PB2A: Complicated Words, Simple Conventions

After an hour of drowning in a vast sea of complicated words and long paragraphs, I was able to make at least some sense of the scholarly article I had read. The article I selected is titled “Which Way Up? Recognition of Homologous DNA Segments in Parallel and Antiparallel Alignments” by Dominic Lee, Aaron Wynveen, Tim Albrecht, and Alexei Kornyshev. In the beginning of the paper, certain questions were posed, such as “how the recognition energy changes when one DNA fragment slides past another,” and the rest of the paper attempts to answer those questions. The first thing I noticed about the scholarly academic publication was that it was extremely similar to the computer science research paper generator we used earlier in the quarter. That being said, a common convention amongst scholarly articles is the long, complicated title. Scholarly publications deal with complex, detailed concepts, so the title must reflect the content. Following the title, there was a paragraph describing the background of the publication and explaining certain things the reader may not know. Then, I noted the very organized structure of the publication. The sections of the publication were titled “Introduction,” “Theory,” “Results, “Discussion,” and “Concluding Points” along with a roman numeral indicating the number of the section. The introduction of a scholarly academic publication serves as kind of a warm up for the paper, and describes the purpose of the research and a brief report of what they will be doing. The “Theory” section provides the researchers with insight to the researchers’ methods of research. This section may be labeled differently in other works, but scholarly academic publications typically provide a step-by-step description of what exactly they are testing/looking for in their research. The “Results” section of an academic scholarly publication provides the results of the research. Then, the publication goes on to discuss the researchers’ comments on the data they collected, and the conclusion sums up the paper and ties the researchers’ original hypotheses to the evidence they found. Aside from the structure, the scholarly academic publication has many other recognizable conventions. Somewhere near the end of the paper, scholarly academic publications will have a section where the authors cite the many works they referenced in their publication. Scholarly academic publications are based on a lot of research and evidence, and therefore require authors to look into others’ works to help prove their point. Since there are so many sources used, they are numbered. These sources are cited throughout the paper using little numbers at the end of sentences corresponding to a source. In addition to the multitude of citations, there are many figures of equations within the paper. These equations serve as mathematical evidence for the point the paper is making, and are numbered and referenced throughout the paper using that number. There are also scientific graphs, which serve to enhance the article’s credibility and provide data in an organized way. Many of the conventions of a scholarly academic publication serve to enhance its credibility and make it seem professional and legitimate.

Within the scholarly academic publication, the authors used the conventions of that genre to authenticate their work. By presenting their research in such an organized structure, it appears professional and easy to read. This alone appeals to the audience of scientists, mathematicians, and such. The authors further enhance the paper’s credibility through the many citations to other people’s work that supports the point the paper is trying to make. They’re providing evidence from other people, showing that what they’re saying has been verified by other people too. The paper further strengthens the argument by providing various equations and graphs, which provide even more evidence and support. The equations and graphs make the paper seem legitimate by providing actual evidence for what the authors are saying. I felt that the most important aspects of the scholarly article were these citations, equations, and graphs. They provided solid evidence for what the authors were saying, and made points in a way that could not be denied. Without such evidence and support, the whole paper could just be viewed as anecdotal, and would not be taken seriously as a scholarly academic publication, as it would be lacking most of the “scholarly” and “academic” part.