TOPIC OF PAPER: The role of women in the military (from supporting roles in the United States and Britain to direct combat roles in the USSR) and their impact on the war effort.
After choosing your topic, narrow your focus to a manageable question that can be answered in a coherent, thesis-driven fashion. It is best to begin by trying to craft an appropriate research question.
It may also be helpful to spell out what this paper is NOT, in order to prevent you from falling into any traps:
- This paper should not be a descriptive essay of a person, military campaign, or event. You need to make and prove an argument, not prove you read books about a topic.
- This paper should utilize a number of sources but should not merely be a recapitulation of them. As a check, highlight your quotes/block quotes in your paper, and if your paper looks more like a coloring book, you might be overdoing it.
- These papers should not be biographical essays about particular people, as you should be focused on making a larger argumentative point about the war as a whole.
Specifically, the following critical elements must be addressed:
- Introduction: Create an introduction that includes a description of your chosen topic as well as the research question you will address in your thesis statement.
- Thesis Statement: Craft a thesis statement that addresses the issue you identify within your chosen topic and identifies supporting points that you will explain in the body paragraphs of your paper.
- Historical Context: Discuss the context or historical setting surrounding your topic, and specifically, how your topic relates to the larger setting of World War II. Be sure to address the causes that led up to WWII, the basic reasons the nations pursued military objectives, and/or the reasons that the Eastern and Western nations were divided from 1945 to 1989.
- Supporting Points: Explain each of the supporting points you identified in your thesis statement. For each supporting point, you should explain how the point supports your thesis and include specific evidence from your primary and secondary sources.
- Integration of Scholarly Research: In the body paragraphs of your paper, integrate scholarly research from primary and secondary sources throughout to defend your thesis statement.
- Conclusion: Develop a conclusion that summarizes your thesis/historical argument and the main points of your paper.