RESEARCH PAPER
Each student will be responsible for the preparation of a four-page, minimum length research paper on a sociology topic which must be chosen from a list of topics located below, at the bottom of the page.
Your paper should contain a cover page with your name and the title. Your name and the title should not appear on the first page of the paper.
The last page of the paper should be a correctly-formatted References list in APA style.
The cover page and references page are in addition to the four-page minimum length of the body of your paper.
Please put the cover page, the body of your paper, and the references list in the correct order in the document for submission in only one file, rather than as three individual submissions.
When typing your paper in your word processor, you may double-space the typing.
Please use only scholarly fonts such as Times New Roman, Arial, or Garamond, in black and avoid colors and the fussier or stylized types of fonts.
Font size should be a 10 or 12 only without bolding or italics.
– the paper is not about personal opinion or personal experience. Do not argue for your personal point-of-view.
– the paper is written in the third person (see green section, below), is objective, and is based upon material gathered from your sources.
Writing in the Third Person
“The difference between first person, second person and third person is the same as if the speaker or writer says, “I, you, or him.” This is sometimes referred to as a grammatical person or point of view.” In most cases of academic and formal writing, avoid writing in the first or second person.
“If a person is speaking or writing in the first person, he or she is talking about himself or herself. The first person would be acceptable in academic writing if a writer were being asked to provide a personal opinion.
“The second person is just the opposite of the first person in that instead of referring to “I,” the speaker is referring to “you,” meaning the reader or the person being spoken to directly. The second person is not a reference used much in formal writing, but may be used in technical writing applications, such as giving instructions.
If a person is writing in the third person, the speaker or writer is referring to “he,” “she,” “they,” or “them.” Most academic writing is done in the third person.”
Reference:
Wisegeek. (2003-2012). What is the difference between first person second person and third person? Retrieved 2/8/12 from the WWW http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-difference-between-first-person-second-person-and-third-person.htmLinks to an external site. .
– the paper must be correctly cited in APA style and must utilize at least 3 credible scholarly sources, one of which must be the course textbook. Please see http://www.ehow.com/info_8715457_scholarly-source.htmlLinks to an external site. for an explanation of what is meant by “scholarly source.”
– one of your sources MAY come from a general Internet search, but the source must be a credible scholarly source and you may NOT use Wikipedia. Web sites such as YouTube may only be used as a source if the author is a credible, scholarly source.
– the remainder of your sources MUST come from scholarly publications, newspaper articles, etc.
– do not use password protected sources from the Internet. I must be able to access your online sources and if they are password protected, I cannot!
– you must cite the material within the body of your paper, using The American Psychological Association (APA) format (see below for APA style resources). All sources must also be listed in a References list at the end of the paper using correct APA style.
The following are excellent Internet resources for APA Style:
http://campusgw.library.cornell.edu/newhelp/res_strategy/citing/apa.htmlLinks to an external site.
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/section/2/10/Links to an external site.
– while writing, the student should practice critical thinking and should self-assess his or her work by asking the following reflective questions: Am I thinking clearly enough? Am I being accurate in what I say? Do I need to be more precise? Am I sticking to the question at issue? Am I dealing with the complexities of the question? Do the sources I have used sufficiently support what I say? Do I need to consider another perspective or point of view? Are my assumptions accurate or are they faulty? Is my purpose fair-minded, or am I being biased/prejudiced? Am I only concerned about advancing my own desires … do I have a personal agenda? Do I really want to get at the truth? Does my argument seem logical, or is it disjointed, lacking cohesion?
DO NOT submit your papers to me via email. Work submitted to me this way will not be considered submitted and will be returned to the student for correct submission.
Graphics, photos, graphs, charts or pictures should not be included in the paper, unless they are submitted in addition to the four-page minimum length body of the paper.
Overuse of lists from your sources is often an attempt to take up space from the length requirement of students’ papers and is not acceptable. If a student encounters a list in one of his or her sources and wants to include the information in the paper, it is best to select a few of the most important items from the list and create a narrative in the student’s own words which summarizes the material and of course, cite the source.
College-level thinking and writing is expected. Correct English grammar, spelling and punctuation should be used and will be considered in the grade. The use of profanity is normally inappropriate for academic work.
Per MCC technical requirements, if uploading a file, it must be in Microsoft Word 2013 or higher version, a pdf file or in Rich Text Format .rtf file.
Files must be free of computer viruses.
Students should keep direct quotations from other sources to a minimum, and those used should be placed in quotation marks and cited in the body of the paper, in correct APA format. The majority of the paper should be written in the student’s own words, using ideas from other scholarly sources. The ideas of others, even when stated in the student’s own words must also be cited. The idea is to give credit to the author for their words and ideas. All sources cited in the body of the paper must be included in the references list, in correct APA format.
I chose A Discussion of Open Borders and Immigration for my topic.
text book link https://openstax.org/books/introduction-sociology-3e/pages/1-introduction
