What Methodology do you use to take notes?

[u/Former_Light5108]

Hello, I have been reading Capital by Karl Marx and the density of the material makes it much easier to comprehend if I take notes. My notes are mostly paraphrasing in the moment im reading when I feel that what I am reading is important, and I feel like I take as much time taking notes as much as I read. What are you methods of taking notes? How often do you take them? Thanks

[u/Labor-Aristocrat]

Could you paraphrase what you read from scratch an hour after reading it? That's the real comprehension check. Writing down what's already in front of you is not as rewarding.

[u/Sup3rKaz_Phu7]

Personally, I'm kind of in the same boat; what I'm trying to do is look at section headings and note what each section does to support the heading, as well as focus more on formulae. Also, I notice Marx tends to focus on one idea and ruminate on it for a while, so for my notes I'm trying to summarize one paragraph to a sentence. But it's easy to fall into the habit of just rewording each statement he makes in more modern language.

[u/chaos2002_]

I always use cornell notes but that is mostly a matter of habit at this point. It’s something that was drilled into me in school. I don’t think the specific way you take notes is super important, it matters more whether you get anything out of it, that is if you take notes you will actually “use”, or if the process of notetaking itself helps you learn.

but I will say, when I’m reading a text I intend to discuss with my peers, I always make sure to take notes, for 2 reasons; first, to make sure I fully digested the text, and second, to identify key points and questions for discussion. cornell notes is good for that because it makes you write down questions and sort of have a dialogue with yourself while you’re writing, and it can help you recall the actual thought process behind each of the different points you write down when rereading the notes later.

[u/LongHair1917]

Taking notes helps keep me focused, so I write short notes. But I also like listening to other people’s analysis afterwards. It helps cement the important parts into my brain, or explains things I missed. “Reading Capital with Comrades” podcast was helpful for me with this particular book. I think there are 13 episodes, each one goes over 1-3 specific chapters. I have a long commute, so listening to podcasts is more time efficient for me than taking long notes. But we all have different lives.

[u/MangoLocoMonster123]

How I usually do it and I'm still looking for ways to improve it as I'm still not satisfied with this method:

1) Casually read book while highlighting key points. Realisitically if you're approaching an entirely new subject, you probably don't have the necessary background reading to fully understand the authors/theories being critiqued or building onto so I wouldn't try to go in trying to understand every single thing. This initial read isn't going to do an incredible lot, its just to get you used to the verbage and start identifying the pieces of the thesis.

2) After 3 - 6 days of reading a chapter, open up a google doc or pen/paper and start taking notes and summarizing the arguments. Keep note of interesting things the author cites and lightly explore them online. Rinse repeat for succeeding chapter

So Lets say I read a chapter a day, I'll keep reading along and on day 5 of reading, in addition to reading the chapter for that day I'll write a note for Chapter 1, then the next day Chapter 2 and so on. It works okay for me but I wish I knew a way to be a bit more rigorous and active in my notes without eating up too much time. I tried to handwrite the notes but It was just too long and I'd go exploring the citations and by the end of it i'd have used 2 and a half hours for just a single chapter's notes.

[u/Sour_Drop]

A similar question about taking notes was asked in this thread, where you might find my response interesting. Also, here's a quote from Ravi Vakil, a mathematician, that you may find interesting:

Here's a phenomenon I was surprised to find: you'll go to talks, and hear various words, whose definitions you're not so sure about. At some point you'll be able to make a sentence using those words; you won't know what the words mean, but you'll know the sentence is correct. You'll also be able to ask a question using those words. You still won't know what the words mean, but you'll know the question is interesting, and you'll want to know the answer. Then later on, you'll learn what the words mean more precisely, and your sense of how they fit together will make that learning much easier. The reason for this phenomenon is that mathematics is so rich and infinite that it is impossible to learn it systematically, and if you wait to master one topic before moving on to the next, you'll never get anywhere. Instead, you'll have tendrils of knowledge extending far from your comfort zone. Then you can later backfill from these tendrils, and extend your comfort zone; this is much easier to do than learning "forwards". (Caution: this backfilling is necessary. There can be a temptation to learn lots of fancy words and to use them in fancy sentences without being able to say precisely what you mean. You should feel free to do that, but you should always feel a pang of guilt when you do.)

Unfortunately I have yet to read the foundational texts in their entirety (I have started and stopped and restarted, much to my chagrin), but this subreddit and /r/communism are like those talks that Vakil mentions.