1. The Annotated Bibliography
Evaluating Sources
The Annotated Bibliography

2. Keeping Track As you do your research…
Clearly mark any notes you take that are paraphrased, summarized, or directly quoted from a source.
Keep a computer file or a sheet of paper with the required MLA information of any source you use.
Remember, any source you use from the school databases will have a citation already done for you. All you have to do is copy and paste it into your Works Cited file.
Use turnitin test assignment to check your work for accidental plagiarism.

3. Evaluating Sources
Tonight, we will be evaluating an example source as a class, and then we will be splitting up and evaluating the source (or sources) that we all brought individually.

4. Question 1: Author Qualifications
Works Cited Entry: Subramanian, Janani. "Alienating identification: black identity in The Brother from Another Planet and I Am Legend." Science Fiction Film and Television 3.1 (2010): 37+. Academic OneFile. Web. 17 Apr A quick google search of the author’s name leads us to the following page: What do you notice about the author’s qualifications to write about this topic? Would this be a trustworthy source for a paper about race and science fiction?

5. Some things to remember about author qualifications:
There are different types of qualifications. These include:
Academic - (A degree in the subject area, books/papers published, a good academic reputation. If a writer is or has been hired as a professor at a college/university, this speaks to his or her academic reputation.)
Personal experience – having living through a situation will often give a writer a unique perspective.

6. Ways of Establishing Credibility
Other evidence of extensive research into the topic. A journalist or a writer who constantly references what others have brought to the conversation probably has a deep knowledge of the topic and a worthwhile perspective.
“Person on the street” – Especially useful if you are trying to prove that an attitude is a common one, but be careful about using this to establish authority about complex issues.

7. Question 2: Who is the audience for this work?
The works cited page for the work we are evaluating tells us it came from the a periodical, a journal called Science Fiction Film and Television
A google search tells us that the website for this journal is and it is published by Liverpool University press in England.
Journals published by universities are peer reviewed, so that speaks well of the author’s credentials.
So, given all of this information, who do you think might be the intended readers for this essay?

8. Question 3: When was the work published/updated, and does that affect credibility?
Looking back at our MLA Works Cited entry, we can see that this paper was published in the journal in 2010.
Does the publication date always matter?
That depends.
Topics with quickly developing conversations or new discoveries call for more recent sources.
BUT, just because a source is old doesn’t mean it’s useless.
YOU need to exercise your own judgment on this issue.
In this case, since this is only one of a very few articles I found in my search, I believe I can use a three year old article with confidence.

9. Question 4: How does the author provide support?
In the example essay, the author provides support through her own analysis of the two movies she is discussing as well as referring to other critics to whom she gives credit in the body of her paper AND her own works cited page.
The works cited pages of your sources are a GREAT place for YOU to find more sources.
A lengthy works cited page filled with relevant sources speaks to the author’s credibility.
Also, a reading of the paper shows that the author’s points are well-thought-out and thoroughly explored.

10. A Note About Providing Support
Not every source will have an MLA works cited page or be written as an academic essay. That’s ok. There are other ways to evaluate the support the author provides.
If the source is an internet source that contains links to other sources, are those other sources trustworthy?
If the source is an internet source, what company or institution put its name behind the source?
Do the source’s arguments make sense to you as a rational, thinking person?

11. Question 5: How might this source be useful in your essay?
If I were a student writing a paper that might include this source, I might use it to show that the way that African Americans have been portrayed in science fiction has not been stable or static, and the changes in portrayals of African Americans in sci-fi mirrors thinking about race in America.

12. For YOUR OWN source, answer the following questions:
Question 1: What are the author’s qualifications?
Question 2: Who is the audience for this work?
Question 3: When was the work published/updated, and does that affect credibility?
Question 4: How does the author provide support?
Question 5: How might this source be useful in your essay?

13. Congratulations!
You have just collected all of the information you need to put into a paragraph after the works cited entry for the source you brought tonight.
That means you are almost 1/7 of the way done with you annotated bibliograpy!

14. What is an annotated bibliography?
An annotated bibliography is similar to a works cited page, but each source is followed by a paragraph that summarizes the source's claim in three or four sentences, argues for the source's authority and relevance to your question, and explains why you have chosen to use it in your research paper. What perspective does this source offer? Why is a quote, paraphrase, or summary from this source a valuable addition to your own writing about the topic?

15. Format of Annotated Bibliography
See handout for general information about annotated bibliographies and an example annotated bibliography with three sources.
Your annotated bibliography will need…
Seven sources
Each source put into MLA works cited format (as in example)
Sources alphabetized
A paragraph following each source discussing requirements on previous slide.
Please skip a line between MLA works cited entries and paragraphs. (See example.)