Research Paper topics- spring 2016- ACC. English III- Mrs. White
*A research paper is NOT a report. Instead, it must deal with a specific issue and should prove a specific thesis. The following topics provide ideas for the focus of a paper, but they are not thesis statements.
*Remember to be as specific as possible when writing your thesis. Because your paper will be argumentative (taking a position), your thesis should take a stance on a certain topic/issue.
1. How did living conditions, working conditions, and religion affect the lives of slaves in the Antebellum South?
2. How did compromises postpone conflict between North and South before the Civil War?
3. What were the goals of Reconstruction, how were they implemented, and why was it given up in 1877?
4. (1850-1900) What pushed immigrants from their homelands and pulled them to the United States, and what was their experience once they got here? Choose one of the following immigrant groups to investigate: Irish, German, Mexican, Filipino, Italian, Chinese, Korean, Indian, Jewish, Japanese, Eastern European, Scandinavian, Arab, Greek, or Vietnamese.
5. Choose three “rebels in petticoats,” women who went against the conventions of their times, and explain the impact of their actions. (Susan B. Anthony, Prudence Crandall, Elizabeth Blackwell, Alice Paul, Cary Nation, Sojourner Truth, Mary Church Terrell, Elizabeth Cady Stanton)
6. How was the massacre at Wounded Knee a culmination of efforts by the U.S. government to move Native Americans off of their land?
7. What were the effects of discriminatory laws, such as the Chinese Exclusion Act, that specifically targeted Asian immigrants?
8. Should John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, and Cornelius Vanderbilt best be remembered as clever entrepreneurs or unethical “robber barrons”?
9. How did the Haymarket Riot, the Pullman Strike, and the Homestead Strike illustrate labor’s struggle to gain fair and equitable treatment during the late 1800s and early 1900s?
10. How did the 1911 Triangle Fire become the catalyst for social reform and the growth of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers Union?
11. Investigate the growth of monopoly in the oil industry, the steel industry, and one other industry, and consider whether or not this is fair business practice.
12. How did women find opportunity, liberation, but ultimate betrayal in World War II industry? (i.e. Rosie the Riveter)
13. Federalists vs. Anti-federalists: What were the main arguments prior to ratification of the Constitution? What was the outcome of the debate?
14. Lincoln-Douglas debates: Compare and Contrast the views of each regarding slavery and governmental power. What was the impact of the debates?
15. Civil War: Why did Lincoln issue the Emancipation Proclamation? How did it influence the decision of European nations not to recognize the Confederacy?
16. Electric power and related inventors: Analyze the impact of the harnessing of electric power and/or discuss the competition among the inventors who played a role (Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse).
17. The political cartoons of Thomas Nast: What was their influence on public opinion? How did they contribute to the downfall of Boss Tweed?
18. Muckrakers: What was the impact of this journalism on progressive reforms?
19. Anti-German sentiment in the US during WWI: What policies were developed as a result? What was the impact on German-Americans?
20. Cold War: How and why did it originate? What were its effects on US foreign policy? How have attitudes toward communism changed since it ended?
21. JFK and the Cuban missile crisis: What were the reasons for the US response? Evaluate the consequences of JFK’s actions.
22. JFK: evaluate his presidency: What he an effective president or simply a nostalgic hero?
23. Vietnam War: Was the role of the anti-war movement in changing American opinions toward the war? How was public policy influenced? (Or, what was the role of the media?)
24. Vietnam War: What were the social consequences? Analyze the treatment of veterans returning from the war.
25. Affirmative action in education of the workplace: Is it still necessary? Why or why not? Be sure to focus on historical implications.
Research Paper topics- spring 2016- English III, 2nd block- Mrs. White
*A research paper is NOT a report. Instead, it must deal with a specific issue and should prove a specific thesis. The following topics provide ideas for the focus of a paper, but they are not thesis statements.
*Remember to be as specific as possible when writing your thesis. Because your paper will be argumentative (taking a position), your thesis should take a stance on a certain topic/issue.
1. First Amendment: What have been the issues surrounding freedom of speech, press, and/or religion?
2. Fourteenth Amendment: How did the Black Codes, Jim Crow laws, and Plessy v. Ferguson take away the rights guaranteed to African Americans by the Fourteenth Amendment?
3. John Marshall is considered one of our nations most influential Supreme Court Chief Justices. What impact did three of his most important decisions have on the US?
4. How did the French-Indian War create tensions that led to the Revolution? (Consider fighting experience, the Proclamation of 1763, war debt)
5. In what ways might the American Revolution be characterized as a rebellious act of ungrateful children against a caring concerned parent?
6. How did the Gold Rush impact the miners, entrepreneurs, and Chinese who all came to California to find gold, and which group was most successful?
