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[zhenzhen]

I'm currently in the honours humanities program and I'm really worried right now. I have to write my thesis next year. On the first and last two research projects I did, I got 2 A's. The problem is that although they both learned something from my papers and found the papers interesting, the arguments aren't original. In one, I applied an author's literary theory to his writing and in the other I analyzed the poetry of a famous author that most people don't know had written poetry. Is this normal as an undergraduate? I feel like no original argument = bad thesis and should not go to grad school right now. Do you have any tips as to how to find an original argument?

[zhenzhen]

I'm currently in an honours humanities program and I'm really worried right now. I have to write my thesis next year. On the first two (which also happens to be the last two) research projects I did, I got 2 A's. The problem is that although both profs learned something from my papers and found the papers interesting, the arguments aren't original. In one, I applied an author's literary theory to his writing and in the other I analyzed the poetry of a famous author that most people don't know had written poetry. Is this normal as an undergraduate? I feel like no original argument = bad thesis and should not go to grad school right now. Do you have any tips as to how to find an original argument?

[kamiakin]

Zen indeed. The question contains the answer, my little one.

[yellowtractor]

Zen indeed. The question contains the answer, my little one.

No, in this case, the quotation contains the question.  It is an enigma inside a...oh, nevermind.

Zhenzhen, we can provide original arguments for a modest fee.  Do you have your credit card information handy?

[zhenzhen]

Having fun, everyone?

[systeme_d_]

You're not going to come up with a truly original thesis statement until you write your doctoral dissertation.  Really.

Right now, for an honors thesis, just try to assert something interesting.  I often encourage my better students to make their thesis statement something they think might be outrageous.  Take a risk.  Then back up that statement with a compelling argument that marshals evidence in a conscientious and rigorous way.

However, you absolutely cannot come up with a thesis statement at all yet -- you haven't done any research!

Take your time, zhenzhen.   Stop worrying about things you cannot yet address.  It will all come in time.

[polly_mer]

Do you have any tips as to how to find an original argument?

Well, if it were easy, anyone could do it and we'd all have humanities honors degrees.

Ok, I'll be serious.  As I see it, you have two issues.  First, how original does an undergraduate honors thesis have to be?  To address that issue, can you get copies of accepted theses so that you can compare them to what you are capable of doing?  No one expects an honors thesis to be doctoral quality work.  The bar for the originality is much lower than you probably think.  Go check with the professors in your program and ask what they expect.

Second, the way to formulate an original argument is to spend a lot of time reading, thinking, and discussing your topic.  Look for gaps in readily available materials.  What questions interest you that don't appear to have canned answers?  After you have done your literature review and bored all of your friends and classmates with discussions on the topic, what are you left with that you really want to know the answer to?  Determining that answer will give you your original argument.

[drlanguage]

How to come up with an original argument (in my field, anyway):
1) Read the current and classic literature.
2) Keep a list of claims or arguments you think may be wrong or at least incomplete.
3) Pick one and formulate a basic idea of what *you* think.
4) Check the rest of the literature to see if anyone else has already said the same thing. If not, you have an original argument. If so, return to step 3, or revise your argument based on what you have read.

It is, however, typical for undergraduates and beginning graduate students to have difficult with this, because when you don't know very much yet, it's hard to identify problems in the literature. So if you are largely capable of understanding what you read and making a logical and well-organized argument, I wouldn't worry too much about how original it is at this point. Your advisor should be able to provide further guidance.

[verysneaky]

If you learn (i.e., read) enough stuff, you will start to notice a) places where other people are wrong or b) places where really vital facts are missing from the discussion. As previous posters have suggested, originality is often a product of learning (even though it's not always considered in those terms). So your first job is to go learn a lot more.

As far as a more practical suggestion: I think that many, many "new" ideas, and especially many "new" ideas from very young scholars, arise as a result of cross-disciplinary work (or at least work across subfields). Is there some topic, perhaps only slightly related to your major on the face of it, about which you know more than most people in your field? Say, for instance, you've done some upper-level classes on military history or on psychology or on theology or in cognitive science, or you just have a deep interest in one of these areas and have done a lot of reading. Can you think of a way to apply that body of knowledge to a corner of your own discipline?

[grasshopper]

I've never seen an undergrad honors program that required an original argument in the thesis. In fact, many Masters programs don't require it either.

