Concept Of Sociological Imagination Study Essay
Order ID 53563633773 Type Essay Writer Level Masters Style APA Sources/References 4 Perfect Number of Pages to Order 5-10 Pages Description/Paper Instructions
Concept Of Sociological Imagination Study Essay
Some initial introduction:
to write an academic paper, using not only course material but also materials gathered from peer-reviewed journals.
The Assignment:
Purpose:
Keeping C. Wright Mills’ concept of Sociological imagination in mind, sociologically analyze any topic of interest that relates to the course. A good topic is one that is original, includes variety of concepts from the course, makes use of theoretical tools, and offers an argument (no descriptive papers please).
Remember theoretical approaches are as important as substantive material.
Steps:
So how should you write a good academic paper? It is as easy as following these steps:
Steps 1: pick a topic
Step 2: Go to the library and read at least half a dozen relevant peer reviewed papers on that topic. You might have to read 20 different papers until you find a good selection of half a dozen relevant papers. There is a mountain of information out there and although search engines help in streamlining the information, at the end of the day, you have to go through lots of different materials until you find a good selection that works for you. A good researcher is one who is organized and smart. Some good strategies:
Start off with a search parameter that is not too restrictive as to only provide a handful of result but at the same time not too broad so that you are left going through the just the titles for days.
Do a quick look through of the titles and abstracts and pull the ones that you find interesting. Don’t be too selective here, as you still want to leave some options open.
Go through all these papers and skim through the material. This might take a few days, so make sure that you give yourself enough time for this. While doing this, start taking some notes of things that you think would be important and categorize them based on topic of interest.
Remember theoretical approaches are as important as substantive material.
Step 3:
After having gone through all these paper and now armed with a good set of notes, come up with one good research question or an argument that you wish to make either in support or against a certain situation, policy or social matter. I suggest coming and seeing one of us (either myself or one of the TAs) when you reach this stage.
Step 4:
Now divide your research question into 3 sections:
Theory
What theoretical perspective do you wish to use?
Why this perspective and not some other one?
How have you found others applying this theoretical perspective to your topic of interest?
How does this theoretical perspective help you answer your research question or make an argument?
Substantive material
What data supports the assertions of the theoretical perspective that you have chosen?
How does this data support your argument or relate to your research question
What data are there that would disagree with your assertions? How do you deal with these?
Policy implication and/or conclusion
Does this paper support the policies put into place to deal with the issue at hand?
How can these policies be improved?
Spend one week on each section. Remember that you might have to do some more research, but this time, keep your search perimeter as narrow as possible.
Step 5:
Make sure that you edit your paper, add appropriate introductory remark and hand your paper in. Don’t forget about the bibliography!
Some more details and instructions:
Length of the paper: the paper is required to be 10 pages in length, excluding the bibliography.
This is a very short paper, thus it is a difficult paper to write. As Mark Twain wrote to his friend “I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.” Be organized, precious and to the point. Each word is important and must be chosen with outmost care.
The font must be Times New Roman, Size 12 and the paper must be double spaced with a title page that includes your name, student number and title of your paper.
Number of sources necessary: You must use as many sources as are necessary to make your argument. Usually about a 20 sources is a reasonable amount, although this number can be cut in half or doubled depending on the topic of your paper or the depth of your argument. Remember, quantity is no substitute for quality, so lots of sources does not necessary mean a good paper.
How to make an argument:
Remember, although sociology is not a hard science, it is part of social sciences, thus its practice requires rigorous discipline and knowledge of the scientific method. In other words, your arguments must be logical, supported by evidence and methodically presented. In order to do that, you must put any personal opinion aside, and only present arguments that are supported by logic and evidence, even if they contradict your previously held belief. At the end of the day, your opinion is as valid and important as the evidence that you have in its support. Furthermore, all of your arguments and evidence must be grounded in your theoretical framework. This all might sound difficult and abstract, but once you read a few good papers you will get a hang of what it is that you are expected to do.
Beyond everything else, we are interested to see if you can make a good logical argument that represents a particular point of view. Don’t be afraid of taking sides so long as you can support why you picked one side over another. A good way of making sure that all of your points relate and fallow one another is to ask yourself one question after making a statement or presenting a supportive data: “so what?” You can list pages of facts but if you don’t frame them within a theoretical framework, they become useless. As an old professor of mine used to say “science without theory is stamp collecting.”
What should my paper look like? I get this question often and I am not sure what it means. Over the years, I have found that the best answer is to redirect you to the papers that you read, imagine that you are writing a paper that you wish to see published in one of those journals. Who can help me? Having been in the post-secondary education for close to 16 years as a student, a TA and an instructor, I have found that the surest way to failure is not asking for help when you need it. So please, seek help as soon as you think it necessary.
Depending on what you need help with, there are many great resources on this campus: a) Help with course content or content of the external readings:
If you need help understanding a particular concept or grasping a theoretical background, then your TAs and myself are great resources. Come to our office hours and we are happy to help.
This is also true if you are unsure of the requirements for the assignment. b) Help with Research:
What should my paper look like? I get this question often and I am not sure what it means. Over the years, I have found that the best answer is to redirect you to the papers that you read, imagine that you are writing a paper that you wish to see published in one of those journals. Who can help me? Having been in the post-secondary education for close to 16 years as a student, a TA and an instructor, I have found that the surest way to failure is not asking for help when you need it. So please, seek help as soon as you think it necessary.
Depending on what you need help with, there are many great resources on this campus: a) Help with course content or content of the external readings:
If you need help understanding a particular concept or grasping a theoretical background, then your TAs and myself are great resources. Come to our office hours and we are happy to help.
This is also true if you are unsure of the requirements for the assignment. b)