We just got our assignments in my class that focuses on John Milton. She listed three possbilities of the types of paper we could write, but left it up to us to choose and then fomulate a thesis. One of the possibilities was to look at a later work that was influenced by Milton and then talk about how that influence affected the author and/or work.
She even listed Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials as an example of the type of work we might consider, so fantasy was definitely okay.
So, naturally my wheels started turning and I'm going to write my paper on the Creation story in The Silmarillion and trace the similarities between Melkor and Satan.
I'm so excited.
What papers have you written that you enjoyed and thought were interesting?
Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
I actually wrote a really good paper on The Great Gatsby once. The teacher accidentally gave me 100, even though he said at the beginning of the year that he doesn't give 100s. But that was AP English.
Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
Wow, that does sound interesting. Lets see, favorite paper topics so far:
-Comparing religious content in Emerson's early and latter writing. -Comparing Native American and foriegn analysis of NA Trickster tales (mainly just 'cause I got to read a lot a Coyote stories). -Comparing Thoreau's work with Emerson's. -Comparing critical reviews of Whitman's earlier and latter works. (It was pretty hilarious to see how different individual ciritc's responces were as he got more popular.)
Hmm, apparently I'm a big fan of comparing and transcendentalism. Well, that's not really news.
Nothing as fun as comparing Tolkein and Milton, but I had fun with them.
Posted by littlemissattitude (Member # 4514) on :
quote:Originally posted by pooka: I actually wrote a really good paper on The Great Gatsby once. The teacher accidentally gave me 100, even though he said at the beginning of the year that he doesn't give 100s. But that was AP English.
I had one of those once, pooka, in a community college archaeology class. The instructor said when he gave the paper assignment that he did not give A's on papers under any circumstances. Well, I wrote about the controversy over the dating of the first entry of humans into the Western Hemisphere. It was a fun paper to write and he ended up having to give me an A because he couldn't find anything wrong with the paper, he said, aside from one typo.
I also wrote another paper in community college that was really interesting, although my teacher thought I had lost my mind when I presented my topic to her for approval. It was a human sexuality class and the paper had to be based on a journal article. I found an interesting article on the connection between sexual fantasy and serial murders, and I really didn't want to write about what everyone else was going to...either abortion or HIV/AIDS. I did very well on that paper, as well, but I kind of got lucky (horrible thing to say) when the whole Jeffrey Dahmer story hit the headlines while I was in the middle of writing the paper, so I got extra points for bringing current events into the paper.
Then, when I was doing my upper division work I think my favorite paper/project was for an anthropology class. We were assigned to write about a religious tradition that was not a part of our own background, so I chose to write about Wicca. Another paper I really enjoyed writing during my upper division work was for an independent study on anthropology of religion. I surveyed the undergrad population of the university concerning what religious tradition or denomination they identified with and then wrote up the results of the survey.
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
quote:-Comparing Native American and foriegn analysis of NA Trickster tales (mainly just 'cause I got to read a lot a Coyote stories).
That one sounds awesome! I would have loved that type of research as well.
Posted by kojabu (Member # 8042) on :
I know I definitely had fun writing some papers in college, I just can't remember what they were about.
Posted by Luet13 (Member # 9274) on :
quote:Originally posted by Belle: So, naturally my wheels started turning and I'm going to write my paper on the Creation story in The Silmarillion and trace the similarities between Melkor and Satan.
That is so great! When I had an advanced writing class in college, I wrote a paper on the similarities between the creation story of The Silmarillion and Norse, Celtic, and Catholic creation stories. I made this crazy chart of all the Ainur and the more pertinent Maiar. Boy was that paper intense. I wonder if I still have it somewhere.
Posted by Carrie (Member # 394) on :
Wow! That sounds awesome
As far as my papers go, I try to stay away from the ones that would bore me to death; sadly, they cannot always be avoided. My fun ones though...
