REL2000 GUIDE TO WRITING A TERM PAPER In partial fulfillment of the writing requirements for Area II Humanities courses in Philosophy, each student is required to write a term paper.

Research for a term paper should begin with an examination of the topic in general works.  Sources you cite in the paper, on the other hand, should come from more specific works.  Therefore, DO NOT SITE GENERAL DICTIONARIES OR ENCYCLOPEDIAS (like Webster's, World Book or Collier's, etc), though citations may be made to specific ones such as The Encyclopedia of Religion in America, The Encyclopedia of World Religions, Encyclopedia Judaica, Hastings Encyclopedia and Ethics, New Catholic Encyclopedia as acceptable overviews of the major teachings of many religious groups.   NOTE:  The textbooks should not be used as references; however, they may be useful as guides for becoming familiar with the topic.

For more detailed references, the student should examine such standard textbooks on religion in America as: Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches; Mead/Hill, Handbook of Denominations; Ahlstrom, A Religious History of the American People; Hudson, Religion in America; Sweet, The Story of Religion in America; and Hudson, American Protestantism. Contemporary essays and articles may be found in newspapers, journals, and magazines. The student may find helpful information in such magazines as: Theology Today, Christian Century, Christianity Today, and the religion section of Time, Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, National Review, New Republic, Current History, Atlantic, and Nation magazines.

Each paper should be stapled in the upper left-hand corner (no folders or other forms of binding are acceptable) and contain the following:

I. TITLE PAGE (one page): The title page should be centered and capitalized and include the title of the paper, the student's name, the course, the instructor and the date.

II. THESIS STATEMENT/OUTLINE PAGE (one page) : The thesis of your paper is the point you are trying to make about your topic.  It is not just a summary of a person's life or of a religion's beliefs or history;  it is the point that you are arguing based on your research.  The thesis statement should be built on a positive statement rooted in a well-chosen active verb. An additional sentence can be used to provide an explanation of how the student will approach the subject or to outline the contents of the paper. For example, "American Catholics struggle with numerous issues of practical and moral authority, including abortion, birth control, and interfaith marriages," or, "The Amish tradition seeks to freeze the morality of an earlier agricultural era and promote this morality as the best pattern for life in the modern world. This tradition can only be understood in the origins of the Amish movement, its moral teachings, and its impact on the American scene."

When writing the outline of your paper, be sure to be consistent in your choice of form. If you choose to do a sentence outline, be sure all parts of your outline are complete sentences. If you choose the topical outline form, be sure the phrases are parallel.  Use Roman numerals for main headings, then capital letters (A, B, C, etc.) for subheadings and Arabic numbers for even further subheadings (see term paper example below).  Remember, too, when writing your formal outline, any subheading implies a division; therefore, an "A" must have a "B," a "1" a "2," etc. Refer to Diana Hacker, A Writer's Reference, 4th ed., 10-12 for proper form of your thesis/outline page.

III. BODY OF THE PAPER (ten pages): The text of the paper must be at least ten pages in length, typed and double-spaced in standard 10-12 point type with the page number in the upper right-hand corner (begin pagination with the first page and end with the last page of the body of the paper). The student should identify the internal logic of the subject and use this logic to structure the paper. (Is the logical approach to the subject a chronological development? A comparison or contrast? A list of most to least important? A biographical portrait of life, thought, and significance?) Once the best structure is chosen, the student should proceed to arrange research materials in a clear and persuasive manner. The paper should move beyond simply relating a list of facts or retelling a story. A detailed analysis of the subject matter is required. Superficiality is a crime. So is plagiarism. To avoid getting an automatic F, be sure to document any direct quotation, paraphrase, statistical data, facts that are not common knowledge, or any derived idea. Documentation should follow the in-text citation method rather than footnotes or end notes. The in-text citation method simply includes the author's name and the page number. This information is placed in parentheses following a quote or at the end of a paragraph. If two or more works are cited by the same author, include the title of the work in the reference. An example of the in-text citation would be: "Religion is the study of beliefs and practices which regulate one's moral system" (Smith 5).

NOTE: Do not use any more spaces between paragraphs than you do between lines within paragraphs. Avoid contractions. Look carefully at the in-text citation example above and follow it explicitly. Use spell-check AND have someone else proofread your paper for errors you may have missed. This is important to catch mistakes spell-check does not. For instance, many of you think -ist is a plural ending (using scientist, Baptist, etc., for scientists, Baptists, etc.).

