Assignment 3: Literature Review & Introduction based on your own
RQ (40%)
Research Question
Dare to be curious and seek out topics that interest you. A researcher will usually find that a particular research question that is interesting to them by studying interesting ideas from books or articles and will identify a blind spot – a question that remains unanswered. Start your writing exercise by reading, keeping your eyes peeled and by following your curiosity and your instincts.
Observe your world attentively and think about developments in society. It will offer many puzzles that you will want to investigate further.
Often readers (and indeed, professors that grade you) can already gauge the quality of the entire essay from the quality of a research question. If the research question is too broad and too general (e.g., “How to promote world peace”,
“, “How to generate profits”,
“What is the role of the Media?”, “How can we strengthen the law”) then the essay and the arguments themselves will be too broad and the author will not be able to answer the question satisfactorily with strong analysis. If the question is too narrow or too self-evident (i.e., the question can be easily answered in 1-2 sentences) then the paper or essay is too simplistic. Make sure your research question is answerable, precise (i.e., define the key concepts) and related to wider significant phenomena or issues in your chosen Major. Read widely around the topic you are interested in to gauge the level of research (and hence research questions) already generated. A good literature review on your topic of choice should help here.
Introduction (500 words)
With your introduction you aim to create interest in your topic. Make sure that you provide enough information for your reader to understand your main arguments. You can best catch the attention of your reader if you include a hook at the beginning of the introduction. A hook is a beginning sentence that makes her or him want to know more your topic. It can be a controversial statement on your topic or something that is currently highly debated. Make sure that your information is well researched; you cannot just state anything because it is controversial. You always have to indicate where the information comes from. In your introduction you:
Explain the choice of your topic and why it is academically relevant
End your introduction with a clear and concise research question / statement Outline the structure of the paper and your main argument
In a well-written introduction, the reader should understand why he or she should read your paper. You should demonstrate that your paper contributes to the academic debate and how. After you have researched an interesting topic, you might be able to fill in blind spots or you provide relevant information to the current debate. Explain the relevance of your topic clearly. How does your topic contribute to the debate? What is the importance of your topic? How can you embed your topic in the academic debate? This means that you will briefly state what has been said about your topic and how and why your paper contributes to the debate (only briefly – the main part of this aspect is the Literature Review – a separate section). You provide factual background on your topic and most important aspects of your topic.
The first part of your introduction should lead to your research puzzle. This is the blind spot, the gap in research you aim to fill or the particular puzzling question you might have. From your research puzzle you state a clear and concise research question / statement. Make sure that your research question is detailed, but also relevant to wider debates. We will practice separately the art of writing and designing meaningful research questions.
In the last part of your Introduction you explain how you will proceed in your paper. This is very straightforward because we provide you with a structure for your paper. In this section you also outline your main argument.
Literature Review (1000 words)
In your literature review, you summarize the existing state of knowledge about your chosen topic. See description before, but this time the literature review will cover your chosen topic and will be based on your research question and introduction!
Be sure to include at least 10 academic sources and to correctly and consistently use the APA citation method.
Words limit: 1,500 words