ENGL 1301/1302 (English Composition I & II) - Mr. C. Rose

What makes a good research topic?

1. Debatable / Controversial. Students need to be able to craft issue questions about these topics. Issue questions, sometimes called research questions, have two or more possible, reasonable, and defendable answers.
2. An abundance of research. You will be doing a lot of research so this topic needs . . . a lot research.
3. A 'layered' topic. Students are tasked with writing specific arguments for their topic, so these topics need to be malleable and adaptive to these types of arguments. They need depth. Another way of thinking about this, is that students need to be creative in how they look at and examine their topics. Immigration, for example, is a good topic that has many different ways to look at it: evaluation of current policies, cause and effect on economic growth or stagnation, definition of ‘asylum seeker’ versus ‘illegal immigrant,’ the definition of ‘illegal immigrant’ in relation to the ‘wet foot/dry foot’ policy aimed at Cuba, and so on.
4. Care. Students must want to research these topics! If you don’t want to spends hours thinking and writing about the politics of the Texas Heartbeat Bill and its relationship to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, then don’t pick it!

CQ Researcher is an excellent resource for choosing a topic. It provides unbiased coverage of social and political issues. Each report offers pro and con interviews, background and historical information, and more. 

To access CQ Researcher from off campus, log in with your student ID and password. 

The video below will help you access and use CQ Researcher.

Gale in Context: Opposing Viewpoints is a great resource for choosing a topic. It provides differing views on political and social issues. Each entry includes a topic overview and a list of resources. 

Gale in Context: Opposing Viewpoints is an excellent place to find peer-reviewed articles on your topic.

To access Gale in Context: Opposing Viewpoints from off campus, log in with your student ID and password. 

This video will help you access and use Gale in Context.

Struggling to think of a topic?

Use the news sites below to get ideas.