Guidelines for ENG 238 Research Paper

Ralph Waldo Ellison (1914-1994). Novelist, essayist, literary critic. Author of Invisible Man, Juneteenth, and Three Days Before the Shooting, and the essay collections Shadow and Act and Going to the Territory.

Novelist, essayist, professor, and literary critic Toni Morrison (b. 1931)

You will write a final research essay of 5-7 pages, allowing you the luxury of extended thought and discussion of a dominant theme in one of the major works we have read this semester (Ex: The Heroic Slave, Our Nig, Passing, The Bluest Eye). This essay, worth 30% of your final course grade, will be written utilizing Modern Language Association guidelines.

ABSTRACT: You must present a 1-paragraph abstract of approximately 75-100 words summarizing the paper topic and how you plan to proceed, detailing the following: why you chose it; what you intend to examine; what library resources you intend to use to complete the assignment.

DUE DATE FOR ABSTRACT: Thursday, 12/9.

RESEARCH PAPER: For your essay, you may want to focus on one of the major themes we have discussed during the course of the semester.

SAMPLE THEMES: abolitionism, accommodationism, adventure, aesthetics, alienation, childhood, class distinctions, colorism/color consciousness, community, corporeality, education, equality, family, femininity, feminism, freedom, gender roles, hypocrisy, individuality, integration, intellectualism, interracialism, law, literacy, masculinity, morality, passing, poverty, race relations, racism, radicalism, rebellion, religion, repatriation, responsibility, revolution, science, segregation, separatism, sexism, sexual exploitation, sexuality, slavery, stereotyping, violence. Some of these themes overlap—your thesis should reflect your theme in a clear, well-articulated manner.

The paper will follow MLA guidelines in matters of form (for complete MLA style, click at left on course blog), and it will contain a Works Cited page, in-text citations to those sources, and a complete outline.  YOUR PAPER WILL BE GRADED ON CONTENT AND MECHANICS (see Student Checklist for Papers).

You must use a total of ten (10) in-text citations from at least five (5) sources, in any combination, for your essay.

For this final research paper, YOU MAY NOT USE the following as sources, as they are NOT considered scholarly works: SparkNotes, Wikipedia,* CliffsNotes, ClassicNotes, Enotes, GradeSaver, or any other student guides.  

*A Wikipedia entry may NOT be used as a source—however, if the “Source” section of a Wikipedia entry contains a scholarly work (a journal article or academic book) that you want to quote in your paper, you are free to retrieve the work from the library (hard copy or from a database) and incorporate it into your paper.

WORKS CITED PAGE: You must present a Works Cited page of sources (books, journal articles, newspaper articles, media sources, Internet sources) used in your research paper.  The page will consist of no fewer than five (5) outside sources.  At least three (3) of the sources must come from scholarly books or articles on the main topic.  Internet sources can comprise no more than two (2) of the sources.    

OUTLINE: An outline is required as part of the grade for the research paper.  This outline must directly correspond to the research paper.

DUE DATE FOR FINAL PAPER: Thursday, 12/16 at BEGINNING OF CLASS (10:00 am.)*

ANY INSTANCE OF PLAGIARISM IN THE RESEARCH PAPER WILL RESULT IN AN AUTOMATIC “F” ON THE ENTIRE PAPER WITH NO POSSIBILITY OF REVISION.

*ANY PAPER SUBMITTED AFTER THIS DATE AND TIME WILL RESULT IN THE LOSS OF 5 POINTS PER CLASS MEETING DAY OVERDUE. PAPERS MAY BE SUBMITTED EARLY.