Guiding
Research Question à
inspired by essay prompt’s question(s) and statements, but more specific and
allows you to analyze a specific aspect of subject
o
From American culture (what is “culture”?), what
do you want to focus on that is one aspect that makes up culture? Some
examples:
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Views of mental health & family; mental
illness; disability
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Class & economics
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Racism
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Appropriation of Language
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Educationà
educational opportunity; education & class; education & gender
§
Christianity
§
Social Networks
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Pop Culture/Media and impact on society
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Privilege
o
Break down the prompt’s language to help clarify purpose: What is a societal prejudice
that uncovered/seen in a word’s usage?
§
How do I—the writer—define prejudice?
·
Pre-Writing Strategies: Brainstorming Terms for a
“Research Word Bank”
o
What are some of the words that come to mind in thinking
about the subject matter?
o
What are some other words come to mind when you
think of “culture” or “society” or more?
Finding
Sources
·
Start library search for
texts with the key words from Word Bank: linguistic databases, sociology
databases; ethnic/gender studies databases; documentary films
o
Record vital information of sources found on
databases
o
Eating
a text à skimming a text for cues of
relevance to your research project
o
Actively
Read your sources: annotate, pose questions, write down main ideas,
other authors cited
o
What types of sources to go for in academic
research? (Guide to research sources)
o
COLLECT
NEW TERMS from indexes, Table of Contents, and from the texts themselves…
Analytical
Insight
·
Use found articles to further research questions
and answers. Look for the many types of claims – about specific aspects of culture/social settings, about
language (linguistics), about your primary author's work!
o
Example: “Among the Dockhands” by Chad Gregory
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“working-class experience"; "physical posturing"; "sexual kidding"; "profanity"; "labor class"; masculinty
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