A manual for writers of research papers, theses, and dissertations, Ninth edition - Kate L. Turabian 2018
Find a question in your topic
Defining a project: topic, question, problem, working hypothesis
Research and writing
2.1 Find a Question in Your Topic
2.1.1 Search Your Interests
2.1.2 Make Your Topic Manageable
2.1.3 Question Your Topic
2.1.4 Evaluate Your Questions
2.2 Understanding Research Problems
2.2.1 Understanding Practical and Conceptual Problems
2.2.2 Distinguishing Pure and Applied Research
2.3 Propose a Working Hypothesis
2.3.1 Beware the Risks in a Working Hypothesis
2.3.2 If You Can’t Find an Answer, Argue for Your Question
2.4 Build a Storyboard to Plan and Guide Your Work
2.4.1 State Your Question and Working Hypotheses
2.4.2 State Your Reasons
2.4.3 Sketch in the Kind of Evidence You Should Look For
2.4.4 Look at the Whole
2.5 Join or Organize a Writing Group
A research project begins well before you search the internet or head for the library and continues long after you have collected all the data you think you need. Every project involves countless specific tasks, so it is easy to get overwhelmed. But in all research projects, you have just five general aims:
✵ ▪ Ask a question worth answering.
✵ ▪ Find an answer that you can support with good reasons.
✵ ▪ Find good data that you can use as reliable evidence to support your reasons.
✵ ▪ Draft an argument that makes a good case for your answer.
✵ ▪ Revise that draft until readers will think you met the first four goals.
You might even post those five goals in your workspace.
Research projects would be much easier if we could march straight through these steps. But you will discover (if you have not already) that the research process is not so straightforward. Each task overlaps with others, and frequently you must go back to an earlier one. The truth is, research is messy and unpredictable. But that’s also what makes it exciting and ultimately rewarding.
2.1 Find a Question in Your Topic
Researchers begin projects in different ways. Many experienced researchers begin with a question that others in their field want to answer: What caused the extinction of most large North American mammals? Others begin with just basic curiosity, a vague intellectual itch that they have to scratch. They might not know what puzzles them about a topic, but they’re willing to spend time to find out whether that topic can yield a question worth answering.
They realize, moreover, that the best research question is not one whose answer they want to know just for its own sake; it is one that helps them and others understand some larger issue. For example, if we knew why North American sloths disappeared, we might be able to answer a larger question that puzzles many historical anthropologists: Did early Native Americans live in harmony with nature, as some believe, or did they hunt its largest creatures to extinction? And if we knew that, then we might also understand . . . (So what? again. See 1.2.)
Then there are those questions that just pop into a researcher’s mind with no hint of where they’ll lead, sometimes about matters so seemingly trivial that only the researcher thinks they’re worth answering: Why does a coffee spill dry up in the form of a ring? Such a question might lead nowhere, but you can’t know that until you see its answer. In fact, the scientist puzzled by coffee rings made discoveries about the behavior of fluids that others in his field thought important—and that paint manufacturers found valuable. If you cultivate the ability to see what’s odd in the commonplace, you’ll never lack for research projects as either a student or a professional.
If you already have a focused topic, you might skip to 2.1.3 and begin asking questions about it. If you already have some questions, skip to 2.1.4 to test them using the criteria listed there. Otherwise, here’s a plan to help you search for a topic.
2.1.1 Search Your Interests
Beginning researchers often find it hard to pick a topic or believe they lack the expertise to research a topic they have. But a research topic is an interest stated specifically enough for you to imagine becoming a local expert on it. That doesn’t mean you already know a lot about it or that you’ll know more about it than others, including a teacher or advisor. You just want to know more about it than you do now.
If you can work on any topic, we offer only a cliché: start with what interests you. Ask these questions:
✵ ▪ What special interests do you have—chess, old comic books, scouting? The less common, the better. Choose one and investigate something about it that you don’t know.
✵ ▪ Where would you like to travel? Find out all you can about your destination. What particular aspect surprises you or makes you want to learn more?
✵ ▪ Can you find an online discussion list or social media page focused on issues that interest you?
✵ ▪ Visit a museum or a “virtual museum” on the internet with exhibitions that appeal to you. What catches your interest that you would like to know more about?
✵ ▪ Have you taken positions on issues in your field or in debates with others but found that you couldn’t back up your views with good reasons and evidence?
✵ ▪ What issues in your field do people outside your field misunderstand?
✵ ▪ What topic is your instructor or advisor working on? Would she like you to explore a part of it? Don’t be too shy to ask.
✵ ▪ Does your library have rich resources in some field? Ask your instructor or a librarian.
