Proposal for Research
Your goal for the proposal for Project 3 is to demonstrate that you have identified a current and exigent topic for research that you want to learn more about.
College-level research is all about learning something new and expanding your current knowledge. Your goal during the preliminary research process is to identify a conversation that is happening, a topic where there are still things to be discussed and questions to be answered.
Once you’ve identified the conversation (topic), you’ll need to figure out what people are already talking about. You didn’t invent the topic and you won’t come up with the answer or last word on it. Instead, you’ll join the conversation by bringing together ideas and knowledge in new ways.
Overview
Your proposal for Project 3 must include the following:
A clear statement about your general topic. The topic must have an Issue Page on Opposing Viewpoints in Context.
A complete summary of the Overview Article for your topic.
Identify the major claims the article makes
Use chronological order and effective transitions
A statement about the themes that you’ve isolated in your preliminary research
Use the Viewpoint Articles to identify themes in the conversation
Identify the larger conversation and the sub-topics within that conversation
A clear question that comes from the themes you’ve identified through your preliminary research
Start with Preliminary Research
Use the search or browse feature to identify a topic that has an issue page in Opposing Viewpoints in Context.
Read the Overview article provided. Make sure you can identify and summarize the main ideas. You should also be able to identify any important themes in the article.
Do a survey of the viewpoint articles.
Begin with “Featured viewpoints” and skim through the titles. What topics or subjects do you see?
Move onto the other “viewpoints.” Scan the titles of these articles for information as well. What are some common themes or topics that you see recurring throughout the viewpoints?
Categorize the topics and subjects you see other writers addressing. Which ones interest you the most? Which seems most urgent or important?
Use Stasis Theory to Narrow Your Topic
Once you’ve read through the materials and you have a general subject, think about how you can specify or narrow your question. You may want to go through some of the stasis questions until you find some questions that don’t have easy answers. These questions can help serve as the beginning for your own research question.
Identify a Question or Two
Once you’ve identified a theme or subject within your general topic that does not yet have a clear or agreed upon answer, think about questions you might ask. Your research question should be open-ended (not yes/no) and require additional searching beyond what you’ve found in the primary materials. You may come up with either one or two preliminary research questions at this stage.
Write Your Proposal
Your proposal should identify the general topic you’ve decided to research and proposes one or two questions to research. You can use headings to label the various parts of your proposed project.
In your proposal, you must provide a complete summary of your Overview article.
Write an additional paragraph that identifies the general themes or common topics that you saw in your preliminary source. Explain why your topic is exigent and how it is appropriate for college-level research.
Include a Preliminary Source List
Along with your proposal, include a preliminary source list. Use the citation generator built into the database to format your bibliographic citations in MLA style. Be sure to fix any capitalization issues and use hanging indents. Your preliminary source list should include anything you looked at or read through to create your proposal. All sources should be in alphabetical order.
