{"id":538,"date":"2016-05-10T11:31:10","date_gmt":"2016-05-09T22:31:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/?p=538"},"modified":"2016-05-10T11:32:58","modified_gmt":"2016-05-09T22:32:58","slug":"writing-a-critique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/2016\/05\/10\/writing-a-critique\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing a critique"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How you write a critique will depend in part on what you are being asked to critique (e.g. a critical review of literature or a critique of a theory). However, in general when you are being asked to critique something you are being asked to assess it (e.g. in the case of a theory or argument is it overall strong\/weak, significant?).<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>One good way to approach a critique is to break it into stages:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Identify the argument\/main point\/s and the evidence\/reasons given in support of them: Understanding what is being critiqued is an important first step in being able to evaluate it.<\/li>\n<li>Assess\/evaluate the evidence\/reasons given in the argument\/main point\/s: Are the evidence\/reasons weak or strong, why?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>One way of assessing\/evaluating evidence\/reasons is to ask relevant questions, such as:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>What other evidence is there to support this argument\/point?<\/li>\n<li>Is the evidence\/reason used to support this argument\/point strong?<\/li>\n<li>What (if any) counter evidence is there against this argument\/point?<\/li>\n<li>Do the conclusions follow from the premises?<\/li>\n<li>Are the premises true?<\/li>\n<li>Does the method suffer from any weaknesses\/limitations?<\/li>\n<li>Does the argument\/point\/theory make a contribution?<\/li>\n<li>What strengths does the argument\/point\/theory have?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Also see:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/study-skills\/critical-thinking.php\">http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/study-skills\/critical-thinking.php<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/studyup-critical-reasoning-handout.pdf\">http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/studyup-critical-reasoning-handout.pdf<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/studyup-critical-reasoning.pdf\">http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/studyup-critical-reasoning.pdf<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/Academic-Writing-Guide-5-Critical-Thinking-and-Other-Useful-Tips.pdf\">http:\/\/owll.massey.ac.nz\/pdf\/Academic-Writing-Guide-5-Critical-Thinking-and-Other-Useful-Tips.pdf<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How you write a critique will depend in part on what you are being asked to critique (e.g. a critical review of literature or a critique of a theory). However, in general when you are being asked to critique something you are being asked to assess it (e.g. in the case of a theory or [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-538","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-postgraduate-study","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/89"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":546,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538\/revisions\/546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/thelighthouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}