Research Project History 100 (117)

You will write a research paper on an important WOMAN who lived during the pre-Columbus period in America and up to 1877.

The paper will be using 12-point font, double spacing and 1 inch margins. It will be a minimum of 5 typed pages not including the works cited page. Your paper will have embedded citations within the report using MLA formatting. At the end of your report you will have a works cited page with a minimum of 5 sources. Do not use information on the web that has no author, like Wikipedia. You can use it to get you started on your research but it is not a useable source. You may use documentary films, scholastic websites, books, magazines and newspapers. Do not use children’s books, encyclopedias or dictionaries.

Remember that this is an essay so I want to see your thesis in the first paragraph. At the end I want a closing paragraph to summarize the major points of your paper. This is the story of someone’s life so you will start with their childhood and discuss where they were born and grew up. You will talk about the family’s economic status and the conditions of the country during this period of time. Talk about the people who influenced your person. Give information about their background and how they influenced your character. The childhood will take you to the woman’s teens.

The next part concerns the woman’s middle years and you will discuss the people in her life and how they influenced her. Talk about the events taking place at the time and how they affected her life. Discuss her accomplishments if they occurred during this time.

The last portion will concern the woman’s later years and death. Look for the people who influenced her and how she influenced the people around her. You can use that issue throughout her life as well. If your person died young you will have to stop at the point where she dies but you will still detail the influential people and how your person affected those around her.

Lastly, you will discuss her legacy and how she changed the world and what contributions she brought forth.

Remember that this is a research paper and all research papers have citations. You will cite all quotes, all unique information you find (things that you find that is not mentioned in other sources). If you use blocks of information from another author and you paraphrase the information, you must cite it. Information that is common to all of the sources your use does not need citing. An MLA citation is simple. After the information you want to cite you insert the last name of the author of the book and the page you found the information in that book. For example you would put (Snow, p. 7). If you use the author’s name in the sentence you will simply put the page number in parenthesis for your citation at the end of the sentence. You will put all of the information about the book on your works cited page. Your embedded citation is simply a reference for the reader to show where you got your information in case they want to verify the authenticity of your statements. On a separate page I want you to list your authors and write a brief paragraph detailing their authenticity so we know we can believe your source.

www.library.cornell.edu/resrch/citmanage/mla

www.indiana.edu/~wts/pamphlets/thesis_statement.shtml