Bibliography of your sources with links as appropriate. Your Annotated Bibliography should include at least five good sources that support your paper. Note that you need to read and evaluate all your sources before you include them in your Annotated Bibliography. This means that by the time you have finished your Proposal, your paper is at least half way complete! You will not be searching for sources the night before the paper is due. You must hand in a proposal to receive your instructor’s approval of your topic and to have your essay marked. Papers for which I did not receive and approve a proposal will not be graded. If your topic changes, you must prepare another proposal and bibliography. You may find it helpful to base the research paper on thought you have already done for a shorter paper in this class. However, if you do so, the research paper must be entirely original and deal with a substantially different aspect of the question.

Answer these questions in your Proposal:

1. What is the working topic for your research paper?

2. What is your tentative thesis – your position on the topic? (Note: Your thesis will likely change as you research and write your paper. You will probably revise, qualify, and rewrite this idea several times over the next weeks as you work on your essay.) Your thesis should be defended and proven through the factual material and evidence you present, as well as through your effective use of argumentative appeals.

3. What research and reading have you done so far? List the sources. Explain briefly how you will use each source to defend your thesis. (Remember, you will need a minimum of five sources for your essay – these should be academic, professional, or government sources.)

4. What experience or knowledge do you already have on the topic? Why did you choose the topic?

5. Attach an Annotated Bibliography of your sources. An annotated bibliography is like a work cited page with a short summary of each item included after the citation.

6. Include links to sources in your Annotated Bibliography.