Language Paper Peer Reviews

Peer review of Rachel Dana
1.She gives her thoughts about how her subjects look and how they respond to being recorded in an interview. “He is about six feet tall, and wearing his usual attire: basketball shorts, t-shirt, and tennis shoes.” “He was giving me dull answers and was speaking in monotone.” “In the beginning, the interview was boring and awkward, but we warmed up to the process.”
2.I can’t really find any focus on trait differences other than giving out the genders of the informants.
3.The physical description was good for Michael but less detailed on the other three informants. I think there should be a little more background given on the informants.
4.They have a few opinions about stereotypes in the subculture. “With a sport like NASCAR, people are rednecks.” “hockey became popular once the U.S.A. team started winning, like when America beat Russia in 1980.”
5.The first interview is with a sports fan named Michael. I’m not quite sure where it takes place though. It was difficult at first for her to get answers from Michael, but they started over after taking a break and things went a lot better. The second interview takes place with three different people, which included Michael’s roommate. I still don’t know where it took place. It went much better than the first one.
6.FIRST THESIS: “With Michael’s interview, I had gained knowledge of how sports fanatics interact with each other along with how their subculture is a giant group of fieldworkers.” It is not true thesis. She’s on the right track with “sports fanatics…[are] fieldworkers.” SECOND THESIS: “There are also many stereotypes about sports fanatics, but there seems to be a common trend that the stereotypes involve how people who are a fan of a certain team behave.” This is the closest I could find to a thesis for the second interview. It is very vague and does not make an arguable point.
7.Balanced.
8.From Michael, she wanted to know about general facts and behaviors of sports fanatics. She wanted to hear more about stereotypes from the second interview.
9.She asked about what and when sports fans should shout to support their team. “Going, Going, Gone!” was an example she used, but she did not linger on the subject or delve into meanings.
10.I learned about the differences between Cubs games and Sox games. I’d like to know more about sayings/verbal art in the subculture.
11..
12.I feel that at some points in the paper, it jumps around too much. There was not really a smooth transition between Michaels quote about college basketball to his competitive nature as a fan.
13.No. I feel like the language is a little choppy and too much like a high school essay. It’s not very story-like.
14.Make a definitive thesis statement.

Julie Burgener Peer Review
1.She mentions that John looks like an important person to her. That’s about it.
2.None
3.She says that he is an important person but does not offer any more description.
4.No world views, just thoughts about his job. “This is the closest thing to the real world.”
5.There is only one stated informant.
6.“They understand the pressure and deadlines, and all learned to help each other out.” I wouldn’t call it a thesis, but it’s the best I could find. It really doesn’t offer any arguable positions.
7.There is much more summary than quotation used.
8.She just wanted to know basic facts about Newsweek.
9.She mentions “beat day” where journalists go out and interview informants.
10.I learned a little more about how the news world works. I’d like to get more than one person’s opinion on it though.
11..
12.Opens with a vague description of the group. Then she just goes into what goes on at Newsweek.
13.The writing style is very plain. It is informative, but would probably not hold the reader’s attention too well.
14.Talk more about the actual interviews and less about the entire subculture as a whole.