Ph.D. TUTORIAL II

Level:

Doctoral

Course Status:

Mandatory

CEU credits:

Academic year:

2011/2012

Semester:

Winter

Start and end dates:

9 Jan 2012 - 30 Mar 2012

Host Unit:

Department of History

CEU Instructor(s):

Marsha Siefert

Full description:

COURSE SCHEDULE AND READINGS

1: Seminar: Writing the dissertation proposal

Topics: Structuring a research proposal, important elements for a dissertation proposal, frequently asked questions about the dissertation proposal, proposal writing in general.

Recommended Reading:

Howard S. Becker, Tricks of the Trade: How to Think about Your Research While Doing It (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998).

Howard S. Becker, Writing for Social Scientists: How to Start and Finish your Thesis, Book or Article (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986).

Richard Marius and Melvin Page, A Short Guide to Writing about History (New York: Longman, 2002).

William Kelleher Storey, Writing History: A Guide for Students (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999)

David Joel Sternberg, How to Complete and Survive a Doctoral Dissertation (New York: St. Martin’s, 1981).

Irene L. Clark, Writing the Successful Thesis and Dissertation: Entering the Conversation (New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 2005).

2-5: Individual Tutorials

Assignment: Each student will be scheduled for a one-hour tutorial during the class time period. For this tutorial, each student should send his or her draft proposal to the instructor at least 24 hours prior to the tutorial. This tutorial will be used to talk about how to improve, expand and/or revise the working draft of the proposal in light of a revision for the seminar presentation. More than one tutorial appointment can be scheduled.

6-11: Seminar: Presentation of Dissertation Proposals

Assignment: The procedure for the seminar will be that no later than 3 p.m. on the Monday before your scheduled seminar appearance, you will send to all of us the draft text for your dissertation proposal. Each dissertation proposal will be assigned a discussant who, after a brief introduction about the dissertation project, will give a set of comments on the draft text before the floor is open to discussion. The goal of these seminars is to pay attention to the text itself, and to comment on the parts of the text that are persuasive, might be confusing, or otherwise could benefit from additional work. Two dissertation proposals will be presented per seminar.