For this assignment, you will first choose a topic you care about and conduct research with the ultimate goal of writing a ten page research paper, due at the end of the semester. You will also provide between one to three potential research questions, a list of the films or media you will consider (if applicable), and an annotated bibliography of five to ten peer-reviewed sources.
Although this proposal is designed to help you conduct thorough and sustained research for your final project, you are not beholden to the topic and may decide to write about something else later in the semester. You will undoubtedly find other sources as you write the final paper as well, and do not have to use all the sources you list in this proposal if they do not support the final research. However, if you decide to change topic, you are encourgaed to see me in office hours to discuss the new idea.
Topic
You may choose any topic that interests you in the history of animation. Topics may explore the historical, theoretical, or stylistic/practical aspects of animation, or a combination of these approaches. You are encouraged to develop your own ideas and follow your genuine interests, but some potential topics in each area might include:
Historical:
Choose a filmmaker, studio, or group of animators and place them in a particular historical context. For example, you could consider, but are certainly not limited to an examination of Walter Ruttman and the historical avant-garde; Oscar Fischinger in Hollywood; UPA and their relationship to Disney; Warner Bros. and propaganda in World War Two; Miyazaki’s influence on American animation; Czech animators abroad, and so on.
Consider the way race or gender is negotiated within a particular historical context. You could consider either how race or gender is represented on screen, implicated in labor practices, or how these relationships and representations have changed over time.
Theoretical:
Consider one of these ontological questions: what is animation? How might we distinguish live action cinema from animation? Are visual effects and animation different?
Evaluate a practitioner’s principles of animation, or a general concept in animation. For example, you might consider the way ideas such as “squash and stretch” or “superflat” represent or diverge from realism; how abstract animation is able to represent forms of subjectivity; the relationship between the principles motivating puppet animation and 3D computer animation, and so on.
Style/practical:
Examine a particular technology or animation technique and its impact on the style of animation. You could consider historical practices such as “slash and tear” or “cel animation,” or new software that is used in computer animation. You might consider the impact of these technologies on labor, or aspects of animation style such as character animation or effects. You could also trace a particular animator’s style over time.
Consider a particular problem that faces animators, and analyze the solutions they have developed. You could consider for example, how animators have approached the problem of creating movement in depth or Z-axis movement; creating synch points in sound-image relations; adding realistic texture to landscapes; lighting characters, and so on.
YOU ARE NOT LIMITED TO THE TOPICS ABOVE:
These are just a few suggestions to get you started, and I encourage you to think about what interests you beyond these suggestions. The categories above can easily intersect (and might change as you work on the topic, as indicated by the example below), and you could think about any number of aspects of animation not listed above as well, such as the marketing, distribution or exhibition of animation, audience reception, taste cultures, production cultures, animation in social media, and so on. The possibilities are infinite, and you should decide on a topic that gets you excited and motivated to conduct original research. You are welcome to discuss your ideas with me further in office hours.
Research Questions
It is essential that your research starts with a question, rather than an argument. Good arguments emerge from questions that are rigorously examined over time by comparing and synthesizing the ideas others have proposed and making original observations based on the viewing of films or other forms of evidence.
Once you have decided on a topic, start asking questions about areas that interest you. In some cases, this might be as simple as rephrasing the topic in question form. So for example, if your topic is “Oscar Fischinger in Hollywood,” you might rephrase as a question: “what is Oscar Fischinger’s relationship to Hollywood?” This might then prompt further questions as you try to clarify the exact aspect of this relationship that interests you. You might end up asking narrower or more specific questions to do with practice, such as “how were Fischinger’s techniques used in Fantasia, and how were they altered?” or broader, more theoretical questions, such as “how does Fischinger’s experiences in Hollywood reflect tensions between experimentation and commerce in animation?”
How many questions you ask depends on the nature of your topic. You must provide one to three questions, but you are welcome to provide more if you like.
List of Media
Provide a list of possible films that you will use as evidence for your paper. The number of films you provide will depend on your research question. For example, if you were tracing the evolution of an animator’s style over time, you will need a larger corpus of films than if you are studying the influence of a certain film on the history of animation.
Annotated Bibliography
An annotated bibliography is a list of source citations followed by descriptive and evaluative paragraphs that explain the relevance and applicability of each cited source.
Your annotated bibliography will need to be in MLA or Chicago format and include five to ten citations. They must all be scholarly peer-reviewed secondary sources. The library has a button that allows you to sort journal articles by whether or not they are peer-reviewed. The reason peer-reviewed works matter is because peer-reviewed status means other experts in a field, besides the author, have evaluated the work for accuracy and importance.
Each citation should be followed by a 150 to 250 word annotation, which explains the following:
The content/topic of the source (What is the source about generally? What specific details are worth noting?)
The applicability of the source to your project (How does it relate to your project? What does this source add that the other materials do not? How do the sources relate to each other? Why is this source necessary?)
Note: You do not need to answer all of the parenthetical questions; however, each of the bolded topics should be addressed.
Tips: When writing within the annotation, referring to works by the author(s) full name on first reference and by their last name on second reference is a typical convention in the humanities in American academia. If there are three or more authors listed, use the first listed authors name followed by et al. For example, “Smith et al. says …”
Format
The final draft should be:
in MLA or Chicago format; with an appropriate heading and citations
(For more information about citing in MLA and Chicago format, visit the Purdue Owl
size 12 Times New Roman Font
in alphabetical order by author(s) last name
turned in as a Microsoft Word Document