7. What role did the Alamo play in the Texas Revolution?
8. What significance did the development of roads and canals have on the growth of specific regions of the US?
9. What role did Frederick Douglass play in the struggle for African American rights?
10. What were John Muir’s contributions to the National Park Movement?
11. What impact did Nellie Bly have on journalism and the image of women?
12. For what reasons and under what conditions did children work during the nineteenth century, and what efforts were made to bring about reform?
13. What were the immediate and long-term effects for the San Francisco earthquake of 1906?
14. What pushed the US to enter WWI, and how did its entry affect the outcome of the war?
15. How did the media bring down Boss Tweed?
16. In what ways can the 1920s be considered the best of times and the worst of times?
17. What was the impact on California of the migration of people from Oklahoma to California during the Dust Bowl?
18. How did the New Deal bring America out of the Depression?
19. What does the short history of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League reveal about the position of women in the US in the mid-twentieth century?
20. Native Americans: What was the impact of European colonization on Native Americans?
21. The US Constitution: How did it remedy the weaknesses of the Articles of the Confederation?
22. Marbury v. Madison: What as the impact of this case on the American judicial system?
23. Indian Removal Act; What were the reasons for its passage? What was the impact of the Trail of Tears that resulted?
24. Manifest Dynasty: What were the causes of westward expansion?
25. Women in the Civil War: How did they contribute?
26. Immigration in the late 1800s: What were the difficulties faced by immigrants, and how did they adjust to life in America?
27. The automobile: What was its impact on America’s economy and society?
28. Tuskegee Airmen: What obstacles did they face? How did they influence the struggle for African American rights?
29. WWII: What was the impact of propaganda and its use in the US?
30. Manhattan Project: What were the reasons for/methods of secrecy?
31. My Lai Massacre: What were the causes? Who was responsible?
32. Hurricane Katrina: What cause the flooding in New Orleans to be so severe? What was the impact of the government’s response? How has the city/region changed since then? What was the political impact?
Research Paper topics- spring 2016- English III, 3rd block- Mrs. White
*A research paper is NOT a report. Instead, it must deal with a specific issue and should prove a specific thesis. The following topics provide ideas for the focus of a paper, but they are not thesis statements.
*Remember to be as specific as possible when writing your thesis. Because your paper will be argumentative (taking a position), your thesis should take a stance on a certain topic/issue.
1. Second Amendment: Why is there controversy surrounding gun control?
2. Nineteenth Amendment: What struggles did women have to go through to get the Nineteenth Amendment, women’s right to vote?
3. What do the Salem Witch Trials reflect about the social, political, and religious tensions of the day?
4. What three events were most important in building tensions between the Colonists and the British leading to the American Revolutionary War?
5. What were the positive and negative effects of the Transcontinental Railroad?
6. How did the Oklahoma Land Rush of the 1890s affect white settlers and Native Americans?
7. What was the importance of the Lewis and Clark expedition as defined by the challenges they faced, the encounters they had with Native Americans, and the knowledge gained about the newly acquired Louisiana Territory?
8. What was Harriet Tubman’s role in the Underground Railroad?
9. How did women contribute to the war effort during the Civil War?
10. What were the causes and effects of the Great Chicago Fire?
11. How did inventions of the late nineteenth century (1800s) change American life?
12. How successful were the early labor unions such as the Knights of Columbus, the American Federation of Labor, and the International Workers of the World?
13. What was the impact of advanced weapons technology in WWI?
14. What caused the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918, what was done to control it, and what was its impact on the US?
15. In what ways can Theodore Roosevelt be considered one of the best leaders of his time?
16. What changes did the 1920s bring about for women?
17. What was life like for children of the Dust Bowl in terms of work, living conditions, and education?
18. Why were Japanese Americans interned during WWII, and what impact did internment have on their lives?
19. What military roles did women play in WWII?
20. American Revolution: What factors contributed to an American victory?
21. The Whiskey Rebellion of 1794: What were the causes and effects?
22. Cotton Gin: What was its impact on the American economy and the use of slave labor on plantations in the South?
23. Mexican War: What were the causes and/or effects? Did the US provoke the war?
24. Pre-Civil War conflicts over slavery: What were the causes and effects of John Brown’s raid of Harper’s Ferry?
25. Abraham Lincoln’s assassination: What did Booth and his co-conspirators hope to achieve? How did Lincoln’s assassination impact the reconstruction of the nation after the Civil War?
26. Galveston hurricane of 1900: What were the effects on the city? How did city government change after the hurricane?
27. The San Francisco earthquake and fire of 1906: What were the effects on the city, especially on the Chinese residents?
28. Pearl Harbor: Could it have been predicted? Would the US have entered WWII without it?
29. WWII: What were the reasons for the success of the D-Day invasion
30. Korean War: What cause the No Gun Ri massacre, and why was it kept secret?
31. Vietnam War: How did the US get involved?