BIS 490C
Senior Seminar:
The American West
Autumn
2007
Research Paper
Assignment
Final version due in final
portfolio on Wednesday, Nov. 28;
interim parts of
assignment due as noted in Assignment Calendar below
Assignment
Calendar
-
Wednesday, Oct. 3
: MEET IN LB1-220. Research paper assignment introduced; library
research session.
-
Monday, Oct. 8 :
NO CLASS MEETING; independent research time.
-
- Monday, Oct. 22 : E-mail annotated
bibliography due in midquarter portfolio no
later than 5:35 p.m.
-
Monday, Oct. 8 :
NO CLASS MEETING; independent research time.
-
Wednesday, Nov. 7:
OPTIONAL conferences with librarian and instructor in
LB1-220.
-
Monday, Nov. 12: Research paper due by e-mail attachment no
later than 5:35 p.m.
-
The purpose of this assignment
is to use critical thinking skills mastered during your
studies at UWB to produce a capstone work of research
and writing. To make this assignment as meaningful and interesting to
you as possible, you will have considerable flexibility in choosing
a topic and approach for this paper, as long as
it is somehow related to the American West.
On Wednesday, Oct. 3, Research Librarian Sarah Leadley will conduct
a research paper workshop in LB1-220 (second floor of the library) to help you
identify a topic and potential sources for your project. Please think about
a potential site (What do you want to study?) and a tentative analytical question
(What do you want to find out about that site?) to work on at the workshop
(although you do not have to have decided upon anything yet). The
tailor-made research guide prepared by Sarah is online at <http://www.uwb.edu/library/guides/BIS490Goldstein.html
>.
This assignment will
enable you to investigate an area of the American West that most interests you
by entering into an academic conversation or debate, building on the work of
others and contributing your own. Your topic can be
historical (the West as it used to be) or
contemporary (the West as it is now), and can focus
on the "real" West or its representations in popular culture.
-
First, identify a topic,
related to the American West that interests you.
Think about what you already know about the topic, and what you still
want to learn about it. Use the question, "What do I want to
learn?" as a way to generate a good research question.
-
No later than 5:35 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 10, e-mail your tentative
research question to me.
Your research question
should include state, as a question, what you want to learn about your
topic. Most good research questions begin with "How" or "Why" and cannot
be answered with a simple "yes" or "no." Here are some
examples:
-
How has Western music changed
from the early 20th Century to the early 21st Century, and how do those
changes reflect changes in the American West?
-
How have water rights influenced
the history of Southern California?
-
How did the Yukon Gold Rush
affect Seattle?
-
Why was Gunsmoke such a
popular television show?
-
How did U.S. Government policies
affect American Indians in the Pacific Northwest in the 19th
Century?
-
In what ways can Seattle be
considered a Pacific Rim city rather than a U.S. city? What does it
have in common with Vancouver, Tokyo, Shanghai, Manila, Taipei, Seoul,
Sydney, and Santiago?
-
Why is Seattle's International
District more diverse than most of the nation's Chinatowns and
Japantowns?
-
Then, use appropriate sources to learn what
other scholars have said about your topic. In most cases, you will need
to use academic books and articles, which you can locate most readily
via the UW Library Catalogue <http://catalog.lib.washington.edu/> and the nearly two hundred academic databases
<http://www.lib.washington.edu/types/databases/>to which the UW Library subscribes.
You will have independent work time on Monday, Oct. 8, because we will not
meet as a class that evening. You probably will need to find other times to seek sources, as well.
-
No
later than 5:35 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 22, e-mail your annotated bibliography
to me.
-
Your annotated bibliography
should include at least six sources, at least four
of which must be peer-reviewed research articles from scholarly
journals.
-
-
To create your annotated
bibliography, first type your research question at the top of a Microsoft
Word document (after your header). Then, below the research
question, put all of your potential sources into an MLA Works Cited
format. Consult the latest edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers
of Research Papers or Diana Hacker's online guide at <http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/p04_c08_s2.html>.
-
After each
entry, write a sentence or two that explain(s) why you think the source
might be helpful in response to your research
question. You need not summarize the source. I just want to know why
you think it might be useful.
-
E-mail this
document to me as an attachment (not cut-and-pasted
into the message).
-
I will return
annotated bibliographies within seven days, and will include comments and
suggestions regarding your work.
-
I will grade your annotated
bibliography like this:
-
I will accept late
annotated bibliographies, but they will be ineligible for bonus points, and
I cannot guarantee that I will have them returned within seven
days.
-
Then, start writing a research paper in which
you argue your own point of view on the topic in response to your research
question.
-
This is a research paper, and I expect that
you will be entering a scholarly discussion on your topic. You
therefore need to take into account previous work and opinions on
your topic, and you should cite those sources in your paper using
proper MLA formatting as described in the latest edition of the MLA Handbook for Writers of
Research Papers or Diana Hacker's online guide at
<http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/p04_c08_s1.html>
(in-text citations) and <http://www.dianahacker.com/resdoc/p04_c08_s2.html>
(Works
Cited).
-
You
should cite at least four scholarly sources (as described above for
your Annotated Bibliography). They need not be the same sources that
you listed in the Annotated Bibliography if you have found others that work
better for you.
At least three of your
sources must be peer-reviewed articles from academic
journals
.
-
Assume that your audience is a smart,
educated person who is not an expert on your topic but is very
interested in academic discussions of your topic. As you write, it
might help to think of a smart friend of yours as your
audience.
-
All papers must be written in Microsoft
Word (available in all UWB computer labs) and must run between
2500 and 3000 words (not counting the mandatory Works Cited
page),
according to the word count tool in Microsoft Word. Do not use
Microsoft Works. It must be Word.
-
Please do not use a cover page or
footnotes. If you wish to quote, do so sparingly, and only after
reading Becky Reed Rosenberg's document, "Using Direct Quotation" at
<http://faculty.washington.edu/davidgs/Quotation.html>.
If you paraphrase or quote one of the authors about whom you are
writing, you can provide just a page number if it is obvious whom you
are citing (such as when you refer to an author in the text of your
sentence). Be sure you cite correctly according to MLA format
according to the latest edition of the MLA Handbook.
-
Before you submit your paper,
but after getting close to a final version, do
some careful editing and proofreading. (I recommend that you
wait until you get your ideas organized and on
paper before worrying about the less-important mechanics of prose.)
-
Because all teachers have their own
idiosyncratic preferences for writing, you should review what mine
are by re-reading "Tips for Better Prose" at <http://faculty.washington.edu/davidgs/Prose.html
>. Reading this document is a required part of the
assignment. I recommend printing that document, and, after you finish
writing your paper, check the items off one by one to make sure your
paper is as mechanically sound as you can make it. Although the
mechanics of writing are less important to me than the ideas
expressed, the mechanics inevitably improve the effectiveness of your
communication of ideas, which, after all, is your ultimate
goal with each piece of writing that you do.
-
As a formal piece of university
writing, your paper should be typed and double-spaced throughout, using a
standard font (like Times New Roman) in 12-point size, and with margins of
one inch all the way around each page. In the top, left-hand corner of the
first page, place a heading that includes (using one line per item) your
name, the course number (BIS 490D), the date, and my name (Prof. David S.
Goldstein). (See item #20 in "Tips for Better Prose"; a link appears
below.) Provide a meaningful but brief title for your paper (not "Research
Paper" but rather a short hint of your paper's main argument) that is
centered just one double space beneath the heading on the first page and
in plain type (no underlining, bold, italics, or quotation marks). (See
item #22 in "Tips for Better Prose.")
-
If I
think your paper is at least a middle draft,
then when I return your paper to you, I will indicate patterns of problems
that I noticed in your paper, using a list of codes such as "T1," "T2,"
and so forth, which refer to the numbered items of the "Tips for Better
Prose" document. (If your paper is still in the early-draft stage,
you will have more important things to focus on, and can take care of
editing and proofreading after you do the major rewriting. There
obviously is no point in worrying about small matters of
prose mechanics if you will be doing major rewriting.)
-
Do a final word count (in
the Tools pull-down menu of Microsoft Word) to make sure you are within
the stated word count requirements. To count all of the words except the
Works Cited page, highlight all of the text except the Works Cited page
before using the word count tool. If you are not within the required
parameters, then please edit appropriately.
-
Needless to say, your work must be entirely
original. Using another
person's ideas or words without proper attribution, whether intentional or accidental,
constitutes plagiarism, and will result in a zero on
this assignment. Please review "Policy on Academic and Behavioral Conduct," which
was the first reading assignment for this
course. -
To provide time for a revision prior to the final
version that you will submit in your final learning
portfolio, you must submit your research paper as an e-mail attachment sent
to me no later than 5:35 p.m. on Monday, Nov.
12
. I
will return these revised research papers
by e-mail within five days of receiving it, so the earlier you submit
it, the more time you will have for revising.
-
After you get comments back from
me, you can revise and then submit your final paper for
inclusion in your
final learning portfolio, which is due no later than 5:35 p.m. on Wednesday,
Nov. 28.
Your
evaluative (i.e., "final") research paper grade
will be determined at that time. Instructions for submitting your
portfolio version of your paper will be included in the learning
portfolio assignment sheet.
Criteria for evaluating research
papers: Please carefully read "Criteria for Assessing Writing" at
<
http://faculty.washington.edu/davidgs/WritingAssess.html> for an explanation of my assessment
criteria. In addition to substantive comments on each version, I also will
designate each draft as "early draft" (E), "middle draft"
(M), or "late draft" (L). I will use the research
paper grading rubric shown on that Writing Assessment page. The
research paper assignment is worth 40 percent of the final course
grade.
Resources:
Some additional advice:
- Get in the habit of saving your work often (maybe every
ten minutes) so you do not lose everything when your computer freezes.
It also is a good idea to keep multiple copies in different places,
such as on a different computer, on diskettes, CDs, flash drives, or Zip
disks, or in your electronic "shell" on the UWB student computer
server. I usually e-mail important files to myself at the end of the
work day, so if my computer blows up, I still can retrieve my work.
- I do not have time to read rough drafts,
but I am very glad to discuss your paper as you work on it. You would
be wise to visit me during office hours (see syllabus) to make sure you
are on the right track, to see whether your thesis makes sense to me,
and to get advice about any particular difficulties you might be
encountering.
- Re-read this assignment sheet
just before each submission of your paper to make sure it meets
all of the requirements.
- Visit the Writing Center (see <http://www.bothell.washington.edu/WritingCenter/>) as many times as you can to help you build
confidence in your writing process.
This page last updated November 11, 2007.
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),
or plus (+) for appropriateness of sources.