Surveying a Book
When you are looking for suitable material for your
written work, you will often have
to assess the value of books you are unacquainted with. Surveying a book is extremely useful if you are working in a
new subject area, if you do not know what is
available in the subject area or if you do not know the works of a particular author. The ability to assess materials
will also save a lot of time as you will be able to
discard quickly any irrelevant or outdated material. You may wish to find information on a
particular topic you are interested in or have
been given for an assignment. If you have been given adequate references, you can consult these immediately for
suitable information. However, it may be that you
are uncertain what line of investigation to follow or what materials may be available on a particular subject. In
that case, you should consult a library catalogue if
you have access to one.
Having discovered a book which may be suitable, you
will need to inspect it more
closely to see whether it will be of value. When searching for relevant information, you will not necessarily
have to read the whole of the book. Possibly only
one section of a chapter will be useful.
To
discover the possible usefulness of a book, a quick inspection of the following
will
help you:
•
acknowledgements (an author's or publisher's statement expressing thanks for help in the preparation of a book and for the use of
the works of other authors)
•
book title and title page (these give the sub-title if there is one)
•
contents page (the main contents will be given in Arabic numerals)
•
foreword (introductory remarks, usually by someone who knows the author's work)
•
preface (an introductory section explaining how and why a book was written - page numbers are given in Roman
numerals)
•
printing history (i.e. date of publication, edition, reprints etc.)
•
index (an alphabetical list of people, subjects etc. mentioned in the text of
the book — usually to be found at the back
of a book)
•
appendix (supplementary section to the main text of the book containing additional information)
•
selected chapters (first and last paragraphs)
•
bibliography
• blurb (the publisher's description of
the book).
When surveying a book, always note the date of its
publication. The date is important
as it gives an indication of how up-to-date the contents are. If you are looking for the latest ideas and the
publication date seems old, check to see if there is
a later edition.
There are recognised authorities in most subject
areas. If the author of a book is unknown
to you, you should find out all you can about him or her. The preface, foreword or blurb are sections of a book
that may give you some useful information.
They can tell you about the author, the author's concerns in writing the book and any approaches or theories
supported by the author. The bibliography will
indicate the authorities and range of works consulted by the author. It will
also provide you with further sources of
information for you to follow up.
TITLE
What does the title
suggest to you? Most titles of academic books and articles give factual information and can be
understood easily by the specialist, so in many instances
it should be possible to find out from a title whether an article or book is relevant to your needs. Occasionally,
however, the language of the title may be figurative
and therefore potentially misleading. You will notice such titles in a few of the articles, or extracts from
articles, in this book. They are much more common in
newspaper articles but can also be found in academic journals and books.
The contents page will give you more detailed
information on the contents of a book.
Often a book is divided into sections, units or chapters which are then
subdivided. The main
headings will help you select possible useful sections.
When
you need to look for specific information in a book, you may use the contents and index pages (see next
section) to help you. If there is no mention of the
information you are looking for, you may then look quickly through the text for mention of particular words or
phrases related to your topic.
A more detailed description of the contents of a
book with an explanation of why
and how it came to be written will be found in an introduction or preface. Similarly, most longer academic
articles will be preceded by an introduction,
clearly set apart and labelled. Articles, dissertations and theses may also be preceded by a brief account of
their content, known as an abstract. Looking
at the first and last paragraphs may also be a useful way of finding out about
the content of a chapter in a book or a short article. This may avoid wasting time reading irrelevant material.
The index (at the back of a book) gives you an
alphabetical list of topics that are covered
in the book. The contents page may not mention directly the topic you are interested in, whereas the index may.
The index should also indicate the pages covering
the topic. However, even though a topic may be mentioned several times, this does not mean that it is dealt with
in great detail in a book.
This can normally be found on one of the first pages
(called the prelims). In the case
of an old book, it is worth checking to see whether this is the first
publication of the book and
whether anything has been done to bring it more up to date since then. If there has been more than one
edition, this will help you assess the popularity
of the book and thus its usefulness as a core text. Librarians can help you to trace earlier or later editions,
according to your needs.
Not only should it give you a description of the
contents, and possibly some information
about the author, but you may also discover what kind of reader the book was written for, and whether the
author is experienced in knowing the needs of
the reader. This will help you assess whether the book is written at an appropriate level for you.
On
the following pages you will find examples of:
•
a title page
•
a contents page
•
an index
•
a blurb
•
a printing history
•
a list of books in a series
•
acknowledgements
•
a note to the reader.
The items above are all taken from the
same book.
2. Contents page
The
introductory pages of the book (prelims) are indicated in Roman numerals such as (vii).
In
the example, the prelim sections consist of 'Printing history', 'Series list', 'Note to the reader',
'Acknowledgements' and 'Contents'. There is no preface
or foreword in this book. Later editions might carry one.
3.
Index
Compare
the kind of information given in the index with that of the contents page. Whereas the contents page
gives the main sections of the book and
the titles of chapters, the index refers to topics/sub-topics, authors etc. (e.g. Alexander) contained within the
body of the work.
4. Blurb
This
is usually to be found on the back cover or jacket of a book. It will
probably
contain:
(a)
a publisher's description
(b)
brief details about the author
(c)
the book series to which this book belongs
(d)
a description of the series.
In
addition, the back cover or jacket may give details such as the ones shown in the example:
(a) other titles in the series
(b) the publisher
(c) the international standard book number
(ISBN) (this is useful if you wish to
order the book through a bookseller).
5. Printing history
(a)
the date of publication
(b)
the name and address of the publisher.
6.
Series list
This
book is one of a new series. Here we are given the titles of the other books in the series.
7.
Acknowledgements
The
author's expression of thanks for help in the preparation of the book.
8. Note to the reader
Extra useful information for the reader
has been included.
Source:
Mackay, John T & S.E. (1998). Study Skills For Academic Writing. London: Prentice Hall
Internaional English Language Teaching.
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar