Reading in Graduate School

Sean Lawson, Ph.D.

Department of Communication
University of Utah

(Prepared for the Department of Communication graduate professional development

seminar, University of Utah, 24 October 2008.)

What, if anything, is distinctive about reading for graduate studies (e.g., goals,
habits, challenges, etc., compared to other kinds of reading)?

Knowing what is distinctive requires comparison. Compared to undergraduate reading,

reading in graduate school is more about mapping and understanding networks of
arguments within whole literatures. In undergraduate, the goal of assigned reading was
usually for the student (you) to gain some sort of content knowledge from the reading.
For example, in a history course, you might be assigned a book on slavery in the
American South in the 1850s. You are most likely being assigned this book because
your instructor believes it will give you the best depiction of slavery during that time
period--i.e. the goal is for you to learn the historical content found in the book. At the
undergrad level, you are not typically being asked to talk about the author's method,
their use of evidence, how their argument/interpretation compares to that of other
scholars, etc. In graduate school, however, that is exactly what you need to do. This
does not mean that you do not need to know content. What it does mean, is that you
will be more focused on getting the "lay of the land" of entire fields of literature. What
arguments have been made? How do they relate to one another? Who are the
scholars in this field? Where does each stand; what does each contribute? Who is in
which "camps," representative of which schools of thought, etc.?

What does it mean to 'read deeply'? Why is this important, and what are some
specific suggestions for enacting it?

Reading "deeply," in my view, does not mean knowing every last detail of an individual
work. (Save that effort for works that are particularly important in a field, or particularly
important to your research project.) Rather, "reading deeply" is about reading to
understand a work's place within a larger ecology or web of works--think "deep ecology"
or "deep web." To do that, there is some basic information you will want from each
work you read:

• What is the author's main argument?

• What are the author's supporting arguments, evidence, and methodology?
• Where does this work stand in relation to the larger ecology of the literature(s) to
which it belongs? What does it contribute? Of which camps or schools of
thought is it representative? (Of course, you first need to know which

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 literature[s] it belongs to and what the camps are within those literatures. If not,
then you will need to answer more basic questions about literatures and camps
first. Maybe on your first pass through a work, the main benefit of your reading
will be to help you identify a literature or camp. Subsequent readings may be
required to fully understand, in a more nuanced way, the position of the work
within the literatures/camps that it initially helped you to identify.) In terms of
assessing contribution, you might think in terms of the following questions:
◦ What are this work's empirical contributions?
◦ What are this work's methodological contributions?
◦ What are this work's theoretical contributions?
◦ What are this work's practical contributions?
• What can this work contribute to my own work? (In this regard, it is important to
do "generous readings." It is easy to take a very narrow, literal view, to discard
as irrelevant anything that does not directly address that in which you are
interested. In most cases, however, it is possible to take away something of
value, whether it be something about your topic in particular, or a more general
insight about research practice, methodology, theory, etc.)1

Graduate study -- and coursework in particular -- typically involves a high volume

of reading. How can we manage this reading load well, and what are some
specific ways to minimize feeling overwhelmed? Put another way, how is it
possible to read deeply amid so much material?

The key is to have tools (both intellectual and technological) to help you. You can't just
splash around aimlessly. You have to read with purpose and direction. That means
that for each and every piece that you read, you should try to answer the questions
outlined above. At first, this will seem mechanical and might slow you down.
Eventually, however, you will come to implicitly ask and answer these questions of
everything you read; you won't really have to think about it anymore, you'll just do it
instinctively. These questions are valuable "intellectual tools." You can enhance the
effectiveness of these tools through the use of technological tools like citation
management applications, note-taking/writing applications, or database applications. In
particular, a simple database with entries for each work you read, with fields for each of
the questions above, not only provides "technological enforcement" encouraging you to
answer each of these questions every time, it also allows for more consistent
comparison between and among sources.

How might reading practices shift at different points in an academic career -- e.g.,
coursework, comprehensive exams, thesis or dissertation, early faculty years,
and so forth?

1. These questions come from Kim Fortun's exam preparation course in the Department of
Science and Technology Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Those who have taken
the course with Kim and/or worked with her as a committee member (as I have), are
indebted to her for taking issues of scholarly practice seriously, as well as requiring her
students to do the same.

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Though, in general, your reading during graduate coursework will still focus on content
to a great degree, you will see a noticeable shift towards thinking about whole
literatures. In many cases, the reading you do during coursework will turn out to be
your "first pass." You will likely come back to many of those sources for a second
reading during your preparation for exams. To make the process of exam preparation
less tedious and more effective, it is valuable to start thinking about the questions above
early on, even during your coursework reading. Finally, when you switch to thesis or
dissertation research, you will likely read each work in a literature relevant to your
research in a much more close and detailed way. For some of these works, it may be
your third or fourth time reading them. Additionally, you will likely devote more of your
focus to "mining for sources," finding "leads" within notes and bibliographies. You will
also be focusing more on the last of the four questions above--i.e. what can this work
contribute to my own work--but also, using your reading to apply question three above
to your own work--i.e. where does my work fit into the literature; what empirical,
methodological, theoretical, and practical contributions am I making?

What sorts of things should we emphasize or prioritize in the various moments of

intellectual development?

My schematic of the general progression: Undergraduate & Graduate coursework =

Content (ideas, concepts, events, etc.) ---> Graduate coursework & Exam preparation =
Mapping (mapping literatures as ecologies/webs of arguments and individuals) --->
Thesis/Dissertation = Situating (carving out your own niche within the literature). As
discussed above, each of these activities makes slightly different demands on the focus
of your attention while reading.

(How) can technologies assist the development of sound reading practices?

Technologies, while extremely helpful (even essential in my opinion), cannot do your

thinking for you. There are three basic kinds of software application that can be of great
value in helping you to manage your sources, stay focused on the essential questions,
compare your sources, and manage your own thoughts about and reactions to your
sources. The creation of a simple database in Access, FileMaker, or OpenOffice can be
very helpful for creating standardized annotations for each of your sources. Create
fields for each of the questions above. Then, use the database not only as an electronic
"worksheet" to answer those questions each time, but also as a tool that will allow you
to sort, shuffle, combine, recombine, and compare your sources based on the answers
you provided. It may also be possible to create custom fields for each of the questions
in a citation management application like EndNote, Reference Manager, Bookends, or
Biblioscape. (NOTE: While each of these typically contains a "notes" or "abstract" field,
those generic fields leave you free to write whatever. It would be better to have a
system that encourages you to answer the above questions each time. Remember, it's
not just about filling in blanks or entering data for the heck of it. That blank field with a

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blinking cursor can be an impetus for you to think about the question associated with
that field. And later, when you need to remember, or when you need to compare and
contrast, you'll be glad you did the exercise.)

Of course, a citation management application, like one of those mentioned above, is

good for helping you to organize, manage, and store your sources. In most cases, you
can attach PDFs of articles to the entries in the database. Instead of having random file
folders, you can organize your sources with one of these databases. Think of them as
iTunes for scholarly articles. Of course, as mentioned above, they can provide a place
for annotating and note-taking as well. Finally, when it comes time to write your exam,
thesis, or dissertation, they allow you to spend more time thinking and writing, and less
time on the mindless details of bibliographies, citation styles, etc. Some time spent up
front to get your output styles set correctly and to get the application to integrate
properly with your word processor will save you untold time and trouble at the end.

Finally, it is good to have an application that can serve as a dumping ground for random
thoughts of various types (e.g. leads to new sources, brainstorms, short essays, notes
to self, a research journal, etc.). Word processors are not very good for these kinds of
messy, random bits and pieces. However, these messy, random bits and pieces are
absolutely essential to doing good work. You can't remember everything. You need a
system in which you can dump your thoughts, freeing you to stop thinking the same
things over and over for fear of forgetting them, a system that lets you feel safe that
once you've put your thoughts in, you can find them and use them later, that they're not
lost forever. Again, random word processor files in various folders don't really do that.
Word processors are good for processing words, getting finished texts ready for prime
time, styling them up and making them look good. For daily jotting of thoughts and
early-stage writing, you need something more like a personal (not public), desktop blog.
There are several applications available that do this kind of thing, but the one I prefer
and have used extensively is Evernote, a free, cross-platform application.