The first thing we need to understand is that this course is on U.S Foreign policy relations and its implications on certain events after 1945. My topic of choice being the (1990-91) Persian Gulf War.
Please start early as this is a 400 level History course and requires proper citations and footnotes (Chicago Format). It is very important that all of this is done skillfully as my life depends on this grade. A generous tip will be added for the grade i get, so you should be aiming for nothing less than an A.
PLEASE PLEASE MAKE SURE ALL THE INSTURCTIONS BELOW ARE FOLLOWED THORUGH OUT.
If you’ve included a source in your bibliography, like to see it referenced throughout the paper, so it’s not sufficient to simply add sources at the end to boost up the quantity. Please do not reference lecture notes or Wikipedia, but class readings are okay.
Memoirs are often overlooked by students, a pity as they contain useful quotes and sentiments that can insert the voices of your actors directly into your paper. Of course sentiments in political memoirs are ‘modified’ by time and memory, but they are still useful, and sometimes they reveal what is glossed over, or concentrated upon. Does the actor need to set the record straight, overcoming a critical bout of leadership? Look at journal articles and books by professional historians, these are your ’secondary’ sources and you can pit authors against one another or include them in a similar category for instance as ‘allies’ that could reinforce the point you would like to put forward.
Your paper should contain a variety of viewpoints, because after all you are arguing something – not merely describing what happened. There has to be contention in the introduction, something to sink your teeth into, with opposing sides inherent in the topic. If you are playing it ’safe’ and veer towards an uncontroversial topic with no slant or thesis statement, then you’ll likely end up with a very bland paper without much point and not a good mark. A good topic will have an implicit counter-argument, and this opposing view is relevant to include, even if you would like to overpower it with your own, stronger, argument.
As for ways to make your paper more argumentative, experiment with your language, and try using ’sub-headings’ – the paper should still flow perfectly well without any sub-headings, so please use them very sparingly. Sometimes a few lines of a song lyric, poem, speech, or observation taken out of the period you’re focusing on can add a bit of depth – so think broadly in terms of what sources can be pulled in to create an interesting paper. The ’Nelson Guide to Writing in History’ (mentioned in the Syllabus and available in the reserve section of Koerner library) includes a section on sources, and you can also peruse through the UBC History Department’s writing guide here:
I have included a page of templates for your citations (this is taken from the ‘Nelson Guide to Writing in History’), showing you the distinction between how a source is listed in your footnote compared to how it should feature in your bibliography. Familiarize yourself with short form in your footnotes, as you should only provide the full footnote details the first time a source is given. Use a hanging indent in your bibliography- this is proper formatting and looks much better than a justified edge.
You likely have encountered the ‘research paper’ before as an assignment, given that this is a fourth-year course and many of you are accomplished writers at this point. I would like to commend you on your fortitude, you are nearly at the end of this course.
The content of your paper should be 3,000 words (excluding footnotes/bibliography), and there is a +/- 10% flexibility (up or down 300 words) so this is the ‘ideal’ range of words. There will be an Assignment channel opening on Canvas for your online upload soon. Please include a title page, with course code, title of your paper etc and include page numbers. I prefer you to format single-spaced as I find this easiest to read. Please leave sufficient margin (an inch or so) all around for comments during the marking process.
Please also make sure to include. “In this argument….” at the end of the intro or give a gist of how the argument will form through out the paper. Dont forget to give a variety of views and conclude the assignment by answering the topic at hand.
The type of credible sources that are expected by my teacher are of the following.
-Books
-Journal articles
-Newspapers and magazine articles.
-Online databases such as EBSCO, JSTOR, LexisNexis, InfoTrac, etc
The topic at hand is:
The Rationale Behind American Expediency in Bringing the Gulf Crisis to a ‘Favorable’ End.
Last Completed Projects
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