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Annotated Bibliography: How to Create One

A series of steps and advice in creating an Annotated Bibliography

Why all the questions?

Before you hand a project in, always read through it again to catch what errors you missed, and those little things like misspellings and grammatical slips that detract from the quality of the work you've done. Remember the old Ford motto: "The quality goes in before the name goes on."

Final Checklist

CONTENT: Does it cover your topic fairly completely? Are all major points of view represented, and/or identified? If not, do you inform your reader in the Introduction, title, or otherwise?

STYLE: Are your comments consistent in voice, tone, level of language? Is the bibliography well organized? Does it follow a logical sequence, whether organized alphabetically, informationally, chronologically, or otherwise?

FORM: Are your comments grammatically correct? Spelling? Punctuation? Is your work organized, spaced and punctuated accurately and consistently, according to the style manual you are using?

OVERALL: Would your bibliography be helpful to someone who wanted to find out which materials might give a good representation of the information available on this specific topic (within the limits you have defined)? Would you find it eminently useful in writing a paper on this topic?