Summary….analysis. What a dilemma this is. I have argued in the past with many English instructors that there is no difference. However there is, shocking! I had an English instructor who finally laid this dilemma to rest. Here is the example he set to me. This is how he explained a summary to me. When writing a summary you write your paper as if you were building a brick wall. Your wall won’t stand unless you place all the bricks in the right places. The same goes with a summary. The story will not make sense unless you recite it in the order it happened. A good way to keep track of this is to write down a chronological time line.
Now to the confusion. The infamous analysis. Here is the difference. Instead of “reciting” a story in a chronological manner, you are instead describing hidden underlying meanings of the story. For example say you come across a poem that could be two sentences. Ok?? How are you supposed to analyze that into three pages? Simple. In poems especially there are usually always some form of hidden underlying meaning the reader doesn’t always catch the first time reading. This is why poems are confusing when read the first time. So you should break down the story or poem line by line, verse per verse…etc. In whichever way it helps you break it down to translate the poem. This is how you should analyze.
This instructor also gave me a good example to go by when writing analysis’s. He told me to think of these papers like a construction site, or a house halfway through construction. Imagine yourself walking though this house and looking at all the different projects that still need to be done in the house. Now you can apply this to a paper. Break the paper down and take it piece by piece and translate it. What does this paper need to make it understand? How should I make sense of this? And so on.
Here is a good book you can choose to summarize on since it is so simple
Here is a good poem to analyze.
DULCE EST DECORUM EST
I really like how you stuck to your guns when it came arguing that you didn't think there was a difference between the two. I have always thought there was a significant difference between the two, but I can appreciate having a difference of opinion with someone about the topic. Also I realy liked the example you shared that your previous instructor gave to you when helping differentiate the two, because a summary really is like building a wall which is a similie I had never heard used before.
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