FMLY 2012 Development, Conflict and Displacement

Guidelines for Writing the Term Paper

Purpose:

The main purpose of the FMLY 2012 term paper is to enhance the student's knowledge of the course material. The term paper is the end-product of an involved process of reading, research, source evaluation, organization, and composition. It is, perhaps, helpful to think of the term paper as a living thing, which grows and changes as the student explores, interprets, and evaluates sources related to a specific topic. Primary and secondary sources are at the heart of any paper Without the support of and interaction with these sources, the paper would morph into a different genre of writing (e.g., an encyclopedic article).

Format of the Term Paper:

  1. Cover Page - It should include:
    1. The paper's title, for example: Civil War and Forced Displacement in Columbia, 1950-2012
    2. Your Name
    3. Course Number and Title
    4. Name of the Instructor (i.e., Dr. Audrey Swift)
    5. Date
  2. Spacing: Double
  3. Writing Style: APA 6th Edition (Hint: Use lots of headings)
  4. Length: 8-10 pages, excluding the References section
  5. Writing the Paper:
    1. The Research Question: Your research question should be oriented towards answering an important question, not necessarily one that policy makers would find crucial, but one that is important to scholars or more importantly interesting and important to you. It will be helpful if you frame the question as a "why" or " how" question about an important political process or issue. Some examples are: What explains ethnic conflict in Nigeria? Why hasn't Indonesia been able to recover from the tsunami? These are problem-driven papers, focused on a problem in need of exploration. 
    2. Paragraph 1 - The Introduction: State your research question in the first sentence or at least the first paragraph of your paper. This way of introducing a paper appears jarring to some students, nonetheless, stating the question early in the paper is one of the best ways to keep the paper on point throughout. Paragraph 1 should articulate the main points of the argument. Finally, end the paragraph with a detailed map of the paper, outlining how you will build the argument and support it throughout. This type of introduction will help make the argument as well organized as possible.
    3. The Structure of the Paper: Next, present a brief factual and/or theoretical background to the topic. This background should be short and its contents should be directly relevant to your central question. 1-2 pages should be plenty. Lay out what current explanations there are, and why yours is the best. It is important to acknowledge and deal with counterarguments. In fact, this is a central part of critical thinking. Rather than blindly pushing their respective points of view, critical thinkers, and papers written by them, take account of ambiguity, uncertainty, and negative evidence.
    4. The Body or Content of the paper should progress in a dual process that 1) marshals evidence to support your argument and 2) presents the entire structure of your argument, (whereas in the introduction you only summarized it briefly). In the body of the paper you will present a number of sub-points that 1) relate directly to your main argument and 2) are supported by your evidence.
    5. The Conclusion of the paper should summarize your main points and state the overall importance of what you have said in your paper. Conclude your paper by restating what you have found, acknowledge that there is more to be explored on the topic, and briefly describe the issues that remain.

General Suggestions on Research and Critical Analytic Writing

  1. Consult scholarly journals. The best way to do this is through careful keyword searching in databases such as those found on the UM Libraries website, located at this web address: http://umanitoba.ca/libraries/ You will usually get a series of articles in response to your searches, with the name of the author of the article, the title, the name of the journal in which the article appears, the volume and number of the journal, as well as the date of the journal issue and the page numbers where the article appears.

    You may also find the brief list of suggested scholarly journals below, useful. You can always browse through the online table of contents for these journals, or do it the old-school way by going to the library and thumbing through the journals themselves.

  2. Find key single-subject books [monographs] on your country and/or your topic. Again, search for these on the UM Libraries website mentioned above. Depending on your topic, there may be few or many single-volume works on your topic.

  3. Be clever and flexible about keyword searches. Searching by "Taiwan" and "state-led development" might be too narrow. If nothing comes up, broaden your keywords -- "Taiwan" and "development," for example.

  4. Mine reference lists of other relevant papers. Once you find a good source that addresses your topic, look at the sources that the author cites, especially the ones cited that seem to speak to your research. LOOK UP THOSE SOURCES -- follow the bibliographic trail. Once your find one good source, its bibliography will surely give you 2 or 3 more.

    Note that you MUST LOOK UP AND READ THE SOURCE if you cite it in your reference list. Citing a source you have never seen or read is considered a form of cheating.

  5. Cross-fertilization is key to good research: This refers to cross-fertilization between your ideas and the ideas you encounter in your sources. You must give yourself time to READ and DIGEST your sources for their ideas to influence, impact and reshape your own. As you read and reflect on your sources, develop a dialogue, insert yourself in "conversation" with the authors' works you are reading. That conversation takes time to develop. You can't, therefore, do a good job on the paper by reading all the sources the night before.

  6. Paper that get an "A+" grade reveal a critical analytic perspective. This comes from reading many resources on a topic and being exposed to many points of view. Again, actually reading and reflecting on your sources starts a form of dialogue between you and the authors of the sources. This helps you appreciate the ongoing debates and opinions in the field, and helps you form a critical analysis. For example, you might be researching arguments that place the cause of the revolution on factors such as modernization, or choices made by the government in the years before the revolution. You can hear, comment on and insert yourself intelligently in that dialogue, (the per-requisite for an A paper), only if you have read and understood the perspectives found in the scholarly literature on your topic.

  7. This kind of reading enables you to produce critical analytic writing. This kind of writing synthesizes. It shows that you grasp divergent interpretations of the same phenomenon. It shows that you can judge these interpretations according to some clearly stated criteria (having to do with the logic of your argument/position), and thereby make meaningful assessments of the utility or insight of the material you have reviewed. Critical analytic writing goes far beyond drawing some facts, some data, some historical or contemporary issue from the sources you examine. It demands that you see each source embedded in its own perspective, argument and purpose, and that you construct your own argument about those sources and the topic at hand.

  8. Critical analytic writing is what graduate schools and employers out there in the "real world" want from you. You gain a critical analytic perspective when you do your own research on a topic of genuine personal interest (also known as intellectual passion), that you chose to pursue. 

Citations and References

Please consult the OWL at Purdue website located at the link below for help with APA 6th edition formatting and referencing:

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/general_format.html