IV. WORKS CITED (one page): Refer to Diana Hacker, A Writer's Reference, 4th ed., 331f., for proper form of the works cited page. The works cited page comes at the end of a research paper and should have the title, WORKS CITED, typed in capitals, centered and triple-spaced before the entries. All works used and/or cited in researching and writing the paper should be listed in alphabetical order in the bibliography according to the author's last name. Book entries (3-5 books would be appropriate for a 10-page paper) should include author, last name first, title, series or volume (if any), edition, publisher's name, date of publication. Article entries significantly enhance one's research and should include author, title of article, name of periodical, volume number, date, pages. Examples:

Smith, Huston. The Religions of Man. New York, New York: Harper 
    &  Row,1978.

Sheler, Jeffery L. and Joannie M. Schrof. "The Bible's Last 
    Secrets." U.S. News & World Report 7 October 1991: 64-70.

NOTE: The exact kind of information for periodicals differs according to type, but all references provide the periodical title, the date of publication, and the page numbers on which the article appeared. Continuously underline (italicize) the periodical title, and capitalize all major words in the title. Note that no punctuation follows the periodical title and that a colon introduces the inclusive page numbers. If the periodical provides both a volume number and a year, put the year in parentheses. Volume numbers are unnecessary when specific dates are given (as in the example above).

For Sirs and News Bank:

Levinsen, Paul. "Abortion...Does the Government Have a Right to Intervene?"       Families Today, April 1986. Reprint in Current Perspectives,      Vol. 6. New York, N.Y." Social Issues Resources Series, Inc., 1984. Sims, Walter. "AIDS Testing Should be Mandatory." Pittsburgh (Pa.)     Pittsburgh Free Press, October 25, 1984 (located in News Bank     microform), Welfare and Social Problems, 1984, 60:C, 15-17. fiche.

For World Wide Web Site:

Sowa, John F. "Peirce's Lecture on Pragmatism."     http://www.ksl.stanford.edu/onto-std/mailarchive/0064.ltm/

NOTE 1: Check out a sample paper to make sure you understand the directions:

Transparent Eyeballs: Our Transcendental Forefathers

NOTE 2:  Download from the Internet and turn in with your paper any material from which you quote  (just the page the quote--which you have highlighted-- appears on, not the whole site)!  Do not use the Internet for more than 30-40% of your sources.  Rely more heavily on books and journal articles.

NOTE 3: Students should proofread the paper to insure that the paper is free of errors. Diana Hacker, A Writer's Reference, 4th ed., will be the standard for grading the format of the paper as well as the punctuation and grammar. The following symbols will be used in marking errors in the papers:

REVISION SYMBOLS

ap Apostrophe (P5)

appr jargon, archaic or invented words, slang, nonstandard English (W4)

case error in case (G3-c, G3-d)

cap Capitals (S3)

cs Comma Splice (G6)

dm Dangling Modifier (E3-e)

doc Documentation (M)

exact Inexact words (W5)

frag Fragment of a sentence (G5)

ital Italics (underlining) (S6)

awk Awkward

lc Lower Case Letter (S3)

log Logic

mm Misplaced Modifier (E3-b)

pn agr Agreement of pronoun (G3-a)

shifts Shifts in person, number, tense, mood, voice, indirect to direct discourse (E4)

sp Misspelled Word (S1)

s-v subject verb agreement

t Error in Verb Tense (G2-f)

x Obvious Error

: Colon (P4)

, Comma (P1)

-- Dash

... Ellipsis Points

// Faulty Parallelism (E1)

. Period

; Semicolon (P3)

[Numbers in parentheses correspond to sections in Diana Hacker, A Writer's Reference, Fourth Edition]

The grading standards for the papers will be:

Title, Thesis and Outline: 10 points

Analysis of Topic: 50 points

Punctuation & Grammar: 30 points

Documentation: 10 points

	Mahayana,
	Theraveda

	Impact of Vatican II on American Catholicism
	Recent Problems in American Catholicism

	Use of Facilities for Religious Clubs Prayer before Athletic Events
	Display of Religious Symbols

	Sunni
	Shiite
	Sufi

	Hasidic
	Reconstructionism
	Zionism