How do you find the right topic for history EE?

[Guest ybscrewed]

All the ideas that I've come up with have been crushed by my mentor telling me that they are rather political than historical, or psychologically oxymoron. Then, how do I find the correct thesis? Arrg under a lot of pressure. Haha... rough draft is due soon.

[Ruan Chun Xian]

What are the titles you had before? You could modify them to be more historical rather than trying to create a whole new different topic out of thin air.

Usually you find an area or period of history that you're interested in then see what resources you have access to. Then you work around that, coming up with a thesis question that you could write about in 4000 words. It does take a little fiddling around and writing and refitting the title in with what you wrote. It's not crucial to have your final title for the first draft, you should try to start writing with a working title first and change it as you go along and write the essay.

[Guest victornumber]

Look at past extended essay samples?I agree with chocolate

[Survivor Rob]

Ive just finished my first draft for my extended essay in history this week,

The way i chose my topic was to just think back on what part of history i had really enjoyed over the last few years. I settled for the history of medicine and then focused on a key individual from this topic. Just think about which topic really catches your eye then everything else should be much easier.

The thesis can be a hard one. I personally think that you should stick to the thesis once you thought of it though. Sure you should have a working title but you should come up with a final title and then stick to it. If you dont i find that the essay can become a bit weak in places since the title of your essay kept changing as you wrote! It can also make the structure seem broken. But thats just from my experience, whatever you prefer its up to you.

Go for a thesis that you can argue with, e.g. 'How important was ..... in establishing.....?' If your thesis allows for arguement you can question your thesis in your essay; making the essay more easy to read and miore interesting. e.g. in the example above you can question whether or not the subject really was important in establishing...etc etc

This also allows for more histiography from both perspectives!

Of course all this really depends on what your topic is going to be, whether your focusing on an individual or factors etc.

I hope this helps!

[Guest Gunslingerstyle]

It would most likely be easier to help you with your questions if you layed down some of the failed topics that were too "political". Your teacher might see a problem where the target of your essay question is veering into deeper political issues at hand (e.g. "How Trotsky might have proved a better leader of the communist party than Lenin."). I think what he wants is a question that targets solely those events that you learned about in the course; maybe how they failed, why so-and-so in them was a success, etc.)

[Guest -caf-]

work around the resources u already have...saves alot of time and hassle and avoids any last minute changes to ur topic. mayb pik a quote from an historian and analyse it

[snowday]

Hey, I think that the key to a history essay is really that you have a variety of sources to work with. The topic does not necessarily have to be wildly imaginative, as the purpose of the EE is to be a research essay. Having said that, an essay on the causes of WWII is perhaps a bit overplayed; nonetheless, the research aspect of the EE is (in my opinion) most evident in the history paper, and therefore you will need some varied and legitimate sources.

Speaking from experience, I do not think that it is the best idea to change topics if your essay has only elements of another topic in it, such as politics. Politics is a fairly broad topic and can subsequently seep into many other topics; this does not necessarily mean your paper should be a politics essay. A politics EE is quite specific in what's expected of you (I do not remember its exact description, though one of my friends is writing a politics essay and I have seen first-hand how difficult it is), and therefore should not be selected simply because it has appeared in elements of your history paper. I think it is best to attempt to remove the political aspect of your paper rather than trying to make it a political paper, as the former will (in my opinion) save you a lot of hassle.

Hope it helps.

Edited November 10, 2007 by snowday

[Guest iber2468]

I think you have to pick whatever you're passionate about that have a wide range of resources.

I did Loyalist social classes in Upper Canada and had many historians to select with. It was a topic that I knew a lot about from elementary school.

[deissi]

I'm not doing History, but a friend of my sister's who did her EE on History said that it can be useful to select a topic which is local (like from where you live), since it'll be easier to get your hands on primary sources. She did hers on witchcraft in medieval Finland and searched through old church records etc.

[cixelsyD]

If you're taking a history course, do it on a topic you've gone over in class -- it saves you TONS of research time

[Guest iber2468]

Oh and our teacher told us to steer away from common topics like, say, communism in Mao's time or something because the examiners will be REALLY familiar with it. It's not cheating, but it rid of some restraints if you do a local topic.

[Guus]

I'm doing my EE on history too (American involvement in the Chilean Coup of 1973). Are you guys actually working on it over the summer? I've talked about it with some people at school and even though our EE instructors have told us to do research and write a draft, no one is really doing anything. One reason for it is that it's summer and we're out on vacation! Who has the time and resources?

[CodeRed15]

Yeah I agree with Crystal. Since I'm doing mine on History too, our teacher said that well known and common topics get marked more harshly since the marker will be more familiar with them and there could be a greater chance of finding errors.

[robertomx]

I'm doing a somewhat 'local' topic (has to do with porfirio diaz) so its HUGELY improbable theyll find any errors, although im not planning on including any mistakes. Just in case.

@ Guus, im working on it over the summer. not daily and stuff, i mean i wont spend my entire vacation doing that, but just getting some of it done. that'll make next year easier.

[__inthemaking]

I've always been interested in WWII and the events that occurred then, particular Japanese-American relations, so of course I focused on that.

Wirte your EE on a topic that really interests you personally.