Is my history IA Topic specific enough ?

[Jessica W.]

My question is :

To what degree did the new deal improve american society ?

Edited January 2, 2013 by Jessica W.

[Kay Clark]

um is there only one "new deal" if not sure you should make it clear which "new deal" your talking about?

[Arrowhead]

No, your question is not specific enough. In fact it is too broad at the moment.

It would help focus your topic if you narrowed it to one aspect of American society and then one demographic in one particular time period, perhaps? The more specific, the better!

[alefal]

Hey there!

Although Kay Clark's advice is unnecessary (as the New Deal is referring to some economic stuff in the US in the 1930s), you are too vague in multiple aspects. In the history IA, you normally only have about 600-800 words to analyse the actual topics, and therefore the research question needs to be very specific. You would need to specify what kind of improvement (I advice you to choose only one) you are talking about and possibly also a time frame. 'To what extent was New Deal important in improving the education system in 1933-1940?' could be one way to narrow your task down. Of course, this isn't necessarily what you end up with.

Do proper research before you write down the final RQ. That way, you can identify the different elements and controversies, and more likely than not find a suitable topic for your IA. Preferably, you will end up with two sources, different in kind, that are central in your IA and that you will use in your source analysis. For instance, I base my IA on a politburo decision from the Soviet Union in October 1949 and a telegram from Stalin to Kim Il Sung in January 1950. These documents are both first-hand sources from the same government, but they say differing things. The politburo decision says that there should be no war on the Korean peninsula, whilst in the telegram, Stalin gives his consent to a Korean War. My question is, of course, why the Soviet government changed its position regarding a Korean War in these three months.

You don't have to find documents like mine, but you want to find something similar. Two first-hand sources that differ in view, two historians that disagree on a specific point (what did really happen during that secret meeting? Was it really his fault? Was it really this very event that caused this to happen?), a first-hand source that says something different than a second-hand source (for instance a diary entry about a meeting and news report of the meeting), etc.

Good luck with your IA!

Edited January 2, 2013 by alefal