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Things to Consider
- Author information: What are their credentials? What institution are they coming from (a thinktank, a school, a government agency, etc.)?
- Article format: Is it a scholarly article? Is it a sourced opinion piece (Journals publish op-eds and commentary pieces!)? Is it a journalistic article? What does the purposes of the article appear to be (e.g. to inform on current issues, to report on research, to entertain, to persuade)?
- Sources and Citations: Are sources linked and properly cited? What sources are cited and how? How do authors of the articles in these publications refer to sources? Do they quote individuals or published sources? Are you able to find or track back to the sources?
- Title information: Who publishes the magazine or journal? Is it peer reviewed/referred? What can you find on the publisher? What sort of language is used in the publication? Is there advertising? The About page is helpful for this information.
- Reception: What was the popular response to this article, was there backlash? Did it cause a lot of other journalists to look into other aspects of the issue/subject? Google news can be especially helpful to this
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