In my humble, uninformed, eleventh-grade opinion, the need for academic sources is highly overrated.
I may be biased, because I'm having a nearly impossible time finding any. But that's because I really do not think academic sources on this topic exist. I mean, sure, there are some; I have found one scholarly article about young adult film adaptations (even though it's from 16 years ago and it does not have current information and it's not exactly the ideal source, it's all I've got), and two or three others about adaptations in general. But I cannot find any current information on YA lit film adaptations that would be considered "academic sources."
There's plenty of stuff out there. Authors blog about it all the time (among them Ally Carter, Melissa Marr, Stephenie Meyer, John Green, etc etc etc), but I can't very well say "Well, see, on this author's blog, she said that she as the novelist has no control over the adaptation, and in this random non-academic website, there's an interview where this guy talks about writing the screenplay..." because that just doesn't fly with teachers.
So, my question is this: How am I supposed to write a decent, well-informed, thorough review of literature that is relevant to my topic (screenwriting of YA film adaptations) when there is no information about YA film adaptations?
I'm finding plenty about screenwriting, from Syd Field to James Ryan, but not much at all about adaptations of YA fiction. It's like the stuff doesn't exist. Which, as my father pointed out, it very well may not. If it's a recent trend, there isn't time for there to be academic sources out there.
I understand that having academic sources is important. I understand why it's important - anyone can post stuff on the web. Anyone at all. That's why we can't use Wikipedia as a source: anyone can post there, so the information could be completely illegit. (My ninth-grade history teacher found an error on Wikipedia while using it as lecture notes.) Blogs, commercial websites, and similar internet locations are not scholarly, nor are they guaranteed to be well-informed. They are just not good to use in research papers.
My only problem is that I don't know where else to find the information.
*sigh* Off to more hopefully-not-futile questing for valid, academic sources. Until next time, internetfolk.
Love,
Bex
Signed Copies and Where to Buy Them
3 years ago
As a former English teacher & now one of the writers blogging abt the adaptation of my book to film, I'm going to suggest that you ask your teacher if you CAN cite blogs. Authors talking abt it isn't necessarily scholarly, but it is a source. (If you're using MLA, there is a format you can use for citing blog quotes.) It's probably handy to reference that the quotes are blog-quotes bc of the casual tone we adopt in blogs.
ReplyDeleteCheck with your librarian to for School Library Journal & Publishers Weekly which--while not scholarly--are the industry journals. You might look in Locus (which is the SFF industry magazine) too.
And therein ends my teache-geekery moment. Hope it helps (& isn't weird that I replied).
. . . with errors! *sigh* Check w librarian TOO (not to) & teache=teacher
ReplyDelete