Within the essay presented on the topic “Khasia”, critical analysis and evaluation brought forth the following points:
1) Organization: The author of the essay has systematically presented the readers with various aspects of the region Khasi in India. While he has clearly demarcated one topic of discussion on Khasia from another by way of forming different paragraphs, the flow of the text within the context is not smooth. Where one paragraph ends on the ongoing issue, another paragraph begins on a completely new note, leaving the reader slightly disheveled and confused. This can be made evident by reading through the essay’s first three paragraphs. While the first paragraph speaks of the geography of the region Khasia, the second suddenly begins with the tribes living in Khasi. As the reader just about begins assimilating the information on the tribes of Khasi, the author jumps to the third paragraph and begins talking about the languages dominant in Meghalaya.
Similarly, in the second last paragraph, while the author explains about the matriarchal aspect of the Khasia society, the beginning on the topic is extremely abrupt. The author begins with “Owing to this particular matriarchal society, Khasia women usually hold higher social status than men does in Khasi communities.” With due attention to the underlined phrase above, it would be apt to note here that nowhere in the earlier paragraph did the author mention of the reason or the presence of matriarchy within Khasi society. Thus, this sudden beginning confuses the reader into thinking that maybe he missed on a few sentences and important information in the essay earlier on.
Then again, while a brief introduction has been provided by the author within the text, the conclusion is missing. Therefore, by the end of the essay, the reader is left discontented.
2) Clarity: The author could be comprehended as one knowledgeable about the topic of “Khasia”. While he has given much thought in putting down the details and information for the reader, somewhere in between, the sentences becomes too long. Moreover, these extra long sentences are filled with excess information, leaving the readers slightly perplexed. For instance, “In Meghalaya pradesh, Khasi and Garo are two dominant languages; among which, Garo language is a member of the Sino-Tibetan language family of which quite a lot of languages are being spoken in South Asia subcontinent, and Khasi language, being used by about 950,000 persons, belongs to the Mon-Khmer language family, which is a subgroup of Austro-Asiatic language family.” This sentence above could have easily been broken into two, hence making it an easy read for the readers.
3) Relevance: As also mentioned above, the author has ensured to include most of the information on the region Khasia, which includes points such as the khasi language, culture, geography, and demographics. While the author has given much relevant information, certain information could have been done away with. For instance, where explaining about the language Khasi, the author also writes to extent about other languages prevailing in the entire region of Meghalaya. The point to notice here is that since the topic was specifically Khasia Region, this extra bit of information was not adding to any relevance with respect to the given theme or topic. Then again, while explaining the origins of the written script of Khasi language, the author narrates an entire folklore regarding the Khasi language. Considering the nature of the essay (which is pure information), the sudden inference of the folklore dampens the serious and intellectual mood created from the beginning. Nevertheless, it will be unfair to say that through the ongoing seriousness of the content, the little spirit of the folklore did create a welcome change, letting the readers heave in a sigh of relief momentarily.
4) Grammar: While one cannot oust the relevance of the information provided by the author within the essay, it has to be noted that the essay was abounding with grammatical errors and bad sentence structure. Several places accounted for disjointed sentences. For example: “But recently, with the popularity of Bollywood films, most of which try to publicize a male-dominating society, coupled with more and more Khasi men go outside to look for higher-salary jobs, Khasi men are aware of the unfair treatment that they have received, thus begin to ask for more social equality between the sexes.” The underlined part within the example above is a clear example of disjointed sentence making and wrong grammar.
5) Plagiarism: From the few blue underlined points and the hyperlinks which have been attached within the essay, it is quite evident that the essay has bits and parts copied from the internet. As the hyperlinks suggest, the content has been copied from information sites like Wikipedia and facebook. While the content was copied, the author does not mention the origin of the content or give credit to the original authors of the content. This clearly becomes a case of plagiarism, making the entire effort by the author farcical in nature.
6) Referencing System: While the end of the essay does showcase a bibliography, the in text citations are missing from within the essay. Apart from that, the general style of referencing followed by the author is APA style.
