Research Papers


These papers should be roughly 4000-6000 words.  By February 21, you need to have a brief paragraph that sketches your research topic and indicates a provisional line of argument, as well as a list of at least six sources that you think will be important to your discussion.   These sources should be listed in proper bibliographic format, with two or three sentences explaining why you expect them to contribute significantly to your essay.

Here are some tips to help you get started:

  1. Choose a topic – in most cases, it will be too broad and your task will be to narrow and refine it.
example: Mike Leigh, British film director.

    2.  Do a quick look around to see how much material there is to work with.        

Primary material:  filmography, writings, interviews

Secondary material: criticism, historical and biographical scholarship, reviews and newspaper articles, fansites

    3.    Begin acquainting yourself with the primary materials, reading some of the secondary materials, and refining your topic (narrowing it, focusing it on a particular aspect or historical moment or area of special interest within the general topic)

example: US audiences for Mike Leigh’s films

    4.    Focus your reading and viewing on this more refined version of your topic.  Begin reading more carefully, and in more depth.  Identify a problem – a crux or difficulty – that remains to be adequately addressed in the secondary literature.  Put this problem in the form of a research question: the question that your essay will attempt to answer.

example: have Mike Leigh’s films gotten worse, less distinctive and interesting, as he has built a wider audience in the USA?

    5.    Continue to refine this question as you begin to develop your answer to it.

example: in what specific ways have Leigh’s films become worse as they’ve reached wider audiences in the USA?

    6.    Make sure this question is not trivial, i.e., that there is real disagreement.

example:  Many critics argue that Leigh’s best films are the ones that have succeeded best in the American market and received nominations or Academy Awards – Secrets and Lies, Topsy Turvy, Vera Drake.  But some prefer his earlier films, such as High Hopes and Naked, which had very little distribution in America.

    7.    As you formulate your own answer to the question (this is your thesis), make sure it is argumentative (not just descriptive), and distinctive (not just rehashing other people’s arguments).  Write a brief paragraph that conveys your thesis and the argumentative trajectory that justifies it.  The example below is not necessarily a very good thesis paragraph; it remains somewhat vague.  But it does focus on a particular issue or controversy within the general topic, as well as indicating the specific works that will be most central to the essay.  And it does convey a line of argument in response to the existing critical literature.

example: The general view is that Mike Leigh really came of age in the mid- to late- 1990s, when his films achieved “greater breadth of vision,” “a more expansive humanity,” and “truly universal appeal.”  Not coincidentally, this was the period when he finally broke through in the American market and found commercial and critical success in the US.  The trouble is that in order to achieve this success, Leigh had to become a more sentimental and a less aesthetically adventurous filmmaker.   If his vision became more “universal,” that is because it lost its quirkiness and particularity – even in some respects its distinct Britishness.  Focusing mainly on two films, High Hopes (1988) and Secrets and Lies (1996), but with reference to others, I will argue that Leigh’s success in winning over North American audiences has been purchased at a high artistic cost.