How to Write a Term Paper

1) Index Search: Although online catalogs may differ slightly from library to library, the most common listings are by

2) Key Word Search/Full-text Search:

3) Boolean Search:

1) Contemporary Literary Criticism (CLC): Authors now living or who died after December 31, 1959.

2) Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism (TCLC): Authors who died between 1900 and 1959.

3) Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism (NCLC): Authors who died between 1800 and 1899.

4) Literature Criticism From 1400 To 1800 (LC) and

Shakespearean Criticism (SC): Authors who died between 1400 and 1799.

5) Classical And Medieval Literature Criticism (CMLC): Authors who died before 1400.

6) Drama Criticism (DC): Dramatists.

7) Poetry Criticism (PC): Poets

8) Short Story Criticism (SSC): Short story writers.

9) Black Literature Criticism (BLC): Black writers of the past two hundred years.

10) Hispanic Literature Criticism (HLC): Hispanic writers of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

11) Native North American Literature (NNAL): Native North American writers and orators of the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries.

12) World Literature Criticism, 1500 to the Present (WLC): Major authors from the Renaissance to the present.

1) MLA publishes two books yearly that provide bibliographic information concerning literary works. The first book lists works in five areas: literature in English, literature in other languages, linguistics, general literature and related topics, and folklore. The second book is a subject index of the first (Gibaldi 13).

2) Obtain a list of the periodicals in the library's collection. Check titles in the MLA International Bibliography against the library's holdings. This precaution will save you the frustration of searching for periodicals that are not available.

1) Author Search

2) Title Search

3) Genre Search

4) Literary Movement/Time Period Search

5) Literary Themes Search

6) Essays on Publishing Companies

7) Essays on Literary Topics

8) Custom Search

1) Contemporary Authors: Provides complete biographical and bibliographical information and references on approximately 100,000 U.S. and international authors.

2) Contemporary Literary Criticism Select: An extensive collection of critical essays on contemporary writers — each entry also contains a biographical/critical introduction, a list of principal works and sources for further study.

3) Dictionary of Literary Biography: Documents the lives and careers of authors from all eras and genres — provides biographies, critical studies, bibliographies and sources for further reading.

4) DISCovering Authors Modules: A student-focused source for biographical, bibliographical and critical information on 1,260 of the world's most-studied novelists, poets and dramatists, including significant coverage of multicultural, popular and genre authors.

5) DISCovering Most-Studied Authors: A student-focused source for biographical, bibliographical and critical information on the 380 authors most frequently studied in North American high schools and colleges, including significant coverage of key novelists, poets, dramatists and short story writers.

1) This source includes citations from 1963 on, adding new records ten times per year; approximately 45,000 records annually. (http://medusa.prod.oclc.org)

2) The standard way to search this database is through author, title and subject (Gibaldi 14).

3) Ask a librarian for a list of the periodicals available in your library. You will want to be sure the journal is available before beginning a search through the library"s periodical collection.

1) Library of Congress: "LOC offers a wide variety of online databases and Internet resources. In addition, the LOC provides an easy-to-use gateway for searching other institutions online catalogs and extensive links to resources on the Internet" Library of Congress Research Tools.

2) There are many Web pages devoted to individual authors. Some are unofficial fan sites and as such may not be appropriate resources for a scholarly paper, but they may contain ideas for topics and provide interesting information about your author. For example, a web page on Toni Morrison includes her views on the possible impeachment proceedings of President Clinton. While these views are not pertinent to the writing of a paper on Beloved, they do offer insights into Morrison's view on contemporary politics. Try entering an author's name on any of the popular search engines, such as Google, Excite, Yahoo, Alta Vista and many others.

a) Author's name

b) Title of a part of the book [preface, chapter titles, etc.]

c) Title of the book

d) Name of the editor, translator, or compiler

e) Edition used

f) Number(s) of the volume(s) used

g) Name of the series

h) Place of publication, name of the publisher, and date of publication

i) Page numbers

j) Supplementary bibliographic information and annotations

a) Author's name

b) Title of the article

c) Name of the periodical

d) Series number or name (if relevant)

e) Volume number (for a scholarly journal)

f) Issue number (if needed)

g) Date of publication

h) Page numbers

i) Supplementary information

a) Summary: A summary is intended to provide the gist of an essay. Do not weave in the author's choice phrases. Read the information first and then condense the main points in your own words. This practice will help you avoid the copying that leads to plagiarism. Summarizing also helps you both analyze the text you are reading and evaluate its strengths and weaknesses (Barnet and Bedau 13).

b) Outline: Use to note a series of points.

c) Paraphrase: Do not quote words and phrases from the original. Simplify the language and list the ideas in the same order. A paraphrase is as long as the original. Paraphrasing is helpful when you are struggling with a particularly difficult passage.

d) Combination: Blend the above techniques.

