Research project

  1. Research Project. This assignment is due on April 15 and is worth 35% of your overall mark. There are three possible formats for this assignment: an applied history project; a historical research essay; a historiographic research essay.

5.a. Applied history project. This assignment builds on the archival research that students did during the term, but they are expected to supplement it with further research in a digital collection or brick-and-mortar archive and with secondary sources. A second goal is to give students real-life experience is working with history.

The central goal of this assignment is to have students learn more about archival research and then to present that original research with a public-facing project.

Students may work alone or in groups of two. The goal of this assignment is to share original research with the broader public by producing digital content. Students will do one of the following four activities or, with approval from Dr. Bryce, students may carry out any other project that that shares original historical research with the community. 1) Make or greatly transform a Wikipedia page; 2) create a podcast; 3) publish an article on www.ActiveHistory.ca; 4) Make a small exhibit that could be used at the Roedde House Museum. More information on how to carry out these projects will be provided in class and on the course website. If writing a Wikipedia entry, students should submit a PDF of the page before and after they modified it. If a podcast, students should send the instructor the completed podcast as an MP3 (or other audio format). If writing an article for ActiveHistory, students should provide evidence of submission to the editors. If a collection of posters for an exhibit at the Roedde House Museum, students should make the posters on a computer, using Adobe Illustrator, Microsoft PowerPoint, or another program, and submit the file to Dr. Bryce. Other possible projects include the following: compiling a cookbook with many historical recipes from some ethnic groups that lived in Vancouver; developing a West End walking tour; developing an exhibit with objects that the Roedde House Museum possesses.

Students will do one of the following four activities or, with approval from Dr. Bryce, students may carry out any other project that that shares original historical research with the community.

1) Make or greatly transform a Wikipedia page. Students should submit a PDF (via Blackboard) of the page before and after they modified it. Students were supported in this assignment through a workshop on February 17 with Erin Fields, Open Education and Scholarly Communications Librarian, UBC Library. The following resources were discussed in the seminar:

Students should also consult this article about becoming a contributor:

Students should read these two articles about the pedagogical value of this assignment:

2) Create a podcast. The podcast should be approximately 15 minutes long. All students interested in podcasting (whether they do so for their final assignment or not) are invited to attend a workshop on Wednesday, March 23 between 2 and 4pm with Duncan McHugh, Digital & Instructional Media Producer, The Learning Centre, Faculty of Land and Food Systems. The group will meet in Buchanan Tower 1133. Before recording, students should prepare a script, and they should practice in advance. Students should send Dr. Bryce the completed podcast as an MP3 (or other audio format) via e-mail.

3) Publish an article on www.ActiveHistory.ca. Students can revise their article after it is marked and before submitting it to the editors. Students should submit a polished draft in Word document via e-mail to Dr. Bryce. The text should be approximately 750 words.

Here are some examples of articles that have been published on the website:

4) Make a small exhibit that could be used at the Roedde House Museum. The exhibit should have at least five panels, with text based on archival research and photographs. Students can visit other museums to see examples of good (and bad) panels. They should be attentive to text size, legibility, attractiveness of the material presented, and the importance of images. Students should make the posters on a computer, using a large document in Microsoft Powerpoint or other program, and submit the file to the instructor. Our seminar on March 31 will be a workshop on graphic design, led by Cody Rocko, Museum of Anthropology.

Evaluation for all applied history projects:

Strength of research – 50%

Analysis – 20%

Presentation – 20%

Embrace of the medium – 10%

A large part of this course is based on experience, and it breaks with conventional learning and teaching relationships. To succeed, you need to embrace that difference. This assignment is unlike what you are accustomed to in university-level history courses. If you give the assignment your best effort and you dedicate as much time to it as you would to the assignments for other upper-level history courses, your grade in this class will be in line with your average history GPA. If you receive a grade 10% lower than your average grade in the history courses you took in 2020-21, you will be able to submit a revised version of this assignment within 14 days of receiving your grade, and your final grade on the assignment will be based 2/3 on the revised version and 1/3 on the original version.

———-

5.b. Historical Research Essay. 12-15 pages. This is an alternative assignment for students who do not want to do an applied history project.

Students are asked to write a historical research essay drawing from both primary and secondary sources. Students must identify and analyze an important topic in the history of migration anywhere in the Americas. Outside research is required, and at least five books or articles not assigned in this course must be examined as well as a reasonable number of primary documents. Many published primary documents related to migration can be found on www.archive.org, the HathiTrust Digital Library, the Chung Collection at UBC, or in archives near home (such as the UBC Rare Books and Special Collections or City of Vancouver Archives). The topic is open but it must relate to one of the main themes of the course. Students should discuss their topic with Dr. Bryce by April 1.

