GOVT 2302: American Government II.

The Semester Project.

 

 

As you should be aware from your syllabus, the requirements for this course includes a long-term investigative project, either in essay or presentation form.  In order to aid you in the fulfillment of this requirement, I have compiled this overview of the standards for this project.

 

If you choose to complete an essay, the material must follow a standard manuscript form, outlined either in the Modern Language Association Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, the Chicago Manual of Style, or the Style Manual for Political Science, published by the American Political Science Association.  In each of these cases, standard marginal limits, both horizontal and vertical, are 1” (one inch), with a standard font size no larger than 12 points. This is not the default margin setting for most word processor applications.  Be sure the margins are adjusted to comply with the standard manuscript form.

 

The standard length for undergraduate research essays in political science or American government is between 7 and 12 pages.  Essays in this course must include the following:

 

• A single discernible thesis.  This is the main idea of the text.  This thesis must be either analytical or expository in nature.  It may serve an argumentative or persuasive purpose; however, the overall essay must conform to the Universal Intellectual Standards outlined by the Foundation for Critical Thinking (http://www.criticalthinking.org).
• An appropriate thesis. You may generally develop a topic of your choice, provided it is directly relevant to the course material and overall themes.  In American Government, Part 2, this means that specific attention to government institutions such as the US Congress or the Texas Legislature, The Presidency or the Texas Executive, federal or state bureaucracies, court systems, the members, processes or behaviors of any of these institutions, or critique and commentary on matters of public policy or civil rights and liberties, are all possible areas of inquiry.  General political theory and philosophy, constitutionalism, federalism, state constitutions, local government, political behaviors, parties, elections, campaigns, information media, and interest groups are not appropriate for Part 2, but are appropriate for American Government, Part 1.
• All material in text connected to the thesis.  Avoid padding any essay with irrelevant information.  While it appears on the surface to improve page length, irrelevant information does nothing to support your thesis.
• Evidence to support the thesis—there are five classes of evidence: Facts, Authority, Logic, Statistics, and Experience.  Logic is a required component and is central to your support.  At least two other forms of evidence should be included to balance your support.  There must be specific evidence, and there must be enough evidence to support your thesis.  Finding evidence will require you to consult primary and secondary sources.
• Credible sources.  Make sure that any source that you claim as an authority is corroborated by independent sources.  Do not trust a single source’s claim unless you can independently verify that claim.  Also, certain sources should not be used in college-level work.  For the most part these sources are general reference sources such as dictionaries and encyclopedias. Under NO circumstances may a dictionary, encyclopedia or other generic reference material be used as a credible source for this essay—this especially includes the notorious Wikipedia.
• Balanced sources.  Sources in politics frequently make biased claims in order to persuade or call to action.  Do not fall into the trap of selective observation.  If evidence exists to contradict a source’s claim, find it, use it, and cite it.
• Citations.  In academic writing, there exist two classes of source documentation: In-text citation and End-of-Text citation.  Both In-text and End-of-Text Citations are required for this project.  In-text citations can include parenthetical references, footnotes, or endnotes.  End-of-Text citations can include Bibliographies, Annotated Bibliographies, Reference Lists, or “Works Cited” pages.  In-Text citations may include direct quotations, indirect quotations, paraphrases, and summaries of referenced sources.  Be as specific as possible when establishing citations, especially if you use online sources.  Simply citing a URL is not a specific citation.  Consult your style manual if you are unsure how to document a specific source.  If you are unsure whether you should include an in-text citation, DO SO. It is far preferable to make a citation when it is not necessary than not to make a citation when it is.  Failure to give appropriate credit to sources through both In-Text and End-of Text citation constitutes plagiarism and will result in failure for the course. (See Part V section 3 of the course syllabus.)
• Abstract.  To reinforce clarity, accuracy and precision, an abstract will be required, but will not be counted towards the minimum page requirement.  An abstract is a brief summary, usually one paragraph, of the article which you have prepared.  It is in essence a distilled, simplified version of your essay.

 

If you plan to deliver a presentation, analogous requirements apply.  The presentation must contain:

• A single discernible thesis.
• An appropriate thesis.
• All material in text connected to the thesis.
• Credible sources.
• Balanced sources.
• Citations.  This should be accomplished with a written source list and source references at the base of any visual aids.
• Abstract.
• Additionally, a written Outline of the presentation will be required as a part of the evaluation process.  

 

The duration of your presentation should be between 10 and 15 minutes.  The presentation will also include a conference period in which participants field questions from the audience.  The instructor is a part of that audience.   If you decide to collaborate with another individual, you must add at least five minutes per person, for a maximum number of three individuals per presentation group.  Individual participants in a group presentation will be evaluated individually. 

