Race( Research question: Can African Americans Be Racist or prejudice)

Title page: On the first page, put your name; the title of this paper; the class, semester and year; and the date.

Introduction
On the next page, in three to five sentences, state the research topic; why it matters sociologically; what findings the literature reports overall and what research question emerges for you from this partial review (these two statements together make up your paper’s argument); and provide a “road map” of your paper (a one-sentence list of the paper’s major parts). (This paragraph is the “tell them what you’re going to tell them.”) Do NOT include the words “me,” “my,” “I” or “research” in the first sentence. Instead, talk about the topic: racism, policing, schools, sociology majors, etc.

Partial literature review
In an introductory paragraph of only one or two sentences, state your preliminary and provisional understanding of this literature, focusing on two things: (a) what scholars have found so far, and (b) what needs further research (i.e., the problem that generates your research question). (Note that these two points are, once again, your paper’s argument, though not with an actual question here).
Then, in a few paragraphs, discuss the seven (7) articles or books you have read. Organize your paper around themes and issues within the one topic; then you must address how these articles address those issues, which means discussing several articles in each paragraph. (Do NOT discuss each article in sequence. That is, do not say what one article says, then what the next one says, then the next one, and so on. Instead, discuss themes or issues, which requires reviewing several articles per paragraph. This means that each article may appear under more than one theme.)
Here are some questions to help you come up with your overall understanding:
– What are the few (2-4) basic themes of this literature? What are the questions that keep getting asked?
– For each theme or question,
o Are there just some issues or questions not even discussed, and thus missing? This is commonly called a “gap” in the literature. One way this happens is that there are two issues connected in real life, but not studied together in academia. There are also other types of gaps, such as issues completely ignored or under-studied.
o Or is it that you see no gap, but you see that authors disagree with each other – are there two basic camps, one taking one position on this topic, one taking the opposite? Or is it more complex, and there are three or more positions? Or are they all talking about the same issue, but talking past each other—that is, not even citing each other and disagreeing?
o With what do you yourself disagree – what does not sound right to you?
At the end, in one or two sentences, restate your overall understanding of what scholars say and do not say about this overall issue, now supported by your analysis (comparison and contrast, and questioning) of the articles.

Research Question
In one (perhaps long) paragraph only, do these things: Make a clear, explicit transition. Use the restatement at the end of the literature review (immediately above) to say that based on the problems you have identified in the literature (and specifically mention them in half a sentence), you have formulated a specific research question. Then state that question.

Conclusion
Restate your research topic. Then briefly restate your argument: what the literature reports so far, and the research question that arises.

Bibliography
On yet another new page, in alphabetical order and according to ASA guidelines, list all the works you consulted for your literature review. In your paper, you must cite and use at least one other literature review. I strongly prefer that this come from a Handbook of some sort, but as I said, if that is not possible, a stand alone article from a journal is fine, or a long article from a specialized encyclopedia. You may use two such articles (from, say, different Handbooks or different journals) at the most. The other six articles and books must be empirical journal articles or books – that is, they are based on research relying on evidence.

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DISCUSSION (These are not instructions – they are supposed to make the instructions make more sense.)

Paper structure
As diagrammed in PowerPoint “7 Starting Research, Proposal Advice” (which you should re-open right now) any proposal has two basic parts: a review of what scholars have found so far (a “literature review”) and a research design (what you will do to help the literature along). As I said in class, this means that any proposal poses a problem and suggests a solution. The problem is what scholars have and have not found (especially what they haven’t found); the solution is your research design – your way to find out more.
In this paper, you will start on the first part: reviewing the scholarly literature on your topic, or “what they have and have not found.” Basically, you report on how this body of knowledge is organized, what the scholars who have written this research have found, and what you think is missing, wrong, or disagreed about. This last (missing, wrong, or disagreed) is what leads to your research question.
Thus, you are making an argument about the literature. You are claiming overall, “This is what the research so far looks like, including what’s good and what’s bad (or present and missing).” It’s an argument because someone could disagree with it. However, it is your opinion based on evidence. Therefore, you have to support your argument, your claim, with evidence. You state what researchers have actually found! That’s your evidence.
The argument about the literature, therefore, is in two parts: what’s good and what’s bad (or what is present and what is missing). Then you turn the second part (what is missing, etc.) into a question.
As I also said in class, any paper in sociology should be in the form (formula, format),
– “tell them what you’ll tell them” (the introduction)
– “tell them” (90+% of the paper), and
– “tell them what you told them” (the conclusion).
If you read the instructions above with two things in mind (the idea of one main point, or argument, for the entire paper, and this three-part formula to lay out that argument), I think those instructions will make more sense.

Reading
Several students in office hours said, “I don’t know where to start.” Reading is where to start. If you don’t know the literature, of course you won’t know where to start. However, if you’ve actually read all seven articles, and have taken notes on them, you’re far more likely to know the literature, far more likely to have an overall “take” on it (i.e., to develop an overall argument), and far more likely to be able to write out that argument. Where do you start? Reading.
Yes, it is possible that you’ve read all seven articles, taken notes on them, and still have trouble. Maybe you’re the problem – but I doubt it. It’s more likely that the literature itself is the problem. In that case, it’s okay to say that the literature on this topic is fragmented, confusing, disjointed, or missing big issues. Remember that you’re going to read seven more articles and write another draft (Exam 3). By the time you’re done, the literature may make a lot more sense, and you’ll have a different argument. But it’s okay to start with it not making a whole lot of sense. All you have to do is provide evidence for that statement, by writing paragraphs that show it. If it does make sense, however, say so.

my Research question: Can African Americans Be Racist or prejudice)