Field Report- Proposal/Outline

Notes for the "Field Report" proposal and outline:

I know this is long, but I encourage you to read it in its entirety.

This assignment asks you to write approximately 100-250 words proposing your topic for the field report paper and prepare an outline for the draft of the field report paper. You should review the syllabus description of the field report paper and the proposal example for that previous assignment.

There are some crucial differences between this proposal and the previous one. For that assignment, you were merely indicating what you would be writing about. This proposal is a little more vital to the overall success of your final paper. You are not just choosing a topic; you are defining the project itself. For example, if you choose to write about your experiences and observations of gendered spaces, the paper will have a much different tone and shape than if you choose to write about the historical materialism of the built environment around campus or its racialized landscape.

For the "response paper," you were asked to choose an academic article to engage with and demonstrate your understanding of cultural geographic concepts and the ability to convey that understanding in written form. The "response paper" had a prescribed subject and format that was generally inflexible.

In contrast, the "field report" assignment is tasking you to think creatively and originally about a topic that interests you. This topic should focus on an empiric subject you can personally observe. This empiric should be one you can examine and explain using a cultural, geographic lens in a short essay of 1000-2000 words. Besides the length, the format and nature of the writing will primarily be prescribed by your choice of empiric and the theoretical background you will be relying on. For example, a paper that chooses to observe the grey squirrel's non-human charisma in a backyard landscape will be very different from one relating the experience of an individual in a workspace related to their gender or ethnicity. Both topics would be appropriate for the assignment, but the execution of them will vary wildly. For this reason, I am refraining from providing a concrete example of what the proposal should look like or how the outline should be approached.

The idea behind this "Field Report" proposal and outline is that you will succinctly present to me the following in your proposal so that I can provide feedback:

1. Your chosen empiric- what you are reporting on.

2. The theory that you are using to approach the empirical subject. For this particular assignment, I am not requiring you to provide citations. However, you will need to for the draft and the final paper. It might help you decide on a couple of papers to base your approach on and cite them here for feedback. Still, it will be enough to concretely identify the kind of theory you will rely on. Suppose you were going to write about the non-human charisma of the grey squirrel. In that case, it might be obvious to cite Jamie Lorimer's 2007 paper. Suppose you were going to write about your individual experiences as a laboratory tech. In that case, it might make more sense to say you were going to use LGBTQ theories and then find papers that were most useful to your personal experiences to cite as you go through the process of observing and writing.

3. The method you intend to use in both observing and conveying those observations. Are you going to rely entirely on personal observation and experience? Or will you instead be looking at other's interpretations of a phenomenon and the discourse concerning it? Or both? Or something else entirely?

4. Tell me what your intended methodology will be. How will you combine your method with the framing theories you are using to examine and analyze the empiric?

5. What are you struggling with?

The proposal is mostly to give me a chance to establish a dialogue with you about how to approach the project. The most important thing is that you provide me with enough info to give constructive feedback and help you shape your paper.

Outlining:

The outline is more for you. As you prepare it, you should get a better idea of how workable your final paper will be. If you can put together an outline that flows logically and presents a workable approach to a final paper, you can be pretty sure your concept is fleshed out enough to be successful. The outline does not need to cover every aspect and detail of your draft- it just needs to show that you can work your idea into something that makes sense. I am not going to grade your outline based on format or length. I am merely interested in seeing that you can take the components of the proposal and array them in a way that you can logically build upon.

Here are some links to help you with the outline:

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/the_writing_process/developing_an_outline/how_to_outline.html

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/the_writing_process/developing_an_outline/types_of_outlines.html

https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/the_writing_process/developing_an_outline/index.html

https://open.lib.umn.edu/publicspeaking/chapter/12-2-types-of-outlines/

https://www.scribbr.com/research-paper/outline/

https://www.grammarly.com/blog/how-to-write-outline/

Troubleshooting:

If you really struggle to arrange your ideas in the outline it is probably a good idea to rethink your empiric and theory. Try to focus on a narrower, more specific empiric, and choose a theory that is directly related to it. Make a thesis statement and build upon it: Using (theory X), I will examine how my observations of (empiric y) demonstrate the cultural geographies of (empiric y) using (method Z). Don't actually use that sentence - it is purely demonstrative and terribly clunky.

If you are struggling to write the proposal, likely, you have not thought through your method and methodology well enough. Ask yourself if you can reasonably hope to get the observation done in the next month and tie it together with your paper's other aspects. For example, it is probably not a good idea to interview people at your work about their Covid-19 quarantine experiences. It could make sense to write about your own experiences. You know what you are interested in and what kind of theory you might enjoy employing to better understand and write about that interest. If you are struggling over the proposal, it is probably because you are not clear on how you want to do it.

Rubric:

Completeness- 3 points

You have a complete proposal statement and an outline that gives me as an instructor enough information to help you. The proposal statement is worth 2 points. If it is incomplete, I will take 1 point. The outline is worth 1 point. It should include all the aspects required in the proposal and give me a sense of the paper's intended structure and internal logic. If it is incomplete, I will take .5 points.

Grammar and Syntax- 1 point

Write with appropriate syntax and correct grammar. For each major error, I will take .25 points. 4 major errors or more, and I will take the full point.

Thoughtfulness/ Quality / Demonstrated understanding- 1 point

If the effort is below your ability or demonstrates an attempt to fulfill the assignment's strict requirements but not its spirit, I will deduct this point. I will deduct .5 points if you don't demonstrate an adequate understanding and engagement with /of the cultural geographic concepts you intend to write about. Remember, your success with the final draft of this assignment will depend on our productive dialogue about your ideas.