Transcript FINDING A TOPIC

FINDING A TOPIC
Instructors usually allow students to find their own topics
for a major writing assignment; thus, choose something of
interest so you won’t get bored after a few days. At the
same time, your chosen topic will need a scholarly
perspective. To clarify what we mean, let’s take a look at
how two students launched their projects.
1. Valerie Nesbitt saw a cartoon about a young woman
saying to a man, “Sorry – I only have relationships over
the Internet. I’m cyber-sexual.” Although laughing, Valerie
knew she had discovered her topic – online romance.
Upon investigation, she found her scholarly angle:
Matching services and chat rooms are like the arranged
marriages from years gone by.
FINDING A TOPIC
• 2. Norman Berkowitz, while watching news reports
of the Iraqi War of 2003, noticed dry and barren
land, yet history had taught him that this land
between the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers was
formerly a land of fruit and honey, perhaps even the
Garden of Eden. What happened to it? His interest
focused, thereafter, on the world’s water supply,
and his scholarly focus centered on the ethics of
distribution of water.
• For further reference on ‘Finding A Topic’, please
read your Writing Research Paper, page: 10 – 17.