I. Introduction

II. General history of slavery.

III. The impact of slavery on Baby Suggs before she lived at 124

IV. Sethe's mother and slavery

V. Sethe's life at Sweet Home

VI. Sethe's flight from Sweet Home

VII. 124 Bluestone Road

VIII. Conclusion

1) A process of development that moves from the general to the specific. Deduction is the most commonly used form of organization for a research paper on literature.

2) The thesis statement is the generalization that leads to the specific support provided by primary and secondary sources.

3) The thesis is stated early in the paper. The body of the paper then proceeds to provide the facts, examples, and analogies that flow logically from that thesis.

Ex. A brief outline for a deductive approach to a paper on Beloved:

Thesis: The spiritual and physical enslavement of Baby Suggs, Sethe, Denver, and Beloved is shaped by chattel slavery and reflected in the houses at Sweet Home and on Bluestone Road.

A brief outline of the body of the paper:

1) A process that follows a plot with a traditional time line or that unravels a plot line that includes such elements as flashbacks.

2) A chronological organization is useful for a paper that explores cause and effect.

1) Begin with a "compelling condition or situation" (Sorenson 151). The first sentence of the following introduction to the paper on Beloved is designed to interest the reader. By ending the paragraph with the thesis, the writer leaves the reader with a clear indication of the paper's direction. The introduction is a kind of funnel, with the narrow end (the thesis) ushering the reader into the body of the paper.

EX. A murdered baby haunts 124 Bluestone Road. And she is not alone. The presence of the spirits of African women once chained in the holds of slave ships, flung alive into the sea, or brutalized by their owners intensifies 124's sadness and anger. Clearly houses provide no protection for the women in Toni Morrison's Beloved. Chattel slavery turns a plantation in Kentucky and a Victorian farm house in Ohio into crucibles for the black mothers and daughters who are trapped in them. The spiritual and physical enslavement of Baby Suggs, Sethe, Denver and Beloved is shaped by and reflected in the houses at Sweet Home and Bluestone Road.

2) Begin with an anecdote that sets the stage for the content of the paper (151).

Ex. No longer satisfied with pranks, the baby ghost at 124 Bluestone Road picks up the dog and slams it against the wall. Stoically, Sethe knocks it out with a hammer, sets its broken legs and pushes its eye back into the socket. After that the dog lives under the porch....

3) Use a quotation that reflects the theme of the paper or that is drawn from the primary source itself (151).

Ex. "124 was spiteful. Full of baby venom. The women in the house knew it and so did the children."

a) Transitional words and phrases are the tiny stitches that provide coherence within your paper. External transition: Words and phrases that are added to a sentence as overt signs of transition are obvious and effective, but should not be overused, as they may draw attention to themselves and away from ideas. Examples of external transition are "however," "then," "next," "therefore." "first," "moreover,' and "on the other hand." Internal transition is more subtle. Key words in the introduction become golden threads when they appear in the paper's body and conclusion. When the writer hears a key word repeated too often, however, she/he replaces it with a synonym or a pronoun. Below are examples of internal transition.

No longer interested in the fate of Sethe and her children, Baby Suggs, Holy withdraws to her bed and waits for Death. Chattel slavery has finally broken her spirit. Her only request is for patches of color. Grown weary of a world dominated by gray, she longs for a bit of lavender or yellow. For Denver, however, there is no escape. Lonely and afraid, she must survive without the grandmother who has been her only comfort.

b) Transitional sentences create a flow from paragraph to paragraph. They include individual words, phrases, or clauses that refer to previous ideas and that point ahead to new ones. They are usually placed at the end or at the beginning of a paragraph. Below are examples of transitional sentences. A sentence that creates a transition from the sample introduction to the first paragraph of the paper:

Before exploring the effects of slavery on the women of Sweet Home and 124, / one must first consider the effects of slavery upon black women in general.

A sentence that creates transition from a discussion of the fate of Baby Suggs to an exploration of the conflicts in Sethe's life:

Baby Suggs falters when she sees the scars on Sethe's back; for her they symbolize the horrors of slavery inflicted on one more generation of black women.

The use of Baby Suggs' name points the reader back to the preceding section of the paper and connects it to the next section, one that will explore Sethe's life as a slave at Sweet Home.

c) A transitional paragraph is designed to conduct your reader from one part of the paper to another. It may be only a few sentences long.

1) When you edit for spelling errors read the sentences backwards. This procedure will help you look closely at individual words.

2) Always read your paper aloud. Hearing your own words puts them in a new light. Listen to the flow of ideas and of language. Decide whether or not the voice sounds honest and the tone is appropriate to the purpose of the paper and to your audience.

3) Listen for awkward or lumpy wording. Find the one right word, Eliminate needless words. Combine sentences.

4) Avoid passive voice. "Beloved was buried without a name." is less energetic than "Sethe buried her baby without a name."

5) Be ruthless. If an idea doesn't serve your thesis, banish it, even if it's one of your favorite bits of prose.

6) In the margins, write the major topic of each paragraph. By outlining after you have written the paper, you are once again evaluating your paper's organization.