How to read an Academic Paper?

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Introduction (You Can Ignore it)

One of the hardest thing that I have ever encountered in graduate schooling is that I was asked to read academic papers, (these are not your ordinary textbooks these are researches that were published full of technicalities and jargons). 

I was introduced reading these kind of literature through prof. Oscar Evangelista in my Introduction to Social Sciences where he asked me to read 3 articles per week. The most terrifying so far was my experience on History of Archaeology by Prof. Michelle Eusebio. These experience happened just recently as I am taking my Diploma in Archaeology Degree (As I am planning to take PhD in Archaeology after it) and the worse is that we are required to read around 16-26 academic papers just in one week. 

These papers are classic publications in archaeology. These papers were the ones that shaped the theory and practice of archaeology to what it is now. The point why I am writing it here is that time is of essence in graduate schooling. What I mean is reading must be done strategically that it could consume the least time possible and digest as much as information as possible as graduate schooling is time consuming and you could spend forever reading just one paper.

How should we read academic papers?


It was an amusing experience when my professors told us that we would be stupid if we will be doing the reading as how it was printed. First of all according to Prof. Paz, reading an academic essay or a research paper is not like reading a novel or a short story that you will have the need to read chronologically. A research paper is structure thematically and it is done for a reason. It is because the academicians are somewhat fucked up if they need to read every academic paper like the way stories are being read. It would take all of their time away and they will accomplish very little. 

So this is how we read an academic paper


1. Of course read the title

So that you have the basic idea of what are you wasting your time for. If the title has nothing to do to what you want to know, then forget reading it. However I suggest that you give the paper a little chance. Try reading the next phase.

2. Read the Abstract

The abstract encapsulates the whole essence of an academic paper. There you can see the objectives of the paper, the methods and of course the result. (If it still has no appeal to you then don't go for it. It will be a waste of time. However if it something like a required reading then you would need to proceed because failing the subject is the last thing that you would want to happen. I suggest you proceed to the next step.)

3. Read the Conclusion 

The conclusion the the reason why the paper is written you is you want to get the substance fast, the you should read the conclusion.

4. Look at the tables, graphs, Illustrations and figures.


You need this so you will have the idea of how the data was processed.

5.Read the introduction

This is for advanced readers. If you want to know the advances that have happened in the topic so that you could understand the gaps in the literature. In short you want an in-depth understanding of not only the paper that you are reading but also the the topic.

 6. Read the methods

I recommend this if you consider writing or doing research in a similar topic and you want to adopt part of the method used by the paper.

Additional tips.

* You can read only the first sentences of each paragraph because the main idea is usually written there and the sentences that follows are most probably the examples that substantiates the claims of the authors.


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