WRITING / Paraphrasing

 Academic Summary skills

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Summary language

  •     This article / book is divided into two / three parts. First…
  •     While the title might suggest…
  •     The tone appears to be…
  •     Title is the first / second volume in the series Title, edited by…The books / articles in this series address…
  •     The second / third claim is based on…
  •     The author challenges the notion that…
  •     The author tries to find a more middle ground / make more modest claims…
  •     The article / book begins with a short historical overview of…
  •     Numerous authors have recently suggested that…(see Author, Year; Author, Year). Author would also be once such author. With his / her argument that…
  •     To refer to title as a…is not to say that it is…
  •     This book / article is aimed at… This intended readership…
  •     The author’s book / article examines the…To do this, the author first…
  •     The author develops / suggests a theoretical / pedagogical model to…
  •     This book / article positions itself firmly within the field of…
  •     The author in a series of subtle arguments, indicates that he / she…
  •     The argument is therefore…
  •     The author asks “…”
  •     With a purely critical / postmodern take on…
  •     Topic, as the author points out, can be viewed as…
  •     In this recent contribution to the field of…this British author…
  •     As a leading author in the field of…
  •     This book / article nicely contributes to the field of…and complements other work by this author…
  •     The second / third part of…provides / questions / asks the reader…
  •     Title is intended to encourage students / researchers to…
  •     The approach taken by the author provides the opportunity to examine…in a qualitative / quantitative research framework that nicely complements…
  •     The author notes / claims that state support / a focus on pedagogy / the adoption of…remains vital if…
  •     According to Author (Year) teaching towards examinations is not as effective as it is in other areas of the curriculum. This is because, as Author (Year) claims that examinations have undue status within the curriculum.
  •     According to Author (Year)…is not as effective in some areas of the curriculum / syllabus as others. Therefore the author believes that this is a reason for some school’s…

http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe-writing-centre/critical-reading-and-writing/critical-review

Evaluation language

  •     This argument is not entirely convincing, as…furthermore it commodifies / rationalises the…
  •     Over the last five / ten years the view of…has increasingly been viewed as ‘complicated’ (see Author, Year; Author, Year).
  •     However, through trying to integrate…with…the author…
  •     There are difficulties with such a position.
  •     Inevitably, several crucial questions are left unanswered / glossed over by this insightful / timely / interesting article. Why should…
  •     It might have been more relevant for the author to have written this book / article as…
  •     This article / book is not without disappointment from those who would view…as…
  •     This chosen framework enlightens / clouds…
  •     This analysis intends to be…but falls a little short as…
  •     The authors rightly conclude that if…
  •     A detailed, well-written and rigorous account of…
  •     As a Korean student I feel that this article / book very clearly illustrates…
  •     The beginning of…provides an informative overview into…
  •     The tables / figures do little to help / greatly help the reader…
  •     The reaction by scholars who take a…approach might not be so favourable (e.g. Author, Year).
  •     This explanation has a few weaknesses that other researchers have pointed out (see Author, Year; Author, Year). The first is…
  •     On the other hand, the author wisely suggests / proposes that…By combining these two dimensions…
  •     The author’s brief introduction to…may leave the intended reader confused as it fails to properly…
  •     Despite my inability to…I was greatly interested in…
  •     Even where this reader / I disagree(s), the author’s effort to…
  •     The author thus combines…with…to argue…which seems quite improbable for a number of reasons. First…
  •     Perhaps this aversion to…would explain the author’s reluctance to…
  •     As a second language student from …I find it slightly ironic that such an anglo-centric view is…
  •     The reader is rewarded with…
  •     Less convincing is the broad-sweeping generalisation that…
  •     There is no denying the author’s subject knowledge nor his / her…
  •     The author’s prose is dense and littered with unnecessary jargon…
  •     The author’s critique of…might seem harsh but is well supported within the literature (see Author, Year; Author, Year; Author, Year). Aligning herself with the author, Author (Year) states that…
  •     As it stands, the central focus of Title is well / poorly supported by its empirical findings…
  •     Given the hesitation to generalise to…the limitation of…does not seem problematic…
  •     For instance, the term…is never properly defined and the reader left to guess as to whether…
  •     Furthermore, to label…as…inadvertently misguides…
  •     In addition, this research proves to be timely / especially significant to… as recent government policy / proposals has / have been enacted to…
  •     On this well researched / documented basis the author emphasises / proposes that…
  •     Nonetheless, other research / scholarship / data tend to counter / contradict this possible trend / assumption…(see Author, Year; Author, Year).
  •     Without entering into detail of the…, it should be stated that Title should be read by…others will see little value in…
  •     As experimental conditions were not used in the study the word ‘significant’ misleads the reader.
  •     The article / book becomes repetitious in its assertion that…
  •     The thread of the author’s argument becomes lost in an overuse of empirical data…
  •     Almost every argument presented in the final section is largely derivative, providing little to say about…
  •     She / he does not seem to take into consideration; however, that there are fundamental differences in the conditions of…
  •     As Author (Year) points out, however, it seems to be necessary to look at…
  •     This suggest that having low…does not necessarily indicate that…is ineffective.
  •     Therefore, the suggestion made by Author (Year)…is difficult to support.
  •     When considering all the data presented…it is not clear that the low scores of some students, indeed, reflects…

source: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe-writing-centre/critical-reading-and-writing/critical-review

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