Summarizing a great deal of books and articles is a task many of us in graduate school learn how to do. There are several ways to start summarizing. In the long run, our notes can store some important ideas for us to draw from later, especially when we need to write new essays or take writing exams. As I went on in graduate school, I realized that I needed to upgrade my summarizing strategies more and more. Again, there are different ways to summarize and store information, or code information in general (there are also tons of programs to help with coding and organizing your information (please check out this blog). I want to focus on the notation and writing process in this short blog. In an old-fashioned way, this involves using a pen and paper and writing notes on your textbooks. Of course, you can still use your laptop to jot down notes. These few short tips will add to your writing tool belt.

[Image Description: A frog using a pencil and paper to take notes]

Noting Key Words:
Sometimes, you read a few pages, and you do not necessarily want to stop and jot down a great deal of notes because you want to maintain a good level of comprehension. An old friend once advised a group of students and me that after you read one paragraph, write one word (or a two-word phrase) next to the paragraph. These words can serve two functions: highlight the paragraphs’ focus and jog your memory about some of the larger ideas and connections you made. 

Paragraph Summaries:
Another way to summarize book or article chapters is to write 4-5 sentences on the last page of the chapter right after you finish reading it. You can also draw on the “keywords” you wrote next to each paragraph to help guide your writing process. Think of these short paragraphs as crystals. In this 4 to 5-sentence summary, you want to crystallize the argument and summarize the key points of the text you've just read: its central thesis, prominent examples, and concluding remarks. Additionally, summarizing specific content directly related to your research is a big plus, so you should also focus your summaries on such areas. (For timesake, sometimes we cannot read an entire chapter – but only its introduction, conclusion, and key examples or findings. Nonetheless, with strategic reading and proper summarizing skills, we can still walk away with some key ideas and store them for future use).

Summarize Ideas that Interest You:
At one point, one of my graduate advisors suggested that if I read a book in my field and really liked it, I email the author and share with them the key ideas I appreciated from their book. This is a great exercise because no writing goes to waste. As you are writing to this professor, you will be actively engaging with some of their ideas; this can prompt you to make connections and ask further questions. Also, these short writings (and even conversations if they respond and some do) can be stored for your future use.

Book Summaries:
A whole other blog can be written on book summaries for this point. Writing book summaries is a very important practice to develop – especially for those in the humanities and social sciences. Some recommend that you write a book summary for every book that will be in your dissertation bibliography. Writing a 2-3 page summary of a book will help you understand a book’s breadth and depth to a higher degree. Often, these book summaries need to include the author's main thesis, the birds-eye-view of the book, a brief synopsis of all or key chapters of the book, and further elaboration on chapters of interest (especially if these chapters make direct connections to your work). As you take time to write these book summaries, if some of the books you wrote about were recently published, you can also polish these summaries further and try submitting them as book reviews for publication.

Placing Ideas in Conversation:
As a final point, one way to summarize information is to note various authors discussing the same topic and place them in conversation. You can create different “living” documents (using Word, Google Docs, Pages, etc.) and constantly update them. Every time you see an author addressing a topic you are focusing on, note it – and make sure to add a few sentences to your living document to show how this specific author contributes to the conversation. Making these bigger connections between writers may lead you to some brilliant ideas!

[Image Description: A light bulb shining because it has a great idea.]

That is all the tips I have for now. Hopefully, these few points will help! Happy writing!