A few weeks ago, I wrote something on another thread that is a pretty good summary of my understanding of an undergrad thesis:

In the humanities and much of the social sciences, the point of an undergraduate thesis is to learn how to do research, and to synthesize that research into an argument. An undergraduate thesis is really a big literature review with a point. The student is saying "I've read the relevant literature on the topic, I understand it, and I cast my lot with this group of really smart people who argue this point over that one. And here's why."

An undergraduate thesis isn't expected to contribute to the body of knowledge in a discipline. It's supposed to demonstrate that the student has the ability to find the relevant sources, understand them, and to turn all these different sources into a coherent argument. I'm sure that the nitty-gritty components vary from discipline to discipline, and from school to school, but I've never seen an undergrad thesis that required an "original contribution to scholarship."

[scheherazade]

I've never seen an undergrad honors program that required an original argument in the thesis. In fact, many Masters programs don't require it either.

A few weeks ago, I wrote something on another thread that is a pretty good summary of my understanding of an undergrad thesis:

In the humanities and much of the social sciences, the point of an undergraduate thesis is to learn how to do research, and to synthesize that research into an argument. An undergraduate thesis is really a big literature review with a point. The student is saying "I've read the relevant literature on the topic, I understand it, and I cast my lot with this group of really smart people who argue this point over that one. And here's why."

An undergraduate thesis isn't expected to contribute to the body of knowledge in a discipline. It's supposed to demonstrate that the student has the ability to find the relevant sources, understand them, and to turn all these different sources into a coherent argument. I'm sure that the nitty-gritty components vary from discipline to discipline, and from school to school, but I've never seen an undergrad thesis that required an "original contribution to scholarship."

Chime.  Find something that interests you, and don't worry quite so much about the original argument.

[commcycle]

Systeme_d is right. An undergrad thesis is a time to explore interesting ideas. Nobody expects you to "solve" a burning issue in your field, or even have a novel approach. If you can summarize current research, synthesize it, and discuss an area in need of attention, that will be probably be sufficient.

[thensomequestions]

An undergraduate thesis isn't expected to contribute to the body of knowledge in a discipline. It's supposed to demonstrate that the student has the ability to find the relevant sources, understand them, and to turn all these different sources into a coherent argument. I'm sure that the nitty-gritty components vary from discipline to discipline, and from school to school, but I've never seen an undergrad thesis that required an "original contribution to scholarship."

Huh. As an UG in the social sciences (psychology), I've specifically made sure that all of my theses topics (yes, I'm doing multiple full theses) are on topics that haven't been studied before, at least not with my specific goals/aims.  In one case, one of the constructs I'm using has only had three previous studies using it at all, and one study was simply defining and measuring the construct. However, YMMV.

[juillet]

But "topics that haven't been studied before" isn't exactly the same thing as "original knowledge that is expected to contribute to the body of knowledge in a discipline."  I did my undergradate thesis on something that hadn't be done before -- and I consulted a scholar who did a similar study who told me that what I was interested in hadn't been done before.  But it was only "original" in the sense that I was trying to pursue a question that had already been pursued in a different population (the study had been done on a mostly white sample; I had reason to believe that the answer would be different in an African American sample).

I mean, sure, your thesis shouldn't be a regurgitation of what someone else has already done.  But that doesn't mean that it's an original line of research necessarily.  I also think as an undergrad, it's relatively difficult (and in some cases unadvisable) to pursue research in an area in which there has been little research done, because the purpose of an undergrad thesis is to learn about the process of research and how to do an independent study, not to contribute something to a discipline, as was already mentioned.

I am also curious to know why thensomequestions is doing multiple theses in psychology, and why his or her advisor thinks that's an advisable course for an undergraduate to take.  I did my senior thesis in psychology as well and just one by itself, in addition to a not-quite-full load of classes and no extracurriculars, was stressful.

[thensomequestions]

Various reasons--mostly, a shift in my research interests and needing/wanting to show a commitment to this new area. The second project sprung directly out of my clinical work, so...

Initially, some of the faculty were quite opposed to the idea of me doing multiple theses and some still have their reservations, but I've worked with them to try to address their  concerns---I've done some workload lightening in other areas to compensate for the increased workload in this one, and winning our Undergraduate Research Conference helped as well, I think.