Final Stories Paper due by Friday, December 7 at noon in your instructor's box. (Remember: A copy of your paper must also be turned in to your "Tools" instructor by this time as well.)

1. GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS: The basic idea of the Phase II paper is for you to work the materials you developed in the Biographical Report into a document that displays a keen awareness of the wider historical context in which your research subject lived. More simply: the paper must do justice to both the background (e.g. the Depression, the Civil Rights Movement, migration to the Sunbelt. the growth of a service economy, the rise to international power of the US, the vast increase in the role of government in our lives) and the "foreground." The foreground is the experience of your interviewee.

2. THE IMPORTANCE OF GENERATIONS: This beloved book allows you to (1) think about the experience of your research subject in terms of wider movements in American society; (2) return to your subject with fresh questions; (3) develop research topics in case our suggestions are not satisfying; and (4) be reminded again of the broad trends that may have influenced your subject's life.

3. THE EXAMPLES PROVIDED BY THE AUTHORS OF OUR KEY BOOKS: Note that each of our biographies are doing something of what you are doing, and the discussions of these books in class should bring out the interaction of the personal and historical. Dorothy Day is, for example, dragged out of her "personal" history by the Labor Movement. But notice that her life was already thoroughly influenced by her father's involvement in the increasingly important profession of popular journalism -- as well as by the problems of the cities and the strains brought about by immigration.

4. THEMATIC AND TOPICAL PAPERS: In most cases, your final paper will be an enhancement or augmentation of your biographical report. Your instructor will have suggested various topics that shed historical light on your interviewee's experience.

For example, if your father was a rock DJ in the early 60's, you might want a section of your final paper to relate your father's tales to the Payola scandals and the merging of "R&B" or "race music" with MOR (Middle of the Road). You would learn about these developments in The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock 'n Roll and quote from this source in your paper. Then you might move on to another topic -- for example, your father 's transfer from lBM in New York to IBM in RTP. Lawrence Wright's In the New World is good source here with his data on the movement of population from the Frostbelt to the Sunbelt. A third topic might be your father's involvement in Formula 1 racing; here you would use sources which trace changes in automobile racing in the last two decades.

IF YOU CHOOSE TO DO A TOPICAL PAPER, THE MINIMUM LENGTH IS 14 pp., NOT INCLUDING CHRONOLOGY, ENDNOTES, BIBLIOGRAPHY, and APPENDICES.

You might, however, become so engrossed in one aspect of your father s life that you choose to focus just on it. The result of your work will be a paper that develops a single theme. "Donald Alexander and the Development of Top 40 Radio in the Southeast, 1955-1965" -- this is a possible final title. In this case, you provide only a brief overview of your father's life and then focus very sharply on his years as a DJ and the wider historical developments that impacted on this profession.

IF YOU CHOOSE TO DO A THEMATIC PAPER, THE MINIMUM LENGTH IS 10 pp., NOT INCLUDING CHRONOLOGY, ENDNOTES, BIBLIOGRAPHY, ETC.

5. KEY INFORMATION

(1) Re-submit your Biographical Report (with all the instructors comments and marks) with the final paper. We want to see how you've responded to our suggestions, hints, etc.

(2) All papers will contain footnotes/endnotes. You must cite a minimum of EIGHT different sources (books, articles, newspaper stories). The biographies and L&J are of course possible sources. A separate bibliography page is also required. This is more than a List of Works Cited -- allowing you to mention documents you have discovered that you found useful in your research. At least seven of your eight sources must be non-internet sources. Any internet sources you use must also be correctly cited. You may, of course, use more sources than the minimum and they may be either from the internet or from traditional sources.

(3) You will submit copies of the final paper both to your Tools and Stories instructor. The due date is Friday, December 10, by noon in instructor boxes.

(4) The method of footnoting/endnoting that you have learning in Tools will be acceptable. When in doubt, go to Hacker!

(5) We will make available in the Reserve Room a folder of model papers done in years past.

(6) Obvious points about the papers:
--typed
--double-spaced
--pages numbered
--spell checked, both electronically and mechanically
--reasonable margins (1 inch on the sides)
--reasonable type size (10 or 12 pitch)
--bibliography
--clear title
--section headings (strongly suggested)
--unless directed otherwise, do not use special covers or binders
--near the beginning of paper: a statement of how the paper will be structured
--plagiarism free: all plagiarists will be nonviolently shot
--when relating your subject to his/her wider historical setting, try to include at least one reference to a social, a political, and an economic aspect of that setting.