FYP Law and Accounting: Writing the Research Proposal

FYP Law and Accounting:Writing the Research Proposal Íde O’Sullivan, Lawrence Cleary Regional Writing Centre, UL www.ul.ie/rwc Regional Writing Centre

Workshop • Freewriting / writing to prompts • The research proposal • The writing process • Planning: • Assessing the rhetorical situation • Establishing an Organising Principle • Strategies to develop writing Regional Writing Centre

Writing to prompts (Murray 2005) • “An area of Law and Accounting that I would like to research is …… “ • Keep writing non-stop for 5 minutes. • Write in sentences. • Do not edit or censor your writing. • Discuss what you have written in pairs. • Joining the conversation • Broad and narrow conversations Regional Writing Centre

Research proposal • Title • Background • Research question and objectives • Method • Initial bibliography Regional Writing Centre

Writing a ‘page 98 paper’ • My research question is … • Researchers who have looked at this subject are … • They argue that … • Debate centres on the issue of … • There is work to be done on … • My research is closest to that of X in that … • My contribution will be … (Murray 2006:104) Regional Writing Centre

The writing process • Prewriting • Drafting • Revising • Editing and Proofreading Regional Writing Centre

Prewriting • Planning • Evaluating the rhetorical situation, or context, into which you write • Choosing and focusing your topic • Establishing an organising principle • Gathering information • Entering the discourse on your topic • Taking notes as a strategy to avoid charges of plagiarism • Evaluating sources Regional Writing Centre

Planning: Assessing the rhetorical situation • Occasion • Audience • Topic • Purpose • Writer Regional Writing Centre

Occasion • What has prompted you to write? • What do I need to know? • What are my obligations? • What are the procedures? • When is it due? How much time do I have? • What’s involved? • My guidelines tell me about procedures that I must follow. • When do I submit a proposal? • Do I need to submit project reports? When? • When do I submit my finished document? Do I need to defend my discoveries orally? • What kind of project will I choose? • How do I write about it? Regional Writing Centre

Occasion • When we consider the occasion for writing, we think about • What has prompted me to write? • How much writing do I have to do? • How much time do I have to do it? • How much time should I allot for planning and organising, and for drafting and revising? • What tone should I adopt? Formal? Informal? Authoritative? Conciliatory? Assertive? Regional Writing Centre

Audience • Your audience affects how you write. • Terms that need not be explained for one audience, may need to be explained to other audiences. • General audiences may not have your subject knowledge, but they are usually thought of as intelligent, thoughtful readers willing to be informed or persuaded. • Your classmates make good audiences. Write for them. Let them read your dissertation and give you feedback on the ease with which they were able to read and understand it. Regional Writing Centre

Topic • Your topic is something that will have your supervisor’s approval. • Some things to think about: • How much do you already know about this topic? • How much am I going to have to know in order to do this project and report on it? To say something meaningful? • How much research am I going to have to do? • How much time do I have to do it? Regional Writing Centre

Topic • Strategies for choosing topics and narrowing or broadening the coverage you will give it. • Taking suggestions from your supervisor • Brainstorming (individually or in groups) • Listing • Clustering or mind-mapping • Free-writing or discussing • Asking wh-questions—who, what, when, where, how and why? Regional Writing Centre

Topic • Topics do not stand in isolation. They exist in a context. • What is the relationship of your topic to your course of study? • What are people saying about your topic in the literature you have read? • What are the issues of concern? Regional Writing Centre

Purpose • What is your purpose for writing? • To express your feelings? • To inform? • To persuade? • As you draft, revise and edit, make sure that every contribution to your report works to realise that purpose. Regional Writing Centre

Purpose • If informing is the purpose of your report, then the point of order is a triangulation of your audience, your topic and your purpose. • Audience analysis • Relevance • Rhetorical appeals Regional Writing Centre

Writer • What do I already know about this topic? • How quickly do I learn? Read? Write? • How much writing have I already done? • Have I developed an academic or authoritative voice? • Have I addressed this audience before? • What are my weaknesses? What are my strengths? Regional Writing Centre

The writing process • Drafting • Revision • Editing and Proofreading • We will return to these in November Regional Writing Centre

Dialogue about writing • Peer-review • Generative writing • The “writing sandwich” (Murray 2005:85): writing, talking, writing • Writing “buddies” (Murray and Moore 2006:102) • Writers’ groups • Engaging in critiques of one another’s work allows you to become effective critics of your own work. Regional Writing Centre

Resources • Ebest, S.B., Alred, G., Brusaw, C.T. and Oliu, W.E. (2005) Writing from A to Z: The Easy-to-use Reference Handbook, 5th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill. • Regional Writing Centre, UL http://www.ul.ie/rwc/ • Strunk, W. and White, E.B. (2000) The Elements of Style, 4th ed. New York: Longman. • Using English for Academic Purposes http://www.uefap.com/index.htm • The Writer’s Garden http://www. cyberlyber.com/writermain.htm • The OWL at Purdue http://owl.english.purdue.edu/ • The Writing Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill http://www.unc.edu/depts /wcweb/handouts/index.html Regional Writing Centre

FYP Law and Accounting: Writing the Research Proposal