Final Research Project, Summer 2005

This page takes on three important questions about the Final Research Project: what, what for, and how to (here's where you can find the requirements for both the proposal and project). My goal is to make this page as useful to you as possible, so let me know if it can be improved. If anything is badly worded, unclear, or missing, please contact me with constructive criticisms. Thanks.

What It Is

You may choose to write a research paper or research project for the SF@SF web site. Or you may propose a different format and see if you can get it approved. Whatever format you choose, you must select and use at least five print secondary sources, in addition to whatever additional non-print research you want to do. Here's more on these formats for the Final Research Project:

• Critical Essay format: write a critical essay of at least eight pages (fifteen pages for graduate students) in which you advance an argument based on analyses of an issue from the course, basing your argument on research relating to at least one of the readings from the course. The goal of this option is for you to incorporate research into secondary sources into the development and support of an argument on an issue from the course--and hence to hone your analytical and persuasive skills by entering into an interpretive dialogue with other readers/critics of the work(s) you have chosen to analyze.
• SF@SF format: contribute to the SF@SF web site by composing web page(s) that, for undergraduates, match the quality of the best web sites on the author you've chosen for your focus, and for graduate students, that match tbe quality of the best relevant scholarly research on your author/topic. The goal of this option is for you to incorporate research into secondary sources into the development and support of an argument on an issue from the course--and hence to hone your analytical and persuasive skills by entering into an interpretive dialogue with other readers/critics of the work(s) you have chosen to analyze--but to make the end product something of use to web surfers who find it. Your responsibilities include
  • considering carefully what audiences you are trying to reach and how you want them to interact with your page(s);
  • figuring out how to improve on existing author pages and science fiction sites on the web;
  • developing your priorities for your author's web page(s), using any combination of literary, historical, cultural, and interdisciplinary criticism;
  • accurately and completely documenting every source you use (in MLA format);
  • bring to bear your own experience, relative expertise, and best ideas in web design to developing an effective way of organizing all the information and interpretations that will eventually go on the site--your section's site should not only look good, but be useful to the kinds of audiences we're trying to reach, so structure, loading speed, navigability, and aesthetics are your priorities.
  • turning in an activities log that documents the work you into every aspect of the project; this log should include entries that list date/time (as precisely as is feasible), activity (such as brainstorming, researching, editing, meeting with group members or web master[s], and so on), and result (as specifically as possible).
  
  

• The Compare-and-Contrast Option: You may take advantage of the longer page length and find a way to compare and contrast any two works in the course, focusing on what's at stake in the key similarities and differences.
• The Twisting-a-CE-Option Option: You may use one of the critical essay assignment options that you haven't already written on as the springboard for inventing your own twist on the question that will provide the basis for a critical response to it.
• The SF Literature/Film/Video Game Option: In this option, you choose one work from the course and either a novel, film, or video game that can be related to it, and offer an analysis of what's at stake in their relation.
• The Major/Minor Option: In this option, you either (a) draw on issues and methods from your primary or secondary discipline and use them to shed light on some topic connected to the course, or (b) draw on issues and methods from the course and use them to shed light on some topic connected to your primary or secondary discipline.

What It's For

By the official end of the first summer session you'll already have done a good deal of writing--ranging from the informal free writing on specific topics in class, to reflecting on the Discussion Leader Project, to contributing to the course Blackboard site, to writing a critical essay. You'll have gotten good practice at noticing things about a range of texts and asking questions of them; we've focused a lot on making connections between texts and identifying tensions within and between them, as well as interpreting significant passages and patterns. What the Final Research Project allows you to do is to pull together all the skills you've developed in these smaller assignments and move through the entire research and writing process: from considering what texts and questions interest you the most, to identifying a research topic or inquiry, to developing your own perspective on that topic or question though critical reading of primary and secondary texts, to conveying your perspective in the form you feel would best showcase your research and critical or creative skills.

The other major purpose of the final research project is for me to indicate clearly what I see as the central questions and modes of analysis in the course. This should provide you with something of a framework for understanding and reviewing each unit and the course as a whole. Hence, it is highly recommended that you consider carefully each of the suggestions listed above as you try to develop your own focus for the Final Research Project. It's easy to miss the forest for the trees, especially when there were so many different "trees" in the course, so seeing the range of topics I think are most important to consider when looking back on the course can give you a new, better perspective on what we've read, as well as lay out possible directions for the Final Research Project.

