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WRITING A REACTION/REVIEW/CRITIQUE PAPER

Suppose that you were asked to write a reaction paper about your favorite movie. You
were given enough time to do it. How would you start writing your paper? In another
scenario, you were asked to evaluate an article written by a well-known writer. How
would you write an evaluation? These are just some of the possible scenarios that you
might encounter in writing. Based on the given instances, you could infer that all these
examples involve evaluation of a written text or something that is watched or read.

What are Reaction Papers, Reviews, and Critiques?

These papers are specialized forms of written text wherein a reader or reviewer
evaluates any of the following:

 Designs (furniture, structural designs, fashion design)

 Work of art (dance, sport, play, film, exhibits)

 Graphic designs (digital media, posters, commercials)

 Scholarly works (academic journals, articles, books)

Reaction papers, reviews, or critiques may have a minimum of 250 words to a maximum
of 750 words. These are not just ordinary papers for it entails analysis, evaluations, and
assessments of works. Critical thinking skills and recognizing arguments are some of the
required skills in writing such papers.

Upon reviewing or analyzing such texts, a writer must not rely on his/her own opinions
because it needs valid and information based from reliable resources. Thorough
research and writing should be done to create and write such papers.

Critical Approaches in Writing a Critique

There are varied ways on how you can write your own critique. You can consider
technical aspects such as its structure and content, approach to gender,
reaction/response as an audience, or through its social aspects.

1. Formalism/Formalist Criticism- claims that to understand a text, one should

examine it using its elements or its structure. Its historical context, author, or any
other external factors affecting a text is NOT necessary.

 Here are the common aspects that should be investigated formalism:

✓ Techniques of author
✓ Central meaning of a passage
✓ Effects of rhymes and rhythms to the work
✓ Interconnectedness of various parts of the work
✓ Paradox, irony, and ambiguity in the work
✓ Unity of the work
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Below is a sample evaluation of A Leader’s Sacrifice by John Smith, 2003, using

formalist approach.

A Leader’s Sacrifice

Tim O’Brien’s short story “The Things They Carried” thoroughly examines the
contents of the things carried by the men of a platoon in Vietnam. If we
examine “The Things They Carried” in terms of formalist criticism, we see that
the story dramatizes through its plot, structure, and narrative details the
necessity and painfulness of the sacrifice that a leader must make for those
he leads. Hence, formalist criticism shall enable us to examine Tim O’Brien’s
“The Things They Carried” from a fresh perspective, possibly elucidating
aspects of the text heretofore undiscovered.

To analyze O’Brien’s story from a formalist viewpoint, an explanation of

formalist criticism should prove useful in clarifying this criticism as a method
of examination. Rather than relying heavily on facts about the author’s life,
the historical context surrounding him, or other external factors, formalist
criticism draws its conclusions mainly from a focus on the work itself. The
formalist critic recognizes the key features of the work—style, structure,
imagery, tone, genre, and so on—and how they work together to have a
total effect on the reader (“Formalist Criticism” 2169).

https://www.elcamino.edu/Faculty/sdonnell/sample_essay_2.htm

2. Feminism/Feminist Criticism- focuses on women and how she is presented in a

literature as subjects of economic, socio-political, and psychological oppression.
Patriarchal culture is also revealed in this approach. Below are the common aspects
that are considered in feminism:

 How culture determines gender

 How gender equality (lack of it) is presented in a text

 How gender issues are presented in a text

 How patriarchal system overpowers matriarchal power in the society.

Below is a sample evaluation of The Madwoman in the Attic, 1979.

The Madwoman Thesis

Made famous by Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar's The Madwoman in the Attic (1979), the
eponymous madwoman is Bertha Jenkins of Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, Rochester's mad wife
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hidden away in the attic of Thornfield Hall. Gilbert and Gubar's thesis suggest that because society
forbade women from expressing themselves through creative outlets, their creative powers were
channeled into psychologically self-destructive behavior and subversive actions. A great example of
the madwoman thesis in action is in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 1892 short story The Yellow Wallpaper.

http://writersinspire.org/content/feminist-approaches-literature

3. Reader-response Criticism- is concerned with the reviewer’s reaction to a piece of

work. This claims that to have a meaningful text, a reader should be present with it. A
text and a reader are inseparable because the reader gives the sole meaning of the
text. Below are the common aspects examined under reader-response criticism.

 Interaction of the reader and the text.

 Impact of reader’s delivery of sounds and visuals on enhancing and changing its
meaning.

Below is a sample evaluation using the reader-response criticism.