✵ ▪ What intrigues you in your reading? What connections do you see among different things you are reading?
✵ ▪ What other courses will you take in your field or out of it? Find a textbook and skim it for study questions.
✵ ▪ If you have a job in mind, what kind of writing might help you get it? Employers often ask for samples of an applicant’s work.
Once you have a list of possible topics, choose one or two that interest you most and explore their research potential. Sometimes beginning researchers choose a topic because they already know what they want to say about it, even before they’ve done any research. That’s a mistake: the best topics provoke good questions; the worst come with ready-made answers. To gauge a topic’s potential, do these things:
✵ ▪ In the library, look up your topic in a general guide such as CQ Researcher and skim the subheadings. In an online database such as Academic Search Premier, you can explore your topic through subject terms. If you have a narrower focus, you can do the same with specialized guides such as Women’s Studies International. At most libraries today, such guides are found online.
✵ ▪ On the internet, google your topic, but don’t surf indiscriminately. Look first for websites that are roughly like the sources you would find in a library, such as online encyclopedias. Read the entries on your general topic, and then copy their lists of references for a closer look. Few experienced researchers trust Wikipedia as a reliable source to cite as evidence, but most would use the site to find ideas and more specific sources.
✵ ▪ Finally, think ahead: you may be in for a long relationship with your topic, so be sure it interests you enough to get you through the inevitable rocky stretches.
2.1.2 Make Your Topic Manageable
If you pick a topic that sounds like an encyclopedia entry—bridges, birds, masks—you’ll find so many sources that you could spend a lifetime reading them. You must carve out of your topic a manageable piece. Before you start searching, limit your topic to reflect a special interest in it: What is it about, say, masks that made you choose them? What particular aspect of them interests or puzzles you? Think about your topic in a context that you know something about, and then add words and phrases to reflect that knowledge:
✵ masks in religious ceremonies
✵ masks as symbols in Hopi religious ceremonies
✵ mudhead masks as symbols of sky spirits in Hopi fertility ceremonies
You might not be able to focus your topic until after you start reading about it. That takes time, so start early (you can do much of this preliminary work online):
✵ ▪ Begin with an overview of your topic in a general encyclopedia (in the bibliography, see items in category 2 in the general sources); then read about it in a specialized one (see items in category 2 in your field).
✵ ▪ Skim a survey of your topic (encyclopedia entries usually cite a few).
✵ ▪ Skim subheads under your topic in an annual bibliography in your field (in the bibliography, see items in category 4 in your field). That will also give you a start on a reading list.
✵ ▪ Search the internet for the topic (but evaluate the reliability of what you find; see 3.3.2).
Especially useful are topics that spark debate: Fisher claims that Halloween masks reveal children’s archetypal fears, but do they? Even if you can’t resolve the debate, you can learn how such debates are conducted (for more on this, see 3.1.2).
2.1.3 Question Your Topic
Once they have a focused topic, many new researchers start plowing through all the sources they can find, taking notes on everything they read. They then dump it all into a report with little sense of purpose or direction. Experienced researchers, however, document information not for its own sake but to support an answer to a question they (and they hope their readers) think worth asking. So the best way to begin working on a focused topic is to pose questions that direct you to just the information you need to answer them.
Do this not just once, early on, but throughout your project. Ask questions as you read, especially how and why (see also 4.1.1—4.1.2). Try the following kinds of questions (the categories are loose and overlap, so don’t worry about keeping them distinct).
1. 1. Ask how the topic fits into a larger context (historical, social, cultural, geographic, functional, economic, and so on):
o ▪ How does your topic fit into a larger story? What came before masks? How did masks come into being? Why? What changes have they caused in other parts of their social or geographic setting? How and why did that happen? Why have masks become a part of Halloween? How and why have masks helped make Halloween the biggest American holiday after Christmas?
o ▪ How is your topic a functioning part of a larger system? How do masks reflect the values of specific societies and cultures? What roles do masks play in Hopi dances? In scary movies? In masquerade parties? For what purposes are masks used other than disguise? How has the booming market for kachina masks influenced traditional designs?
o ▪ How does your topic compare to and contrast with other topics like it? How do masks in Native American ceremonies differ from those in Africa? What do Halloween masks have to do with Mardi Gras masks? How are masks and cosmetic surgery alike?
2. 2. Ask questions about the nature of the thing itself, as an independent entity:
o ▪ How has your topic changed through time? Why? What is its future? How have Halloween masks changed? Why? How have Native American masks changed? Why?
o ▪ How do the parts of your topic fit together as a system? What parts of a mask are most significant in Hopi ceremonies? Why? Why do some masks cover only the eyes? Why do so few masks cover just the bottom half of the face?
o ▪ How many different categories of your topic are there? What are the different kinds of Halloween masks? What are the different qualities of masks? What are the different functions of Halloween masks?