- "Nard: What is it?" - a four-page response paper... in rhyming couplets - something about the literary continuation of Homer (especially in modern historical and science fiction) - the paper I wrote for a Latin class that involved absolutely no Latin - the other paper for a separate Latin class that also involved no Latin - my MA thesis: "Helen of Troy, the Mortal Muse"
I had a gimmick in high school where I'd always write limericks whenever we had to do a poetry unit. I had some good Huck Finn ones... Posted by vonk (Member # 9027) on :
Oh, I remember a highschool paper where we had to pick a famous person and decide wich level of Dante's hell they would go to. I sent Yoko Ono to the ninth level for Treachery to Kindred.
Posted by Belle (Member # 2314) on :
vonk that sounds like an awesome project. What fun - I could think of several places to send several people....
Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
quote:Originally posted by kojabu: I know I definitely had fun writing some papers in college, I just can't remember what they were about.
For the most part, me too. I do remember a few, though:
The one on my family's history, which I interviewed my grandfather for (I just wish I still had it, or the audio tapes);
The 40-page (well, it was SUPPOSED to be 40, anyway) paper on balancing college and kids (basic result: no common factor among those who manage it and those who drop out after having kids, except maybe luck and determination);
The paper based on interviewing farmers who sell produce at local farmers' markets.
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
I wrote one I liked doing on Einstein during the First World War and how his theories trickled through Europe in order to culminate in the discovery of the bending of starlight around the sun thus proving his theories.
I wrote one on Music Hall, in which I got to quote musical hall songs; also fun.
I wrote a fairly interesting one on British Radio in World War Two. Again, it was really interesting to hear old radio broadcasts and such.
And I wrote one on the governance of the internet which was pretty interesting to research because I had to teach myself all new things that turned out to be really useful to know and understand about the internet.
I wrote one about the fall of the Soviet's influence in Eastern Europe in 1989 but it turned out to be to vague to be a very good essay. However, it was quite interesting to research how the revolutions across the countries influenced each other and how each country went about their own revolutions. For example, I think it was the Czechoslovakian or Polish (I forget) revolutions which were based in theatres.
I guess I'm really interested in media and how people exist and create and communicate under war/revolutionary conditions.
Posted by Javert (Member # 3076) on :
I think one of my favorite papers was Neo Eastern Thought: Buddhism in "The Matrix".
Although I did a lot of my best work in my "UFO's in American Society" course. I'll have to get back to you on some of the juicier topics.
Posted by theCrowsWife (Member # 8302) on :
My favorite papers were mathematical proofs, particularly in the topology section. Proving the different orders of infinity was fun, too.
In an English course I wrote a paper on Kafka's Metamorphosis where I compared the actions of the main character to the clinical symptoms of co-dependency. One of the books I used in my research was a literary analysis that had been translated from German. The sentences were convoluted and nearly nonsensical, and the professor dared me quote from it in the paper. So I did. I wish I could remember what it was, because it was very bizarre.
--Mel
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
My favorite paper was on Conrad's Heart of Darkness that I wrote in AP English for high school. I ended up using a lot of the material from that paper for the essay I wrote on the eventual AP test that I got a 4 on.
My favorite college paper, well that's a tie between a paper I wrote on Anne Hutchinson and an anaylsis on an HH Scullard book about Rome I did in an Ancient History class. Anaylsis of historical texts is fun.
Doing a paper on the Silmarillion should be a blast, and you certainly have enough to work with. Tolkien said he never intended for any of LOTR to be a direct allegorical reference to the Bible, and in fact hated it whenever someone suggested it, but you can't ignore that there are obvious comparisons to be made.
Posted by enjeeo (Member # 2336) on :
My favourite essay topics by far were the ones I got in my honours year at university. The theme for the Politics course we all did was 'Justice' and it was basically political philosophy all concerned with social justice. I wish I could remember the exact topics, but it was years ago. I do remember really enjoying writing about Rawls. I also got one of my topics as a challenge from a lecturer that I disagreed with in a tutorial, haha. He dared me to justify my position on something and I took the challenge. Great fun!
I find general philosophy (you know, the 'how do I know I really exist?' stuff) a bit pointless and self-indulgent most of the time, but if you want to study stuff that will open your mind and change you forever, I will recommend Political Philosophy every time.
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