Evidence The Writing Center. What this handout is about. This handout will provide a broad overview of gathering and using evidence. It will help you decide what counts as evidence, put evidence to work in your writing, and determine whether you have enough evidence. It will also offer links to additional resources. Introduction. Many papers that you write in college will require you to make an argument this means that you must take a position on the subject you are discussing and support that position with evidence. Its important that you use the right kind of evidence, that you use it effectively, and that you have an appropriate amount of it. If, for example, your philosophy professor didnt like it that you used a survey of public opinion as your primary evidence in your ethics paper, you need to find out more about what philosophers count as good evidence. If your instructor has told you that you need more analysis, suggested that youre just listing points or giving a laundry list, or asked you how certain points are related to your argument, it may mean that you can do more to fully incorporate your evidence into your argument. Comments like for example, proof, go deeper, or expand in the margins of your graded paper suggest that you may need more evidence. Lets take a look at each of these issuesunderstanding what counts as evidence, using evidence in your argument, and deciding whether you need more evidence. What counts as evidence Before you begin gathering information for possible use as evidence in your argument, you need to be sure that you understand the purpose of your assignment. If you are working on a project for a class, look carefully at the assignment prompt. It may give you clues about what sorts of evidence you will need. Does the instructor mention any particular books you should use in writing your paper or the names of any authors who have written about your topic How long should your paper be longer works may require more, or more varied, evidence What themes or topics come up in the text of the prompt Our handout on understanding writing assignments can help you interpret your assignment. Its also a good idea to think over what has been said about the assignment in class and to talk with your instructor if you need clarification or guidance. What matters to instructorsHundreds of fun educational games and activities for kids to play online. Topics include math, geography, animals, and more. The Something Only They Would Say trope as used in popular culture. The polar opposite of a Not Himself or OutofCharacter Alert a character in disguise or. I cringed at these things my friends said to me these few years. For those of you who dont really get us, Ive decided to let you know 10 things not to say to a. How long is a generation these days I must be in Mark Zuckerbergs generationthere are only nine years between usbut somehow it doesnt feel that way. This. Along with the whole thing that seems to be building within this specific subject material, a significant percentage of perspectives happen to be very stimulating. Whilst the Stop Online Piracy Act is not yet set in place, it is currently still being talked about. The purpose of this bill is very clear. Instructors in different academic fields expect different kinds of arguments and evidenceyour chemistry paper might include graphs, charts, statistics, and other quantitative data as evidence, whereas your English paper might include passages from a novel, examples of recurring symbols, or discussions of characterization in the novel. Consider what kinds of sources and evidence you have seen in course readings and lectures. MAHATMA Life of Gandhi abridged This is the abridged version 2hrs 15min of a 5hrs 10min documentary biography of Mohandas Mahatma Gandhi. You may wish to see whether the Writing Center has a handout regarding the specific academic field youre working infor example, literature, sociology, or history. What are primary and secondary sources A note on terminology many researchers distinguish between primary and secondary sources of evidence in this case, primary means first or original, not most important. Snowtime! Ipod Movie there. Primary sources include original documents, photographs, interviews, and so forth. Secondary sources present information that has already been processed or interpreted by someone else. For example, if you are writing a paper about the movie The Matrix, the movie itself, an interview with the director, and production photos could serve as primary sources of evidence. A movie review from a magazine or a collection of essays about the film would be secondary sources. Whole Please Say Something Movie Online ' title='Whole Please Say Something Movie Online ' />Depending on the context, the same item could be either a primary or a secondary source if I am writing about peoples relationships with animals, a collection of stories about animals might be a secondary source if I am writing about how editors gather diverse stories into collections, the same book might now function as a primary source. Where can I find evidence Here are some examples of sources of information and tips about how to use them in gathering evidence. BCC/Explore/March%20on%20Washington/The%20March_PhotoGallery/07_MOW_1963_MLK_Marching.jpg' alt='Whole Please Say Something Movie Online ' title='Whole Please Say Something Movie Online ' />Ask your instructor if you arent sure whether a certain source would be appropriate for your paper. Print and electronic sources. Books, journals, websites, newspapers, magazines, and documentary films are some of the most common sources of evidence for academic writing. Our handout on evaluating print sources will help you choose your print sources wisely, and the library has a tutorial on evaluating both print sources and websites. A librarian can help you find sources that are appropriate for the type of assignment you are completing. Just visit the reference desk at Davis or the Undergraduate Library or chat with a librarian online the librarys IM screen name is undergradref. Observation. Sometimes you can directly observe the thing you are interested in, by watching, listening to, touching, tasting, or smelling it. For example, if you were asked to write about Mozarts music, you could listen to it if your topic was how businesses attract traffic, you might go and look at window displays at the mall. Interviews. An interview is a good way to collect information that you cant find through any other type of research. An interview can provide an experts opinion, biographical or first hand experiences, and suggestions for further research. Surveys. Surveys allow you to find out some of what a group of people thinks about a topic. Designing an effective survey and interpreting the data you get can be challenging, so its a good idea to check with your instructor before creating or administering a survey. Experiments. Experimental data serve as the primary form of scientific evidence. For scientific experiments, you should follow the specific guidelines of the discipline you are studying. For writing in other fields, more informal experiments might be acceptable as evidence. For example, if you want to prove that food choices in a cafeteria are affected by gender norms, you might ask classmates to undermine those norms on purpose and observe how others react. What would happen if a football player were eating dinner with his teammates and he brought a small salad and diet drink to the table, all the while murmuring about his waistline and wondering how many fat grams the salad dressing contained Personal experience. Using your own experiences can be a powerful way to appeal to your readers. You should, however, use personal experience only when it is appropriate to your topic, your writing goals, and your audience. Personal experience should not be your only form of evidence in most papers, and some disciplines frown on using personal experience at all. For example, a story about the microscope you received as a Christmas gift when you were nine years old is probably not applicable to your biology lab report. Using evidence in an argument. Does evidence speak for itself Absolutely not. After you introduce evidence into your writing, you must say why and how this evidence supports your argument. In other words, you have to explain the significance of the evidence and its function in your paper. What turns a fact or piece of information into evidence is the connection it has with a larger claim or argument evidence is always evidence for or against something, and you have to make that link clear. As writers, we sometimes assume that our readers already know what we are talking about we may be wary of elaborating too much because we think the point is obvious. But readers cant read our minds although they may be familiar with many of the ideas we are discussing, they dont know what we are trying to do with those ideas unless we indicate it through explanations, organization, transitions, and so forth. Try to spell out the connections that you were making in your mind when you chose your evidence, decided where to place it in your paper, and drew conclusions based on it.