HW 38 - Insights from pregnancy & birth book - part 1

After having read the first hundred pages (roughly) of your book please address the following points;

1. How the book is organized (2-3 sentences)

2. The major question the book tries to answer (1-2 sentences) and some responses you have to that question (2-4 sentences).

3. The major insight the book tries to communicate in the first 100 pages (1-3 sentences) and your response to that insight (2-4 sentences).

4. 5 interesting aspects of pregnancy and birth that you (and the author) agree deserve public attention (1-2 sentences each)

5. The author's use of evidence - what support does the author build for her/his arguments, how reliable do you find the evidence, how deftly does the author use the evidence without stalling the progress of the book?

Suggestions for each of the 5 points above;

1 (organization) - Look at table of contents, read introduction, flip through book, think about how you would lay out a book you were writing about pregnancy and birth. Map the major topics.

2 (essential question) - Re-read introduction and first chapter - skim through 100 pages again to spot this. If you can find an actual quote or two from the book to answer this, that would be better than a paraphrase.

3 (thesis) - If you can find an actual quote or two from the book to answer this, that would be better than a paraphrase, perhaps connecting several quotes to be more accurate.

4 (key points) - Check your notes, what struck you, what do you find yourself still thinking about?

5 (evidence) - Think about the type of evidence (anecdotal, statistical, logical, etc), the source of the evidence (doctors, mothers, eyewitness, scientists, anthropologists?), and the way the evidence got communicated (endnotes in the back of the book, quotes, footnotes?). Does the text convince you, do you find it honest and accurate?

Due Tuesday, March 15 at 8:30am.