Research Paper

• Title: The Social-Political Ramifications of Immigration

• Novel: Funny in Farsi

• Sources: Several have been given to you. Others that you may find must be approved by me. These should be sufficient.

• Dates: Varies

• Final product due: Beginning of December

Research vs Opinion

• This is not an opinion paper. You should have an opinion after your research. Do not pick a side. Your thesis will eventually be the last sentence of your last introductory paragraph. It will connect with your conclusion, which should show your opinion without you specifically saying your opinion about the social and political ramifications of euthanasia of persons with special needs.

Source Cards & Notecards(At least 100 cards)

SOURCE CARDS

• #1

Dumas, Firoozeh. Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America. Random House Publishing Group. 2004.

MORE

• #2

• Armas, Genaro C. “Language Barriers Cause Problems”. The Associated Press. 2009.

• #3

• Holeywell, Ryan. “How Language Fits into the Immigration Issue”. Governing. 2012.

More • #4

• Granquist, Mark. “Religious Issues in American Immigration”. Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. 2012.

• #5

• Griswold, Daniel. “Immigrants have enriched American culture and enhanced our influence in the world”. The Cato Institute. 2002.

More

• #6

• Kane, Tim, Ph.D. and Johnson, Kirk A., Ph.D. “The Real Problem with Immigration … and the Real Solution”. Backgrounder. The Heritage Foundation. 2006.

• #7

• Garcia, Ann. “The Facts on Immigration Today”. Center for American Progress. 2013.

And…

• #8

• Bhugra, Dinesh and Becker, Matthew A. “Migration, cultural bereavement and cultural identity”. World Psychiatry. 2005.

• #9

• American Immigration Council. “Strength in Diversity: The Economic and Political Clout of Immigrants, Latinos, and Asians in the United States”. Immigration Policy Center. 2012

Notecards – Organizing your information

• A very important part of writing a good research paper is organization. This includes both time and information. Do not procrastinate!. Begin reading and gathering important information that you want to use in your paper as soon as possible. The most time consuming aspect is reading for information. It includes a great deal of close reading, annotating, finding the best information that will give you a good paper. If you are not organized, it will take considerably more time to write the paper. 

Help

• To help you keep organized, you will be responsible for using index cards for both your sources and information that you have gleaned from those sources. With this method, you will categorize the information you find by topic.

• For each topic, you will have several cards from several different sources. Later, as you write your paper, each card topic becomes a body paragraph (supporting idea) in your paper.

Researching for Note cards

• In order to keep your ideas in order, and to remember where you found the ideas, there are four items that you should include on each note card.

• Card # 1-? : top left

• Source # 1-? : top right

• Topic : Underline; second line on card

• Quote from source; two-three sentences of commentary.

• For cards from the novel, INCLUDE PAGE NUMBER – BOTTOM RIGHT (PG.??)

Organizing your cards

• Once you have written the information down on the note cards, go back and organize your cards by topic.

• When you finish, you should have your cards in piles, one topic per pile. You can have any number of piles and any number of cards in each pile.

Each Section

• Depending on each section, sub-topics will determine number of topics on your note- cards.

• Ie. Section 2: Immigration, cultural diversity, language. Section 3: historical; personhood, religion. Section 4: language, education, language, religion, environment, ethnic identity

• These subtopics will also be determined by the information that you find useful.

Assignment #1

• Due: Tuesday, November 5th

• Find fifteen (15) examples from the novel that exemplify Dumas’ experience in America, from a young age to adulthood.

• Each example should be on a note card. The note card should also have commentary, page number, and #1 in the top right hand corner.

Notecard

#1 #1Topic: LanguageQuote: “My mother’s approach to learning English consisted of daily lessons with Monty Hall and Bob Barker” (Dumas, 10).

Commentary: Dumas illustrates the great difficulty her mother has with the English language. Watching game shows did not help to build her confidence in communicating with the average American. Although she may have understood what was said, she probably told the results to her family in her own language. She did not try to speak English with Americans. She used Dumas as an interpreter.

p. 10

Notecard

#2 #1

Topic: Politics

Quote: “Dear Brainwashed Cowards, We are going to blow you up” (Dumas, 114).

Commentary: The Dumas family, along with numerous Iranians were subjected to the prejudice of ignorance. Although frightening, and this experience could give them reason to reject the American dream, they remained positive and did not lose their love of America and its citizens. p. 114