The book George and Martha (as well as all the other books in the series), by James
Marshall, is in most ways a typical case prototype. The reading level that is assigned
to the book is for ages four through eight. Each book is divided into five stories, and
the stories are about two hippopotamuses that are best friends and act like humans.
Each of the stories starts with a title page that has bold yellow bubble letters. As the
pages are turned the left-hand page has the print for the story and the right-hand
page has the illustration for that portion of the story. This is very much typical case
prototype—very consistent, very simple in both a visual and a reading sense. And
each story is short in length endorsing the idea that children get bored easily.
All the illustrations are simple—basically white backgrounds with bold black outlines
and three or four colors used to emphasize certain parts of the images (namely grey,
green, yellow, and red). The pictures tell the story of everything that is going on,
which makes it unnecessary for a child to be able to read to understand what is
going on in the story. In fact, the pictures include almost no object in that is not
directly involved in the story, meaning there is nothing used in the background of the
pictures to fill the space.
The story is as simple as the illustrations using little or no complex language or difficult
vocabulary. The story, however, is not told using rhyming endings or any kind of
rhythm in the sentence structure, which is less typical case prototype, even though
plenty of children’s literature does not utilize rhythm or rhyme. The story also includes
only two characters (save the image of the dentist in the last story). There are no
other characters introduced which also keeps the story simplified.

https://www.longwood.edu/staff/mcgeecw/sampleresponsepapers.htm

4. Marxist Criticism/Marxism-focuses on economic classes, social concerns, and

conflicts between the working class and elite. It attempts to reveal that the ultimate
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source of people’s experience is the socio-economic system. Below are the aspects to
consider in this criticism:

 Economic social class

 Social class of the author

 Social class of the characters

 Conflicts and interactions of the different social classes

Here is a sample evaluation using Marxist approach:

 The Hunger Games, which is a trilogy by Suzanne Collins. In it, various districts
are struggling economically and socially and eventually revolt against their
government. The Marxist critique would go as far as to say that it was those
conditions that caused the series to unfold the way it did. It was simply people
rebelling against an unfair way of life.

 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. This book takes place in the
American South in the 19th century and follows a white boy, Huck, as he helps
a black slave, Jim, escape his situation. Here we have got quite a bit more
detail. Instead of just two large classes, society is really divided into several
smaller ones. As a result, a Marxist critique would focus not only on those
classes, but also what happens when they break down. After all, Huck and Jim
form a bond that society would have forbidden. Because of this, it would be
argued that Twain wanted society to get rid of race-based castes altogether,
since they only kept humanity in bondage.

https://study.com/academy/lesson/marxist-criticism-definition-examples.html

Since you already know the underlying concepts about reaction paper/review/critique,
let us now proceed with the logical organization and structure of your paper.

Structure for Critiques of Academic Researches and Articles

I. Introduction (5% of the work)

 Title of the book/article/work

 Writer’s name

 Thesis statement

II. Summary (10% of the paper)

 Objective or purpose

 Methods used (if applicable)

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 Major findings, claims, ideas, or messages

III. Review/Critique (75% of the paper)

 Appropriateness of methodology or mode of presentation to support arguments

 Coherence of ideas

 Sufficient explanation to other available information and experts

 Multi-perspective of explanation of different concepts

IV. Conclusion (10% of the paper)

 Overall impression of the work

 Scholarly or literary value of the reviewed article, book, work

 Benefits to the intended audience or field

 Suggestion for future direction of research

For other types of reviews, there is no definite structure, but the following parts are
mostly present.

I. Introduction

 Basic details about the text such as title, director/artist, name of event, etc.

 Main assessment of the material

II. Plot Summary/Description

 Gist of the plot

 Simple description of the artwork

III. Analysis/Interpretation

 Discussion and analysis of the work (use critical approach)

IV. Conclusion

 Reinforcement of the main assessment

 Comparison to a similar work

 Recommendation of the material (if you would like to recommend it)

Let us now proceed to how you are going to write an effective reaction paper/ review/
critique. Below are the guidelines in writing such texts.
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Guidelines in Writing a Reaction Paper, Review, or a Critique

1. For articles or journals

a. Read, view, listen to the work that will be examined to focus on its main point.
b. Connect the work to what you already know.
c. Focus on how the work discussed its topic. Use introductory phrases like this
book/work presents, the author points out, the writer suggests, etc.
d. The analysis should be anchored on theories used by the author.
e. Examine the findings and report the types of analysis used in the text/
f. Compare the work to another person’s work of the same topic
g. Suggest some points for improvement
h. Show your agreement with the author’s or creator’s ideas

2. For Artworks and Other Media

a. Use speculative verbs (evoke, appear, create, and suggest) to express that
your interpretation is just an interpretation.
b. Describe the material and suppose that the readers have not read the or seen
it. For films, make sure not to spoil key points or main events.
c. Describe the material in simple terms so that the readers/audience can
visualize it.

3. Your reaction paper’s conclusion may focus on the following:

a. Did the work make you interested?
b. Did it annoy or excite you?
c. Did it let you to have questions for the author?
d. Did it make you to realize some ideas?
e. Did it remind of other piece of work that you have read, viewed, or listened
to?