 

The following material borrows heavily from the following source:

Paul, Richard and Linda Elder. The Miniature Guide to Critical Thinking Concepts and Tools, 3^rd edition. Dylan Beach, CA: The Foundation for Critical Thinking, 2003.

 

Universal Intellectual Standards.

 

 

Clarity

If a statement is unclear, we cannot determine whether it is accurate or relevant.  In fact, we cannot tell anything about it because we don’t yet know what it is saying.  For example, the question “What can be done about the education system in America?” is unclear.  In order adequately to address the question, we would need to have a clearer understanding of what the person asking the question considers the “problem” to be.  A clearer question might be “What can educators do to ensure that students learn the skills and abilities which help them function successfully on the job and in their daily decision-making?”

 

Questions to ask: Could you express that point in another way?  Could you give an example?  What do you mean?

 

Accuracy

A statement might be clear but inaccurate.  If a statement is inaccurate, then the credibility both of the article, essay or speech and the speaker is cast into serious doubt.

 

Questions to ask: Is that really true?  How could we check on that?  How could we find out if that’s true?  How do we test this claim?

 

Precision

A statement might be clear and accurate, but not precise.  If a statement is imprecise, it may be misapplied, exaggerated, or understated. 

 

Questions to ask: Could you give more details? Could you be more specific? Could you be more exact?

 

Relevance

A statement can be clear, accurate, and precise, but irrelevant to the topic.  For example, students often think that the amount of effort they put into a course should be used in raising their grade in a course.  Often, however, “effort” does not measure the quality of student learning, and when that is so, effort is irrelevant to their appropriate grade.

 

Questions to ask: How is this related to the topic?  How does this help us with the issue?  How does this help us understand the problem?

 

Depth

This has become a fundamental problem on in-class essay questions, and is often the reason many who attempt a term paper often fall short of the minimum page length.  A statement might be clear, accurate, precise, and relevant, but superficial or oversimplified in its treatment of a topic. For example, the statement “Just Say No”, which is often used to discourage children and adolescents from using illicit drugs, may be clear, accurate, precise, and relevant to the issue.  However, this statement fails to deal with the complexities of the issue of the pervasive problem of drug use among young people. 

 

Questions to ask:  What factors make this a difficult problem?  What complicates the issue?  What are some of the difficulties we need to deal with?

 

Breadth

Problems with depth occur when the thinker only approaches an issue from a single point of view.  This point of view might be limited by all the factors that influence opinion:  worldview, ideology, partisanship, religion, socioeconomic background or status, profession, geography, political culture, race, ethnicity or national origin, age, sex, marital status.  The challenge here is to address a problem from more than one angle. 

 

Questions to ask: Do we need to consider this from another point of view?  Is there another way to look at this issue?  What would this look like from a (insert factor here) standpoint?

 

Logic.

When we think, we bring a variety of thoughts together into some order.  When the combined thoughts are mutually supporting and make sense in combination, the thinking is “logical”.  When the combination is not mutually supporting, is contradictory in some sense, or does not “make sense”, the combination is “illogical”.  For example, Marxists claim that in order to create an economically just society, the proletariat must overthrow the bourgeoisie.  However, in order to gain the power to overthrow the bourgeoisie, the proletariat must become the bourgeoisie.  Marxists further claim this process is part of an inevitable march of history.

 

Questions to ask:  Does this really make sense?  Does that follow from what you said?  How does that follow? Does all this make sense together?  Does your first statement fit with your last?  Does what you say agree with the evidence?

 

Significance

A statement may conform to all of the standards listed above, but it might call attention to an issue that matters little to the larger issue or problem of which it is a part.  This typically requires a call to judgment on the part of the person identifying the issue.  An entire argument might be made to demonstrate that a fact, idea, problem, or issue is central to understanding a larger topic.

 

Questions to ask:  Is this the most important problem to consider?  Is the central idea to focus on?  Which of these facts are most important?

 

Fairness

We are prone to assess thoughts, claims, ideas, arguments, and facts according to our own interest.  As James Madison puts it, “the seeds of faction are…sown into the nature of man.”  Consequently, a danger lies in evaluating claims in that we are likely to view those claims through the lens of our own interests, beliefs, desires, and fears.  “I would consider myself the happiest of mortals,” says Montesquieu, “If I could cure men of their prejudices—by prejudices I do not mean what makes one unaware of other things, but what makes one unaware of himself.”

 

Questions to ask:  Do I have any vested interest in this issue?  Am I sympathetically representing the views of others?