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Final Project – Research Option
Essay Proposal: Due May 21
Essay 1 Rough Draft: Due June 4
Essay 1 Peer Review: Due June 9
Final Essay: Due June 16
Note: Please turn to page 3 to see the “Creative Option.” You will choose one of
these options for the final project.
Overview
The goal of this essay will be to compose a research question about a text that we
have read this quarter and to write an essay that incorporates both that research
and your own independent analysis. The direction that the research can take is
very open, and it will be based on the research question that you ask.
Steps:
1. Formulate a research question. This question can be historical, social,
political, or literary in nature, and the openness of the research question
itself allows you to frame the essay according to your own research interests.
Here are some examples of possible research questions:
a. Historical/social: In Much Ado About Nothing, the characters often
discuss and play with gender roles. How were people talking about
gender in Elizabethan times? How strict or fluid were gender roles?
b. Literary/historical/political: Why might Diaz use Magical Realism
is The Brief, Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao? What political or social
purpose might it serve? (Or, alternately, why does Diaz incorporate
footnotes into Oscar Wao? Why juxtapose fiction and historical
references?)
c. Literary/personal: How does Marie Howe use What the Living Do
(the book of poems) to explore multiple aspects of the elegy? How is
her life, identity, and poetic style shaped by the circumstances of her
brother’s life and death?)
2. Conduct research in our library databases. You will need to find at least two
database articles on the topic of your choice. (Your third source will be your
primary literary text.)
3. Draft your research and analysis essay. In the process, you should
a. Develop an original, independent, specific thesis statement. The thesis
will often be the answer to your research question.
b. Engage in conversation with your sources, incorporating them
seamlessly into your essay and argument.
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Essay Assignment:
Expectations:
The essay should be 4-6 pages, double-spaced with 1” margins, and formatted
according to MLA citation style. The essay should also contain a Works Cited page in
addition to the 4-6 pages.
Thesis:
The central focus of your essay will be your original, argumentative thesis. The rest
of the essay will be driven and organized by this thesis. The thesis should
1. Answer the research question as fully as possible. In the process of writing
and revising your thesis, you may need to reframe your research question.
To refine your thesis, keep asking yourself questions such as “Why is this
significant?” or “So what?”
2. Be placed at the end of the first paragraph. Because the thesis will drive the
organization of the rest of the essay, it should the final sentence of the first
paragraph. Then, the point sentence or topic sentence of each paragraph
(the first sentence of each paragraph) should refer back to the thesis.
Body:
The body of your essay will both a) develop your central thesis and argument and b)
incorporate the research from your source. A literary essay is often text or
quotation heavy because it focuses on analyzing language use. You should focus on
specific language found in both your primary literary source and your secondary
resources.
As noted above, the first sentence of each paragraph (the point or topic sentence)
should
a) reference the thesis or central argument AND
b) provide the “mini-argument” and focus for the paragraph.
Conclusion:
In the conclusion, you should think about how your thesis has evolved throughout
the course of the essay. Therefore, the thesis found in the conclusion should be a
more complex version of the thesis found in the introduction; after all, your reader
now knows much more about your topic.
In this kind of essay, the conclusion is also used to extend the “So what?” question.
Why should we continue to care about this issue, even if this text was written 10 or
100 years ago? What remains relevant and significant? What do you want us to take
away from this discussion?
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Final Project – Creative Option
The other option is to propose a creative response to a text that we’ve read in this
class. This response should also incorporate two sources, though those sources
might be in the creative text itself OR the reflection (see below).
Assignment:
If you choose the Creative Option, you’ll compose a Creative Response of your
own design and then write a two-page reflection.

Creative Response: In your proposal (due May 21), you will propose a creative
response to one of the essays that we’ve read this quarter. This creative
response is – necessarily – very open, but it should entail approximately the
same amount of work as the research essay. I’ll review the proposals to make
sure that the amount of work seems appropriate.
These Creative Responses might be completely text-based (a short story, a
linked set of poems, a series of letters to a character or someone in your life,
Magreb’s Twitter account, etc.), or you might present a multimedia response to
the text (e.g. a series of images, collection of objects, short video, song, etc.).
If you’re interested in this option, I’m happy to send some suggestions or
guidance or to talk through your ideas! However, at this point, I want to leave it
fairly open to see how you respond. Just email me if you have questions!

Reflection: If you choose this option, you will also compose a two-page
reflection that discusses the relationship between the original text and your
response.
Incorporating Research:

As noted above, the Creative Response should also incorporate two research
resources, either in the original response or the reflection. The purpose of this
research is to deepen your understanding of the original text and/or to help you
explore your own response to that text.
o For example, if you were composing a Creative Response to The Brief
Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, you might research the history mentioned in
one of the footnotes in order to learn more, or you might research an
aspect of your own family or cultural history and use that to create an
Oscar Wao-ish response.