As a group, write up a one-page outline of your current idea(s) for your research paper. This will be similar to a research funding proposal, but less formal. When you’re done, one of your group members should upload the outline as a post under the category “Topic Outline.”
Be sure to include the following:
- The research question you’d like to answer. A research question is what it sounds like: a question that you’re going to try to answer through research. It should be more specific than the assignment prompts I provided, but should not be specific to your neighborhood either. Instead, it should indicate the general knowledge that you hope your paper will contribute. For example, a viable research question for this class might be, “why does gentrification have different outcomes in different neighborhoods?”
- A brief explanation of why your study neighborhood provides a good or interesting case study with which to address this question.
- The names of the comparison neighborhood(s) that you’re considering, and why they’re appropriate. (i.e., what they’ll add to the study)
- A description of the types of primary sources you expect to analyze. Say where you think you might find these sources, or how you might gather the data in question, and how you expect to analyze them. Try to be as specific as possible in this section.
