Introduction to Biological Anthropology Fall 2018, Merritt
Primary resource critique assignment For this assignment you will write a brief essay that critiques a primary research article relevant to any of the topics we have covered in the course. The only requirement for the source you select is that it must be a piece of scholarly work that comes from a peer-reviewed journal. This means that it must be an article that is published in a journal, not a book chapter, website article, or article from a magazine such as Popular Science, Discovery Magazine, or National Geographic etc. You should begin with a search of key words at the library using a research reference tool like Web of Science or Google Scholar. The following journals often feature material that is relevant to this course: Evolutionary Anthropology Journal of Archaeological Science American Journal of Primatology Current Anthropology Journal of Human Evolution Science Nature Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Your essay should critically summarize the article and explore how it relates to what you have learned about this topic in lecture and from the textbook. A critical summary does not simply recount important methodological facts and interpretations, but contextualizes these findings in a larger discussion of your topic and explores its relevance to human evolution and/or biological anthropology. As a student in an introductory biological anthropology course you should not expect to understand all the minutia in the source you are using – I will take that into account when reading your paper. But I do expect that you will use your analytical skills and what you have learned in this course to explore an example of scholarly research about human evolution. It is important to examine the primary source material that the lectures and text derive from. Please produce a 3-4 page essay using double-spaced TNR 12-point font. Include a bibliography page and cite your article using MLA format so that I can examine the original source. The following questions may help you critique your research article: • What is the main point of this article, and what evidence does the author use to support this idea? • Are you convinced by their argument? Are there any complicating factors that cast doubt on their conclusion? • If you were conducting this research, what would you do differently? • How does this research support, contradict, or complicate an idea that we discussed in lecture or read in the text? Assignment timeline: Your essay is due via upload to Canvas on Thursday, December 6 by 11:59pm. Emailed assignments will not be accepted. Late assignments will only be accepted with an officially recognized university excuse like a doctor’s note, etc. A brief prospectus of your essay is due via upload to Canvas by Thurs, Nov 15 at 11:59pm. You must upload 1) the pdf of the journal article you are writing about and 2) an initial outline of your critique.