3. 3. Turn positive questions into a negative ones: Why have masks not become a part of Christmas? How do Native American masks not differ from those in Africa? What parts of masks are typically not significant in religious ceremonies?
4. 4. Ask speculative questions: Why are masks common in African religions but not in Western ones? Why are children more comfortable wearing Halloween masks than are most adults? Why don’t hunters in camouflage wear masks?
5. 5. Ask What if? questions: how would things be different if your topic never existed, disappeared, or were put into a new context? What if no one ever wore masks except for safety reasons? What if everyone wore masks in public? What if movies and TV were like Greek plays and all the actors wore masks? What if it were customary to wear masks on blind dates? In marriage ceremonies? At funerals?
6. 6. Ask questions that reflect disagreements with a source: if a source makes a claim you think is only weakly supported or even wrong, make that disagreement a question (see also 4.1.2). Martinez claims that carnival masks uniquely allow wearers to escape social norms. But I think religious masks also allow wearers to escape from the material realm to the spiritual. Is there a larger pattern of all masks creating a sense of alternative forms of social or spiritual life?
7. 7. Ask questions that build on agreement: if a source offers a claim you think is persuasive, ask questions that extend its reach (see also 4.1.1). Elias shows that masked balls became popular in eighteenth-century London in response to anxiety about social mobility. Is the same anxiety responsible for similar developments in other European capitals? You can also ask a question that supports the same claim with additional evidence. Elias supports his claim about masked balls entirely with published sources. Is it also supported by evidence from unpublished sources such as letters and diaries?
8. 8. Ask questions analogous to those that others have asked about similar topics. Smith analyzed the Battle of Gettysburg from an economic point of view. What would an economic analysis of the Battle of the Alamo turn up?
9. 9. Look for questions that other researchers pose but don’t answer. Many journal articles end with a paragraph or two about open questions, ideas for more research, and so on. You might not be able to do all the research they suggest, but you might carve out a piece of it.
10. 10. Find a professional discussion forum on your topic, then “lurk,” just reading the exchanges to understand the kinds of questions being asked. If you can’t find one using a search engine, ask a teacher or visit websites of professional organizations in your field. Look for questions that spark your interest. If questions from students are welcomed, you can even post one yourself, so long as it is very specific and narrowly focused.
2.1.4 Evaluate Your Questions
After asking all the questions you can think of, evaluate them. Not all questions are equally good. Look for questions whose answers might make you (and your readers) think about your topic in a new way. Avoid questions like these:
✵ ▪ Their answers are settled fact that you could just look up. What was Audre Lorde’s first published poem? Questions that ask how and why call for interpretations, not just the discovery of facts. That’s why they invite deeper thinking than questions beginning who, what, when, or where, and deeper thinking leads to more interesting answers.
✵ ▪ Their answers can’t be plausibly disproved. How important are masks in Inuit culture? The answer is obvious: Very. If you can’t imagine disproving a claim, then proving it is pointless. (On the other hand, world-class reputations have been won by those who questioned a claim that seemed self-evidently true—for instance, that the sun circled the earth—and dared to disprove it.)
✵ ▪ Their answers would be merely speculative. Would church services be as well attended if the congregation all wore masks? If you can’t imagine finding data that would settle the question, it’s not a question you can answer.
✵ ▪ Their answers are dead ends. How many black cats slept in the Alamo the night before the battle? It’s hard to see how an answer would help us think about any larger issue worth understanding better, so the question is probably not worth asking.
✵ ▪ Their answers require different capacities from the ones you have. How do Japanese translations of The Great Gatsby treat early twentieth-century America? If you can’t read Japanese, this question is not for you to answer.
✵ ▪ Their answers require more or different resources—materials, technology, money, especially time—than you have. How is childhood represented in the Victorian novel? Can you read enough of them in the time you have to arrive at a reasonable answer?
Don’t reject a question because you think someone must already have asked it. Until you know, pursue its answer as if you asked first. Even if someone has answered it, you might come up with a better answer or at least one with a new slant. In fact, in the humanities and social sciences the best questions usually have more than one good answer. You can also organize your project around comparing and contrasting competing answers and supporting the best one (see 6.2.5).
The point is to find a question that you want to answer. Too many students, both graduate and undergraduate, think that the aim of education is to learn settled answers to someone else’s questions. It’s not. It is to find your own answers to your own questions. To do that, you must learn to wonder about things, to let them puzzle you—particularly things that seem commonplace.