Human Rights Seminar S07

Précis guide

Each student is expected to present a précis (and lead class discussion) on one of the assigned readings. This includes drawing up and distributing a précis of the article as well as giving a brief presentation of the arguments offered.

The précis:

(1) The précis is limited to a single typed page and ought to consist of a reconstruction of the author’s argument(s) in your own words. We are looking not only for the author’s conclusions and the premises offered in support of those conclusions, but also for the justificatory reasoning offered to support these premises.

(2) Students are expected to make and distribute copies of their précis to all members of the class.

(3) Remember, the précis is not an evaluation of the author’s position but rather an abstract or brief of that position. In a sense you are attempting to draw up a clear and concise study guide of the article for those in the class.

(4) Your précis should demonstrate that you can understand, extract and layout the steps in someone else’s argument. This will require that you boil the article down to just the bones of the arguments within it and be able to communicate these points in your own words.

(5) Ideally, your précis should be able to stand on its own – that is, based solely upon your précis someone unfamiliar with the class or subject matter should be able to grasp the author’s conclusions, her reasoning to that conclusion, any relevant assumptions made by the author, premises from which she started, etc.

(6) NB: A successful précis will often require that you present the material in an order different from that used by the author.

The presentation

(1) The primary goal of the oral, critical evaluation by the presenter is to draw the members of the class into a substantive discussion of the assigned material.

(2) The presentation ought to include a very brief summary of the author’s main points (NB: This does not mean you should read aloud from either the précis or the article!).

(3) A presenter is expected to play the role of “expert witness” on his or her assigned readings; as such, he or she should be prepared to field preliminary and clarificatory questions on the material from the class as well as to lead discussion of the material.

(4) Presenters are encouraged to prepare a number of questions for potential use in guiding our class discussion.

(5) NB: A good presentation will not include merely reading either from one’s précis or from the article.

(6) NB: A good presentation will last no more than ten minutes and be followed by substantive class discussion.