Templates for Research Papers

The following material is intended to provide you with some guidelines for organization of aterm paper. We have also included some examples of topic or thesis statements. Theexamples are not related to your class but are intended as examples of what type ofquestion you can ask for an art history paper, and what makes for a good – or bad – thesisstatement. The exercises on analyzing thesis statements and the templates for organizingterm papers come from Suzanne Hudson and Nancy Noonan-Morrisey, The Art of Writingabout Art (Harcourt, 2002). You might want to look at the book for further discussion ofwriting papers.

1. The Descriptive or Expository paper: this paper chooses a position which you will proveor substantiate. The typical topic for a paper like this is either an investigation of sometheme in the work of the artist (ex.: “Although the CoBRa artists did not personallyexperience the Holocaust, the theme of the Holocaust unites their works through style andcontent”). In the beginning to this paper, you identify the key points that are necessary toprove your thesis. The body of the paper then demonstrates the validity of each point. Fora paper about a group of artists (such as the example I gave above), this would includeexamples of works of art for each point. If your topic had to do with the demonstration of aparticular idea in the work of one artist, your points to be developed would show how thisidea is found in a body of work. If your topic is the detailed analysis of a single work, yourthesis statement becomes a statement about the interpretation of the art work and your“points of proof” become the supporting “data” for your interpretation. This might bereferences to earlier works as support for understanding a later work or it might bereferences to interpretations of works which are similar to the one you have chosen.

2. Argumentative Paper: As the title suggests, this paper is based on your establishment ofa point of view which is contrary to that of someone else. Example: “The well-known criticJohn Smith suggested that Alex Katz’s contributions to modernism are insignificant,whereas I think they respond to a comparable development in fiction writing and areimportant because they demonstrate the widespread influence of a prevailing cultural trendin the 1960s.” The development of this paper follows from an exposition of the argumentyou disagree with and an exposition of your position. To make this a convincing paper, youneed to be able to support your own position with ideas from other sources (in other words,it’s not enough to say: I think this is wrong).

3. Synthesis of the Expository paper and the Argumentative paper: The argument isessentially taking place between two (or more) interpretations or analyses. Both positionsneed to be developed. The conclusion to the paper is your synthesis of the two arguments,either by rejecting one and accepting the other or by finding that each offers somethingvaluable. A typical thesis might be something along the lines of: “Although Bradbury’sposition appears to be contrary to that of Barris, upon close analysis we find substantialagreement between the two.” You then outline position A (Bradbury’s) and position B(Barris’s) using the same categories (ex: Bradbury discusses the form of the artwork inthese terms; Barris discusses the form in these terms....) You then makes specificcomparisons between the two. This can therefore be thought of as a comparison paper,although your comparison is between two arguments or interpretations. Other comparison papers focus on the comparison of two artworks. This might be acomparison between two works of art by one artist, between two works of art by differentartists but dealing with the same subject, or between different media: which is moreeffective? The movie version of Frankenstein or the novel? The comparison still needs athesis statement which will generate the categories for comparison. The body of the paper

can be approached in two ways: either an analysis of each work, one at a time, using thesame categories for both works, or a parallel analysis of both works, organized according tocategory rather than work. The conclusion of the paper pulls out the points of differenceand similarity and offers an explanation for them and a discussion of the impact of thesedifferences.