The OPOV Paper.
Those of us who have the ambition of continuing our studies in a 4-year program, on in a "research heavy" program like nursing or physical therapy, will eventually find ourselves writing research documents known as "reviews of literature". This OPOV paper is a small version of a document like that. It's practice.
Our mission: To organize our opposing arguments and sources for ourselves. We can either use them later by cutting and pasting into our actual argument, or we can refer to them as we are writing so that we'd remember clearly whom we're addressing.
It is *not* our mission to include every possible idea we come across. We are also not arguing! We're not trying to convince anyone that anything is true. All we're trying to do is show a set of ideas and their sources.
Question: How do I know which ideas are to be included and which ones I can cut?
This is a good question. Sometimes, we won't really know until we start trying to get organized. A rule of thumb is to include things that are useful and reasonable and to exclude things you know you won't use or that present obviously unreasonable arguments.
Several semesters ago, one of my classes used a book called Lean In to think about the problem of equality in the workplace. Its author, Sheryl Sandberg, had an argument about what women could do to become more competitive in the corporate world, but she also urged corporate executives to change the way they think about employment and management.
In that context, let's consider the priest who says, "Women should stay home and avoid work because it is the will of the Lord." He has a point of view that's directly opposed to various feminists, including Sheryl Sandberg, for example. That point of view can make for an interesting (if frustrating) argument in a paper focused on theology, philosophy or cultural history.
In an argument about income equality or gender fairness in the workplace, the priest's point of view is irrelevant. We're assuming women should have the right to work before we start writing it. The priest isn't hiring anyone in a corporate or professional setting.When it's so far out of our context, we avoid it.
That said, I always suggest that we err on the side of inclusion. It's easier to cut something later than to have to scramble to find it.
One of the reasons we're writing this document is because it's hard to remember what "so and so" thought in "that article we read" three weeks ago. At the moment when we're arguing, it's really helpful to have a list of summaries that we can refer to as we're building our ideas. Literally, it's a shortcut, a cheat-sheet. Instead of going through books and chapters and bookmarks in our browser, we just refer back to this document, and everything's there, previously organized for us.
Step one:
Summarize your opposing point(s) of view.
Step two:
Tell us who supports this/these point(s) of view and why. Are these institutions, individuals or just people who are writing about the problem? Why do they think or believe what they do? Where did their ideas originate? How are they used?
Step three:
Arrange these points of view in a way that makes sense to someone who has not been collecting the data.
Answer any questions that might come up.
Step Four:
Set up a Works Cited Page
Step Five:
Save this document in an online drive somewhere so that you would not lose it even if your house explodes!
Attachment:- Thesis.zip