The exact number of primary sources will vary based on the length of the sources; three 100-page reports might yield lots of evidence, but six newspaper articles might provide enough material for only a superficial analysis. In any case, students should consult far more documents than they actually cite. Students should present an argument based on original research and connect it to arguments and points made by other authors.

Evaluation:

Strength of research – 45%

Strength of analysis – 35%

Mechanics – 20%. This includes structure of paper, style and grammar, and bibliography and citation.

Style and grammar: The evaluation of this assignment is based primarily on the strength of your analysis, the research, and the structure of your argument. Nevertheless, how you present your argument is important. You should revise your work several times in order to present your ideas in clear and succinct prose. English language learners will not be unduly penalized for minor grammar problems and syntax errors.

Citation: You are required to cite your work where appropriate. This applies to all quotations and when you paraphrase an idea from somebody else. If you are discussing or summarizing an idea (paraphrasing rather than quoting), you can place the citation at the end of a series of connected sentences. Be sure to include both footnotes and a complete bibliography following the Chicago Manual of Style (See the Quick Guide of the Chicago Manual of Style here:

http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html). Note that footnotes and a bibliography follow slightly different formatting rules.

Pitfalls:

  • The essay lacks an argument and goal.
  • Evidence is almost always paraphrased and rarely quoted. This often leads to generalizations and misrepresentations of the documents.
  • The essay is too descriptive. A strong analysis would move beyond summarizing documents and stating how they relate to published sources and instead would advance an argument based on primary sources.
  • Not enough balance between sources. Try to give a similar amount of attention to all primary sources and try to engage to a similar extent with all secondary sources.
  • You are not interested in the topic. You are free to choose a topic that you are passionate about, and you are welcome to write an essay on a topic that you define (after discussing it with Dr. Bryce).
  • You do not include a bibliography and proper in-text citations.

———-

5.c. Historiographic Research Essay. 12-15 pages. This is another alternative assignment for students who do not want to do an applied history project. Students are asked to write a historiographic research essay. Students must identify and analyze an important topic in migration history anywhere in the Americas. Outside research is required,

For this option, you must identify and analyze three or four themes found in at least ten publications. Outside research is required, and at least ten books, chapters in edited volumes, and articles not assigned in this course must be examined. You can use books assigned in class in addition to ten other publications. The topic is open but it must relate to one of the main themes of the course. Students are encouraged to discuss their chosen topic with Dr. Bryce.

Not all of the authors need to discuss all of the themes you analyze. For example, perhaps author 1 discusses themes A and C, author 2 themes A and B, author 3 themes B and C, author 4 themes A, B, and C, etc. The goal of this assignment is to have you analyze a historiographic discussion and to have you learn more about a single topic that interests you. Historiography means “the body of work dealing with a historical subject.” In a historiographic analysis, you are to “discuss the discussion” that takes place within this body of work. This means you are asked to analyze the points that others have made. The themes that you analyze (i.e. A, B, and C) should be those that appear fairly frequently in a number of sources. In a historiography paper, you are not asked to write a narrative or explain something based on the facts presented by historians. Instead, you are asked to tell the reader what historians are writing about (discuss the discussion).

Evaluation:

Strength of analysis – 35%

Strength of research – 35%

Mechanics – 30%. This includes structure of paper, style and grammar, and bibliography and citation.

Style and grammar: The evaluation of this assignment is based primarily on the strength of your analysis, the research, and the structure of your argument. Nevertheless, how you present your argument is important. You should revise your work several times in order to present your ideas in clear and succinct prose. English language learners will not be unduly penalized for minor grammar problems and syntax errors.

Citation: You are required to cite your work where appropriate. This applies to all quotations and when you paraphrase an idea from somebody else. If you are discussing or summarizing an idea (paraphrasing rather than quoting), you can place the citation at the end of a series of connected sentences. Be sure to include both footnotes and a complete bibliography following the Chicago Manual of Style (See the Quick Guide of the Chicago Manual of Style here:

http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html). Note that footnotes and a bibliography follow slightly different formatting rules.

Pitfalls:

  • The essay lacks an argument and goal. In a historiography paper, the argument is often as simple as “I argue that historians have often focused on themes A, B, and C in the study of topic X.” For example, “I argue that the concept of whitening, nationalism, and citizenship are central topics in the historiography on immigration to Brazil.”
  • The essay is too descriptive. A strong analysis would move beyond summarizing books or articles and would highlight the commonalities and differences between the chosen texts.
  • Not enough balance between sources. Try to give a similar amount of attention to all sources.
  • You are not interested in the topic. You are free to choose a topic that you are passionate about, and you are welcome to write an essay on a topic that you define (after discussing it with Dr. Bryce).
  • You do not include a bibliography and proper in-text citations.

Spam prevention powered by Akismet