The Research Proposal

1. The Research Proposal Practical Criticism 3000

2. Primary Goals: The point of a literary research paper is to explore an issue of some argumentative/interpretive nature; usually, the actual proposal will indicate some sort of underlying analytical question the writer wishes to address in the paper.

3. Questions: What might be some of the significant psychological and social dimensions of x? In what ways might x seek to revise yet unwittingly reinforce established ideologies or cultural norms? How might x serve as a microcosm of synecdoche of a larger social condition, conflict contradiction, etc.? How might x serve as a fulcrum of political action? (fulcrum: means of exerting pressure) How and why is x symbolically significant to many Americans? (such a question, for example, might help us to understand Chris McCandless and Timothy Treadwell as products of our American cultural sensibility that values a romantic view of the unfettered, self-reliant individual) How might x reflect or refract strict gender hierarchies?

4. Questions cont.- How might x be associated with an economic tension or policy? How does x seem to reflect a mix of conflicting emotions or responses (fascination/disdain, etc.) What is distinctive about x in this specific historical period? What is distinctive about x in this specific literary context (such as, for example, conventions of genre)? What does x illustrate about a specific culture's worldviews at a particular historical juncture, or tensions between various worldviews? What ideals does x reflect and/or call into question? How does x reflect a historically specific political climate? (not necessarily a specific historical EVENT, but a dominant political “atmosphere” in a given period)?

5. Goals cont.- The point of the proposal is also to show an awareness of what has been written on the issue, what evidence was used, what theories applied, and what arguments were made.

6. General Guidelines • You must consult secondary works on this topic in order to show you are well informed. • Make clear how these works animate and inform your argument. • On some level, you want your explanation to be original or different. Remember that a good research paper (and thus the proposal) will offer a sense as to how the writer’s explanation/argument will differ from that which has been made by other authors/critics).

7. A Rubric Checklist… Provide a sophisticated thesis that demonstrates independent thinking. Offer compelling, insightful arguments. Maintain a distinctive voice and consistent viewpoint that incorporates interesting and varied style. Provide secondary sources that demonstrate independent research in the field. Enter into meaningful dialogue with theory and/or secondary sources, such that the student is not just proving someone else’s point but developing original ideas in relation to research material.  

8. Strategies1. Start With A Theory (Theory + “Hinge”) Judith Fetterly, in The Resisting Reader, argues that male authors presumed for centuries their readers all were male. Describing phallocentric assumptions as “universal” (xii), Fetterly explores the ways in which patriarchal practices in literature penetrate the “consciousness” of female readers who must learn “to read like a man” to successfully navigate a masculine language community (which has its own codes and conventions). Because women were and are raised in a language system and literature that still presumes its authors and readers are male, Fetterly argues that they become psychologically “immasculated”—not “emasculated,” in the sense of having “maleness” taken away from them, but rather they learn to think and read and write like men (what she calls an “assenting” reader).    In The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros presents Esperanza in terms of what Judith Fetterley calls a “resisting reader” (4) who increasingly resists her social text through the development of the novel. However, even at the end of the text Cisneros makes it clear that Esperanza has not freed herself entirely from the confines of her immasculated universe, but as she has up to this point, she continually struggles against the grasp of this framework. As Esperanza grows up within her community, she observes women acting subservient to men. At times she and her friends even model this type of behavior amongst themselves and for others. But overall, as the story progresses and Esperanza matures, the reader witnesses her struggle more and more against the masculine/feminine stereotype that surrounds her. Like the red balloon in “Boys and Girls,” she rises above her surroundings as much as she is capable of doing and fights against the ideological anchor of patriarchy to which she is barely, but surely, tethered (9).

9. Remember… Use this approach when the theory serves as the lens for the paper. The theory, in other words, is foundational to your reading of the primary text.

10. 2. Start With a Conundrum, Paradox, or Interesting Textual Phenomenon If The Last of the Mohicans is concerned with questions of racial mixing and purity, as many critics claim, why is it that in the forest, “miscegenation” occurs with remarkable ease as men pass for bears and beavers, animals for humans, whites for Indians, and Indians for whites?

11. 2. cont.- If The Scarlet Letter is a feminist text, how do we reconcile that with the ending when Hester returns to Salem to put the scarlet letter back on?

12. 3. The “yes, yes, but…” method Many critics of Sandra Cisneros’ The House on Mango Street only implement traditional critical perspectives to analyze the home’s significance. Limited to Post-Colonial, Feminist, or other literary theories, analysts like Jacqueline Doyle diminish their insight by ignoring the link between every literary interpretation of the text: architecture. In a novella where a young girl, Esperanza, journeys to redefine her cultural identity through re-conceptualizing her domestic space, it seems bizarre that academic critics ignore architectural discourse in their analyses, especially considering architecture’s impact on literary criticism’s development. Michael Foucault, a founding theorist of Cultural Poetics, created his notion of “the other” by observing that “physical and social arenas outside of our daily life” most accurately portray the social order, and also “suspend, neutralize, or invert sets of relationships,” for example (as quoted by McLeod 16). The Greeks, founders of many modern literary and social ideologies, used the word oikeios or “own” as the adjectival form of the word oikos or “house,” equating the home to one’s “owness” or identity (Bergren 80). Indeed, the home and identity remain linked throughout the novella, as Esperanza struggles to find her literal and figurative place in the world.

13. Acknowledgment/Contribution In recent years, some of Cooper’s most sophisticated critics have taken the apparent strain within the ideological context of The Last of the Mohicans to indicate its critique of progressive egalitarianism in the nineteenth century. Such readings overlook the subversive dimensions of the text, however, those comically resilient, yet hostile places that flatly renounce static categories of existence and elide virulent forms of differentiation.

14. Cont.- In recent years, The Red Badge has become a canonic cultural reading of the changes occurring in the industrializing decades of the late nineteenth century. Critics of The Red Badge have indeed taken stock of the import of Crane’s ideological realism for the cultural contours of the 1890s, but in a somewhat piecemeal style.

15. Dialogue With Sources Don’t assume that quotations are self-sufficient and prove your point automatically. In other words, don’t drop a quotation in a paragraph without explaining it.You need to analyze it thoroughly in your own words, explaining why it is important. You may need to clarify a point or define a key term in the quotation. As a general rule, each quotation should be followed by at least several sentences of analysis. Follow through by explaining the relevance of a quotation to your topic and thesis. It is not necessary to recap what has already been said in the quotation. Neither is it necessary to use phrases like “Weisman is saying in this quotation that….,” which are obvious and redundant. Instead, illuminate the importance of the quotation to the thesis, to your topic.

16. Cont.- Effectively assimilate, introduce, and integrate quotations into your own writing. Use lead-in phrases that signal a quotation and orient the reader on the context of the quotation. Avoid using obvious and unnecessary cues like “This quotation is saying that…” Be discrete and selective when using quotations. Don’t quote a paragraph from a text when a single sentence contains the heart of what you need. Don’t quote a whole sentence when you can simply integrate a few words into one of your own sentences. Give the whole story. Be careful of altering the context of a quotation by pulling out portions of it and leaving out the context within which the quotation is situated. Be true, in other words, to the author’s intentions.