So, in a nutshell, the Final Research Project is designed to give you the chance to connect this course to your primary academic or intellectual interests. By choosing a topic and a format that you are most interested in, you get a chance not only to pull together but also to deepen your learning in the course. The hope is that this project will provide a bridge between this introductory consideration of science fiction and alternate history and your future examination of related issues, either in other courses or outside of an academic setting.

How To Do It

The first stage of the Final Research Project is to write a proposal and get it approved. In it, you must identify which topic and format you have chosen, describe specifically what you want to focus on, explain your interest in the subject and justify making it the focus of the final project, lay out your research plans, and provide a bibliography of works you've already consulted in developing the proposal. In other words, you must try to persuade your audience (in this case, me) that what you want to do is worth doing. As with any proposal, your job is to pique your readers' interest and get your readers excited about seeing the results of your research and analysis. Often, this involves laying out a key question, explaining its significance, and suggesting how your approach to answering it will improve on existing approaches. Please email this proposal to me no later than Friday, July 1, 2005, although you are encouraged to get it to me as soon as you can. We'll discuss your proposal over email after you turn it in.

After your proposal has been approved, the next stage is to research your topic. Actually, your research should begin before you start your proposal--a good proposal is the result of a good amount of research into what precise question to ask, who else has asked it, how they have attempted to answer it, what their answers have been, and why you are dissatisfied with any single answer. So it's not like this is a stage that happens after you've turned in your proposal and we've talked it over; it overlaps the proposal drafting stage. You should use the reserves, the links page, and the library databases to help you accomplish this research. Learn how to use the ILLiad interlibrary loan system and how to take advantage of advice from your professors and reference librarians. A lot of what we talk about in discussing your proposal will be research-related.

The final stage is to use your research to help you draft, revise, edit, and hone your final project itself. Again, this can be an ongoing process--you don't have to wait until your research is complete until you begin drafting your project; in fact, you shouldn't. I'll be happy to discuss any stage of the writing process with you--from brainstorming to organizing your thoughts, from drafting to revising, from editing to proofreading.

So here's the assignment sheet for the Final Research Project.

Due: proposal due over email by 5 pm on Friday, July 1, 2005; final project due no later than 5 pm on Monday, August 1, 2005, either in my mailbox in the English department main office (Fenton 277), or in the envelope on the bulletin board outside my office door (Fenton 240), or (in the case of web page[s]) emailed to me as text-only attachments.

Format: FOR CRITICAL ESSAY: typed or word-processed; minimum of ten pages; double spaced, with reasonable fonts, font sizes, and margins (be warned that barely getting onto the 10th sheet of paper does not a ten-page essay make!); heading that includes your name, the course name or number, and the date; title that alludes to main themes of the essay or story; subtitles that indicate your focus in each section; formatting, bibliography, and citations (the latter two of which should appear only in the author's note if you are doing the creative format) in MLA format (see the links page for explanations and examples of MLA style; the basic template is: Author. "Title of Poem, or Essay, or Story." Title of Book from which It Comes. Ed., Editor of Book [if any]. City of Publication: Publisher, Date of Publication. Page Numbers.); proper MLA quotation format in body of paper (typically author's last name and page number in parentheses in body of paper--"..." (Piercy 17).--and blockquote format for quotations five lines or longer); FOR WEB PAGE(S): basically similar, but site design is up to you.

Audience: In general, think of your immediate audience as someone who may be interested in the core issues of the course but who has not been taking this class; hence, you can't assume that your readers have read the texts you're writing on, so you have to include the kind of background that someone not taking this course would need.

Grading Criteria: Dependent on the format you've chosen, as follows:

• Critical Essay format: I will be grading this essay in terms of how well you make your case for your argument, how well you base your argument on research, textual analysis, and interpretation, and how well-organized and well-written your paper is. Hence I will be evaluating the coherence, validity, and persuasiveness of your paper's argument, the effectiveness of your paper's structure, and the quality of your paper's prose (diction, grammar, syntax, and punctuation).
• SF@SF format: I will be grading your web page(s) using the following criteria, in addition to the ones for the critical essay above: the quality of the web pages to which you contributed research, writing, and/or editorial or design work; the quality of your contribution to the SF@SF site; and the quality of your overall performance relative to the duties, responsibilities, and expectations laid out on this page.