dean's+draft

1. introduction: Thesis: Whether intentionally or unintentionally, Brownlee puts forth a few ideas in a manner that proposes them to be fact, while the scientific integrity of these ideas is yet to be proven.

Audience: fantastic connection in the first paragraph.... Subject: The subject ... that scientific reporters oftentimes present unproven text as fact isn't really introduced. The subject seems to be that which is alluded to in the last sentence of the first paragraph: "we often forget that as humans the biochemistry of our love is very similar to that of our animal relatives." The paragraph that follows seems to be suggesting that we can rely on certain scientists or scientific writers to introduce us to the truth.

So ... he's going to need to introduce the reader to the thesis. How? He can suggest in the first paragraph that we tend to believe what we see on television, when sometimes what we are viewing may a popularization of an unproven idea.

Purpose: critique comes alone in the last sentence of the second paragraph. But it isn't really in evidence until then.

2. In the body of the paper, the purpose seems to shift away, at least in the reader's mind, from critique, because there are no words to signal to the reader that the critique is still going on. The summary, which in this case runs three paragraphs long, doesn't connect itself in language back to the thesis. The feeling of a slight disconnect becomes more pronounced when the critique begins but doesn't touch on almost any of the materials covered in the summary.

What would I do ... I would build upon the two-fold emphasis in the introduction that the writer makes generally successful use of sources but that this success is weakened by a singular failure to make adequate use of source materials: (Rosen 81, "Facts and examples should fairly represent the available data.")

I would shorten the summary .... one focusing on the positive: oxytocin / vagus nerve .... one which picks up on the negative.

I would then follow with a positive critique of the way she made good use of materials in one instance: oxytocin. I would then follow this with a negative critique of the way she made poor use of materials in the case of the talapoin monkey research.