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Summary vs. Analysis 5741 Views


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Description:

This video identifies the difference between a summary essay (just a restatement of the text) and an analysis essay (a breakdown of the text). One doesn’t require as much brain power to write (spoiler alert: it’s the summary), but both are opinion-free zones.

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:00

Thank you We sneak summary versus analysis allah shmoop we

00:09

get all kinds of assignments in english class obviously there's

00:12

reading on reading and more reading but we're also expected

00:17

to write intelligently about what we read Enter the essay

00:23

well there are two types of essays we commonly sweat

00:25

over an english class although we might find these essays

00:28

haunting us elsewhere too They are summary essay and the

00:33

analysis essay Well summaries are easy so easy there's simply

00:38

a brief restatement of whatever text we read put in

00:41

our own words we don't have to have an opinion

00:44

we don't have to evaluate anything A summary only wants

00:47

the facts Jax for example say were asked to write

00:51

a summary of george r r martin's epic novel a

00:54

game of thrones here's ours winter is coming and so

00:58

are the murderous ice zombies Ned stark of winterfell dips

01:02

his toe in the pool of political intrigue and then

01:04

promptly wishes he had good things happen to bad people

01:09

Bad things happen to good people and start a family

01:12

gets ripped apart now obviously a summary essay will consist

01:16

of more than this but note how all we're doing

01:19

Here is retelling the story in our own pithy words

01:23

while summaries are all about conveying what happened in the

01:25

text and nothing more and analysis is a little more

01:29

complex in this type of s a wee break what

01:32

we've read into smaller components so we can get a

01:35

better grip on the whole let's go back to a

01:37

game of thrones in an analysis essay we're not going

01:40

to spend the assignment regurgitating story We've got one paragraph

01:45

up front to get that business out of the way

01:47

Instead we're going to ask ourselves questions like wide there's

01:51

martin retell the story from so many different viewpoints and

01:54

does this technique work Why did martin title his book

01:58

a game of thrones When what goes on in the

02:01

story all the dying incest and getting thrown out of

02:04

powers and stuff it's so clearly not a game as

02:08

we normally understand the word game And why haven't the

02:11

rulers of westeros clubbed together to buy a throne made

02:15

out of something other than swords When we analyze these

02:18

questions which cover smaller parts of a sprawling story then

02:22

we'll have a better grasp of the novel is a

02:24

hole more generally what we're looking for when we analyze

02:27

a text is what the author is arguing for or

02:30

against how well here she supports that argument and what

02:34

the strengths and weaknesses of the text are along with

02:37

whether the author considers alternative viewpoints or not As with

02:41

a summary we aren't supposed to present our opinion in

02:44

analysis or at least not much of an opinion waken

02:48

state whether or not we think the author's argument holds

02:50

water or whether the author's sources are reliable or not

02:54

But we can't rip the author a new one if

02:56

we completely disagree with what he or she says So

02:59

in brief a summary is a restatement of what we've

03:02

read and analysis contains a breakdown of the text and

03:06

we pretty much have to leave our opinions at home

03:08

when we write these types of essays The good news

03:11

is if we do accidentally slip what we think into

03:14

an essay well we aren't likely to take a sword

03:17

to the neck like poor old ned stark at least 00:03:20.13 --> [endTime] let's Hope not

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