WHAT IS EXPECTED FROM YOUR RESEARCH ESSAY:

Engagement with scholarship (secondary sources). You should seek out, read and integrate appropriate scholarship into your argument. You can use the bibliography included here as a starting point for your reading, and should seek advice from the instructor if you are having trouble finding material relating to the question, texts, myths or themes that your essay is addressing. Some tips on you to use secondary sources appropriately can be found in the Essay Guide for this course. As a rough guide, you should aim to utilise at least six relevant secondary sources in the final essay, and may use more. In order to find and integrate this scholarship you will likely also need to consult a larger number more sources as several of these may not prove finally relevant or make it into you submitted essay.

Interpretation and argument. While this is a research essay, it also requires you to provide your own arguments in answer to the question based on the reading of primary texts and secondary sources you have undertaken. These arguments are not expected to be original (although they may be), and may in some cases be similar to the arguments and conclusions you are citing from secondary sources. However, the citation of the conclusions of scholars are not sufficient in themselves to prove your argument and answer. You need to provide the primary evidence and explain the reasons for these conclusions (i.e. provide arguments) as well. While you need to take great care about the strength and basis of your arguments, in some cases you may indeed find that you can support contentions from your own arguments based on primary sources in the absence of support from secondary sources.

Use of primary evidence to support arguments. Demonstrating how primary evidence supports your arguments (whether or not those arguments are or aren’t based on secondary sources) is also critical to this essay task. For most of the available questions, your most important primary evidence will be either textual (poems, plays, writings of other sorts) or iconographical (sculptures, architecture, etc.). You need to be familiar with these sources. But you will also need to be selective in their use, identifying and referring to only the specific details of the evidence that are relevant to your question and arguments. This is another extremely important skill in this discipline and in the study of humanities generally.

Essay structure. Your Research Essay must be a structured essay answer to one of the questions above. It should follow a clear paragraph structure and each main paragraph should have a clearly identifiable contention supported by primary evidence, secondary sources and your own interpretive arguments as appropriate.

Clarity of expression and presentation. As with other assignments for this course, the Research Essay is an exercise in the clear communication of complex ideas and arguments. These need to be expressed in clear and correct English and presented in a manner that directly conveys your meaning.

Bibliography and footnote citation. Your essay must have a bibliography and employ footnotes to cite secondary sources where used. Footnotes and bibliography must follow the Chicago Style (a useful online guide to this and other can be found as part of the University of Melbourne Library ‘Re:cite’ tool: http://www.lib.unimelb.edu.au/recite/citations/chicago/generalNotes.html?style=3

Note: Footnotes and bibliography are not included in the final word-count for this task.

WHAT IS NOT EXPECTED FROM YOUR RESEARCH ESSAY:

Description. You should avoid simply describing the subject matter, texts, iconography or myths relevant to your question. Any context or descriptive material should be included only as it is required to support your contentions and arguments. In effect, material is only relevant, and should only be included, if it is part of your argument. Some judgement is required here. But be critical with your own work. If there is any material that clearly is not necessary to explain your contentions or support your arguments in answer to the question, edit it out.

Comprehensiveness. You are not expected to present every possible argument for your answer to the question, to approach the question from every possible perspective, or even to provide every possible piece of supporting evidence for the contentions and arguments you do focus on. In the scope of this essay, you can adequately develop only 5 or 6 key contentions as part of your overall answer to the question. You need to prioritise the strongest arguments that support your answer. For this task it is far more effective to present a few key arguments that are well developed and supported than many arguments that are under-developed or left with inadequate supporting evidence.

word count
1750 +/- 10%