used to obtain the item, followed by the annotation itself: a summary of the subject and main point(s) of the secondary source which clearly and explicitly describes the specific interpretation of or argument about your primary text which it contains (rather than e.g. praise for or criticism of the secondary source itself).

Bibliographic Citation:  each entry on your annotated bibliography should begin with a complete, correctly formatted bibliographic citation (follow link for basic guidelines; fuller details are found in your MLA Handbook).  Review rules about how to transcribe the titles of works (including puctuation, capitalization and italics / underlining) in the chapter of your MLA Handbook called "The Mechanics of Writing."  NOTE:  Remember that italics and underlining should never be mixed in the same document; you must pick one and use it consistently.  Please use underlining rather than italics for all work submitted for this class.

The annotation should be concise (a single paragraph) but detailed and specific, indicating not only what topics are covered, but what the author argues about these topics.  Do not praise or criticize the work in question. (Inclusion of the item on  your bibliography is praise enough; if you don't like it or find it useful, it shouldn't be on your bibliography.)  Be concise, but give enough information so that readers can decided whether this source would be useful in their own research. If the secondary source discusses more than one primary text, state clearly what it argues, specifically, about your primary work (the focus of your presentation); if it does not specifically discuss your primary work, be sure that you make clear how and why the secondary source is relevant to your presentation topic. (Note: if you include an item that you come across in an annotated bibliography, be sure that your summary is in your own words.)  The complete annotated bibliography should not be longer than one double-sided page. The annotated bibliography will be graded for complete and accurate bibliographic citations; the relevance / clarity of annotating comments (as well as mechanics / style -- proofread for typos!); and whether you include all required types of source and modes of access  -- see below).

Distribution of Items on Annotated Bibliography: You are expected to use the full gamut of research tools and resources available to you (following the Research Assignments linked to the course syllabus) to gather a broad range of secondary source materials on your topic. Your bibliographic entries should therefore include at least one of each of the following kinds of sources: 

• a book written entirely by an individual or joint author(s) (i.e. not an edited collection); 
• an essay from an edited collection published in book form (what the MLA Bibliography refers to as a "book article" -- be sure to cite the specific essay by author, title and inclusive page numbers, rather the collection as a whole by editor and title); and,
• a scholarly journal article.

• an item from Cal Poly library's print collections (indicate "Cal Poly" and provide call number in parentheses after the citation); 
• an item obtained through LINK+ (e.g. an essay in an edited book collection or a single-author book not available in Cal Poly's print or electronic collections; indicate LINK+ in parentheses after the citation); 
• an item obtained through ILL (e.g. an article from a journal not avilable in Cal Poly's collections or from a book not available through LINK+; indicate ILL in parentheses after the citation); and,
• a REPUTABLE SCHOLARLY SOURCE accessed electronically from a subscription database (i.e. a full-text scholarly article from one of the online journal databases or an ebook from NetLibrary).  There is no need to provide a separate parenthetical reference to the mode of access for an electronically accessed item from a subscription database, since the complete bibliographic citation for a work from a subscription database already includes the name of the subscription database and the URL where it is found.
• Do not include websites. 

Grading of the Annotated Bibliography: 

• A penalty of .5 will be subtracted (starting from a base of 4.0) for each required kind of source or mode of access which is not included on your annotated bibliography.
• Bibliographical Citations will be graded for completeness and accuracy of formatting (each error counts!)  You are stongly advised to bring your Annotated Bibliography to one of my office hours several days before your scheduled presentation so I can point out any citation errors and you can correct them before you duplicate the bibliography for distribution in class. 
• Annotations will be graded for mechanical errors, clarity of expression and for sufficient detail/specificity.  To receive full points, annotations should make clear not only what general topics are addressed, but what, specifically, the secondary sources argues about that topic.  If the secondary source discusses more than one primary text, be sure to indicate what, specifically, it argues about your primary work (the focus of your presentation); if it does not specifically discuss your primary work, be sure that you make clear how and why the secondary source is relevant to your presentation topic, and that you state clearly and explicitly what insight it provides into your text. 

How to begin? Start with the obvious. . . 

• Check bibliographic references included in your primary text (ENGL 430 students: see especially the first Explanatory Note on your text in the Riverside Chaucer) and use Polycat, LINK+ and/or Interlibrary Loan to locate and/or order listed items that sound most useful to you.
• Work your way through the research exercises linked to the class homepage and calendar of assignments. 
• Don't neglect to browse the Kennedy Library stacks and, especially, to consult the items on reserve for this course. 
• Check Polycat to see if there are specialized bibliographies on your topic in the library's collections; if so, consult them. 
• Piggy-back on the work of other scholars!  When you are reading a secondary source on your topic, always peruse its bibliography and notes; use Polycat, LINK+ and/or Interlibrary Loan to locate or order any listed items that sound interesting. 

NOTE 2: Start making your LINK+ and ILL requests EARLY IN THE QUARTER, or you risk not obtaining necessary materials in time for your research presentation and to complete the Working Bibliography which you must submit as part of your Paper Prospectus (typically due week 5 or 6 of the quarter; see calendar of assignments for your class for specific date. . .)

NOTE 3:  If you have problems finding relevant secondary sources on your topic, COME SEE ME for assistance.  In some cases, it may be appropriate to include a secondary source that focuses on a genre, theme, form etc. which is relevant to your primary text, even if the secondary source does specifically discuss your primary text itself. But check with me first before including such an item on your Annotated Bibliography. If you begin your research in a timely fashion, you should not have problems locating sufficient sources on your topic.  But if you are having difficulties, do come see me for assistance!
 

Contents of this and linked pages Copyright Debora B. Schwartz, 1999-2009

Click here for Dr. Schwartz's Guide to Research Tools

Return to Home Pages for ENGL 430; ENGL 439 "Gender in Medieval Literature"; ENGL 439 "Love in Medieval Literature"; ENGL 459 "Love and Death: The Tristan Tradition"; ENGL 459 "Modern Arthurian Literature"; ENGL 459 "Medieval Arthurian Literature"; ENGL 512 "Medieval British Literature" 

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