Annotated Bibliography Essay

I learned that it is very important to do a lot of research when writing with sources. Not only on the topic of your paper, but also on the sources you are looking at and using. You should inspect them to see if they are actual real, factual information, or just toned pieces of writing that aren’t written by reliable sources. As I went through more and more sources, it became a lot easier to analyze them to figure out if they were reliable or not. I used the CRAAP Test, looked at the website link, and many other things to determine if I should be using this source in my paper or not. This annotated bibliography has prepared me for my paper by giving me four good, reliable sources that I am very familiar with that I can use throughout my essay. It also prepared me with the knowledge of how to find a dependable source and how to use it. Doing this annotated bibliography taught me how to break apart my sources and get the most from them. I will refer to my evaluations, summaries, and reflections on these sources whilst writing my paper. I will also think about these ideals when using other sources that I haven’t listed here.  Without my sources like “Queer Representation in Media by Marginalized Queer People and Queer People of Color: ‘Rent’ – by Jess Garner.” my essay would have gone a completely different way. One quote from this article that really opened my eyes is “This refusal can be elucidated through the Kenyon Farrow article ‘Is Gay Marriage Anti-Black?’ as well as the medical status of both characters. Farrow argues that, yes, gay marriage is anti-black. Gay marriage, while touted as proof of ‘progress’ in contemporary “, is still an overwhelmingly white movement, and this is because the class, racial, and acceptability politics of marriage often exclude people of color from the beginning,” (Page 1) This source opened my eyes to another concept in Rent that I think will be very important to discuss in my essay. One of my other sources “Paper and Pride: A Look at Gay NYC in the ’80s and ’90s.’, Paper Magazine,” really helped me get a feel of what the times were like in the setting of Rent (New York City, the early 1990’s) and how that affected the queer community. Pulling apart this source really taught me so much about my topic and I am very excited to use it in my essay.

Some key terms I used when finding sources for my research paper were ‘Rent’, ‘1990’, ‘LGBT’, ‘Queer’, ‘Gay,” and many other words along those lines. As I was researching, I would add different terms here and there, but these are the main ones I stuck with. Since my topic is “How was Queerness Represented in Rent and how did it Affect the LGBTQ+ Community?”, these key terms fit in nicely and were very helpful in finding sources for my paper. I figured anyone else in the audience wondering about queer representation in the musical Rent would also use these key terms to find information just like I did. The genre of most of these articles are informative. A rhetorical situation I was able to find is that these text exist because there are people like me who want to dive deeper into queer/LGBTQ+ representation in Rent and what the show is really providing. Rent is one of the most popular musicals in existence, and it is definitely known for having many queer characters and issues throughout the show. I’m assuming fellow audience members were interested in what Rent did for the queer community after it came out and wrote these article on that idea, which I am now using in my essay. I see many opportunities to apply this knowledge in future academic assignments. Not only in this class, but throughout many other pieces of work I will do in my life. The skills and functions I have learned whilst writing this annotated bibliography are quintessential and will greatly help me out in the long run. I have only ever done one other annotated bibliography, so these skills are still pretty new to me. I am excited to keep using and strengthening my talents and become a better writer thanks to this assignment!