Research Paper


Life in the Matrix, Spring 2005

All students will do a research project, which will count for about fifty percent of their grade. The project should be about information technology and society, and should involve mastery of some significant body of scholarly literature on the topic. This involves more than just finding a bunch of interesting things about an interesting topic and saying some interesting things about that topic. It involves becoming an expert on that topic.

There are two hard things about becoming an expert on a topic. First, you have to narrow your topic down to something very specific. You can't become an expert on, say, the internet and society in three months. Nobody can do that. But you can become an expert on, say, problems with efforts to introduce the internet in select sub-Saharan African countries in the last five years. It may not sound very exciting, but if you really narrow your topic down properly, then you can really know what you're talking about.

And really knowing what you're talking about is a rare and valuable trait in our world.

Second, you have to do really thorough, painstaking research. This involves a lot of time, and a lot of planning; if you start your research in April you just won't have a chance of doing a good job. But it also involves learning to make intelligent judgments about what you find: how reliable and trustworthy are your sources? For starters, stick to scholarly research, i.e., research that is peer-reviewed; stay away from mass market magazines like Time  or Newsweek, random websites, and the like. But also you need to ask: How good is the data? What point of view or theory is shaping the articles and books you find? What controversies are being addressed? Who is the author writing for? Who is he/she arguing with? Making smart judgments about literature, and figuring out how it all fits together, is hard. It's also an immensely useful skill; it can make you powerful.

Everyone will turn in a proposal, an annotated bibliography, and do a class presentation on their subject. Beyond that, students have two options:
  1. A traditional research paper of 12 to 20 pages. (Guidelines below.)
  2. A video documentary or web essay on an aspect of the topic. (Requires some technical expertise; may be done in groups with instructor's permission.)

1) The Proposal (due no later than 3/3): The proposal outlines the main idea, the point, and explains the kind of evidence you plan to use to support it. It should be 1-2 pages long, typed, double-spaced. It should be organized, clear, and concise, and reflect the logic of your idea. It should not just list a topic area and some information (e.g., "this paper will be about the digital divide and will use evidence collected from journal articles.")

2) The Annotated Bibliography (due no later than 3/29): An annotated bibliography is an alphabetical list of complete citations to all the literature on your topic, with a brief paragraph explaining the contents of each entry. (That's "complete" as in everything that's relevant, not just what you happened to have stumbled upon in a visit to the library. Read that again: everything. Yes that's hard. But trust me, you can do it if you just put in the effort.) Most of you will have to use interlibrary loan to get some important information; that typically takes ten days, so start planning ahead now; "the books I ordered didn't get here yet" is not a valid excuse for late or incomplete work. The annotations should contain information useful to anyone studying in the area (e.g., fellow students writing research papers). It should not summarize the article or book or list its contents; it should briefly explain 1) the author's main point or argument; 2) the author's method or approach; and 3) the place of the piece in the literature as a whole (e.g., does the author agree with other scholars?). The bibliography as a whole should provide a solid overview of the existing state of the discussion in the area you are studying.

Here's an example of a good annotation:
Fjellman, Stephen M. Vinyl Leaves: Walt Disney World and America. New York, Routledge. 1992: A detailed, largely anthropological analysis of Walt Disney World in Florida. Written with an obvious passion and love for Disney, Fjellman describes the corporate craft of Disney and how the political, ecological, technological, and entrepreneurial systems (marketing and promotion) have been developed and manipulated to create WDW, and the peculiar vision of history it promotes. He argues that Disney World acts as the muse for the allied transnational corporations that sponsor it as well as for the world of late capitalism, where the commodity form has colonized much of human life.
Here's an example of a mediocre annotation:
This book looks at all kinds of things about Walt Disney's world, from toys to decorations, and talks about how it relates to America. It has chapters on the rides, the pavilions, on corporate strategy, and on other topics.
3) The Rough Draft (due no later than 4/14; earlier submissions are encouraged): This should be full, coherent, typewritten, draft of your paper, complete with references.

4) The Presentation (during the last weeks of classes): The presentation should be about ten minutes long, and should be both informative and interesting. Again, it should be designed to communicate the logic of your main idea. It should also explain why your topic is important, i.e., why scholars, including your fellow students, should care about it.

4) The Final Version (due exam week): This should reflect the best writing and argument you are capable of, and should show that you have thoroughly researched your topic and thoroughly understand it.

Please remember: Your sources must be fully documented using a standard system of reference. If you're not absolutely sure about how to do this, see me right away (Some of the basics can be found at http://bailey.uvm.edu/sage/cite.html). Remember that you need to provide references for ALL material you find in other sources even when you use your own words (NOT just for those things you quote directly). Remember that improper documentation is considered a form of plagiarism, which can get you in serious trouble, e.g., flunking or thrown out of school.