History EE: Slavery Uprising > German Coast Rebellion

[lolkeinthatsghey]

My process of how I selected this topic: History > Haitian Revolution > Haitian Revolution's refugees influence on slavery in Louisiana > German Coast Uprising

I found this interesting article that stated the German Coast Rebellion was fairly overlooked for certain amounts of reasons (French Revolution, Haitian Revolution, Nat's Rebellion, Louisiana was not a state at the time). I would like to do my EE on this, but I don't know how I would explain how each of these 5 reasons. Would I do a compare and contrast of the reason to the German Coast Rebellion or explain the impact of the reasons on U.S population/historians at the time? Should I lower the amount of reasons to the most important ones (how many should the reasons be)?

(Though this is a bit less interesting than above) An article stated the German Coast Uprising had a significant impact on the statehood eligibility of the Territory of Orleans into Louisiana. So maybe I could look it impacts of German Coast Uprising on statehood of Territory of Orleans?

 

Edited July 21, 2017 by lolkeinthatsghey

[Nomenclature]

I wasn't quite sure what you were trying to ask about in your question so I've left two different answers

 

Answer for if you were asking about the "justification for the investigation" criterion and not about selecting your central research question

First, I'd just like to say that the justification for the selection of a student's topic is worth very few point(s) in the grand scheme of things. If you're just starting your EE and are worried about this small part of the process, don't be. I just followed my mentor's advice and focused two or three sentences in the intro on directly addressing the criterion.

I too had an essay that focused on race in the U.S., and I used a quote from personal research and alluded to race's continued importance in the U.S. I also mentioned about how federalism (something I focused quite a bit on) has been a staple of U.S. political and historical debate. Nothing too fancy. A variety of approaches can work. 

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Answer for if you were instead asking selecting your central research question

My problem with the statehood question is that it has a conclusion that I can already guess: It hurt Louisiana's prospects of becoming a state. That's not a fatal error, but it's going to be really difficult to score well with a question like this. It's possible that you could think of a more nuanced question involving statehood, but I honestly can't.

I like the question on whether the "German Coast Rebellion was fairly overlooked for certain amounts of reasons". I've actually seen an essay that scored extremely well that—though it concerned a very different issue—had a similar idea in terms of historical attention and historiography (you might be able to find it online as an exemplar essay; it's about Lyndon B. Johnson and Vietnam). I'd say start with all those topics and then you can cut stuff out. If you go over your word limit, something doesn't fit, or there's just something you can't get information on; then you can cut it.

3 hours ago, lolkeinthatsghey said:

Would I do a compare and contrast of the reason to the German Coast Rebellion or explain the impact of the reasons on U.S population/historians at the time? 

Good question. It's up to you, but I honestly think analyzing the impact of events on public/historiography is more difficult then analyzing causes. One thing that I surprised when reading the essay I previously mentioned was the how much it was focused on analyzing Johnson (it then supplemented this with historians' opinions). You'll obviously want some focus on historians/historical accounts, but you shouldn't be penalized if you choose to emphasize the actual event rather than reactions to the event. You should ultimately aim to have a bit of both, but it doesn't have to be even. Also, given the time and place, you won't be looking for "historians", rather eminent/influential people. Think correspondence of politicians, newspapers, etc.

[lolkeinthatsghey]

 

Thanks for your input!  I'll probably put more emphasis on the reactions to the event itself, but have a good mix of both. (Feeling good right now because I have a bunch of resources from newspapers, letters, and politicians on the immediate "suppression" of this topic!) 

 

12 hours ago, Nomenclature said:

had a similar idea in terms of historical attention and historiography (you might be able to find it online as an exemplar essay; it's about Lyndon B. Johnson and Vietnam) ... analyzing Johnson (it then supplemented this with historians' opinions)

However, I spent a good 4 hours trying to search for the exemplar essay you mentioned above. The closest I could get was one where it studied media's interpretation of Vietnam War, but didn't score really well nor mentioned much about Lyndon B. Johnson. I would really enjoy reading this exemplar to see how he/she analyzed Johnson and then inputted historian's opinions. (If you don't mind, could you try to help me locate it? Doesn't matter if it's the smallest detail e.g. on a website, from this person, etc.)

 

[Nomenclature]

18 hours ago, lolkeinthatsghey said:

 

Thanks for your input!  I'll probably put more emphasis on the reactions to the event itself, but have a good mix of both. (Feeling good right now because I have a bunch of resources from newspapers, letters, and politicians on the immediate "suppression" of this topic!) 

 

However, I spent a good 4 hours trying to search for the exemplar essay you mentioned above. The closest I could get was one where it studied media's interpretation of Vietnam War, but didn't score really well nor mentioned much about Lyndon B. Johnson. I would really enjoy reading this exemplar to see how he/she analyzed Johnson and then inputted historian's opinions. (If you don't mind, could you try to help me locate it? Doesn't matter if it's the smallest detail e.g. on a website, from this person, etc.)

 

I'm sorry to hear that. I will say you have an amazing work ethic. Because you weren't able to find it online, I'm pretty sure that I remember having received it only as a physical copy from my school and it was a paper written by someone who had attended my school. Thus, I don't have the paper and have virtually no means of getting it as I've long ago discarded any possible reminders of the EE (partly for storage space, but mostly for psychological reasons ). 

Sorry.

I will say though, that inserting historians' takes doesn't change the format much. Reading any exemplar essay should give you a good idea of what you're aiming for. Essentially, when you want to talk about interpretations/historiography all you do is you state the claim of the person/media/historian, and then just like you normally do you use evidence to support it or controvert it. Also, EE markers like when are able to disagree with an interpretation and are able to provide good evidence to show why the interpretation was flawed.

P.s. I will reach out to some of my friends who are in IB2 this year to see if they know anybody doing history and who has a copy of the paper, but honestly I don't think I'll be able to get it for you.