Final Paper Guideline

3153 Spring 2015

The goal of the final paper is to get a taste of doing ethnographic fieldwork and to
connect the themes of the Urban American Experience course to your everyday
lives, neighbors and communities. The paper should be four to six pages long,
double spaced, 12pt font, one inch margins. The following is a guideline to help
you write your paper. Your paper may take a different form, but please note the
grading rubric.
Introduction
Your paper must have an introductory paragraph that sets out the context and
point of the paper. The last sentence of the paragraph should encapsulate the
main idea of the paper. Think in terms of the class material. What do these
interviews help us to understand about the Urban American Experience? For
example, my group and I interviewed recent immigrants from China to find more
about how transnational immigrants try to maintain their ethnic identity.
Context and Background
You should include a page providing relevant background information. Clearly
describe the who, what, where, and when of the context being studied. Clearly
describe relevant places. You may need to include demographic information, or
recent history, or information on recent development projects. Please cite
sources.
Data Analysis
Next you should provided two to three pages of analysis based on your
interviews and any outside research. Do not give me transcripts of the
interviews. Instead, look for three or four themes that seem important and that
relate to class material. For example, Option A may have gender difference, kin
work, and social reproduction. Subtitles can be very helpful. Use quotes from the
interviews to back up your assertions. Try to connect with course material. For
example, Perez, in her study of Puerto Rican migrants, found that women do
most of the kin work. However, in my study I have found that men also play an
important role in keeping up transnational familial connections.
Conclusions
In such a small study you cannot make any definitive conclusions. Instead sum
up your main findings. Then discuss the limitations of the study. Finally, what
aspects of the urban American experience do you to think would be important for
further research based on this study?
Grading Rubric
Format, Organization, Style
Topic and Context
Data Analysis
Connection to Class Material

20%
30%
30%
20%