Planning and conducting gay rights research papers

Whenever you set about to write a research paper on a controversial topic such as gay rights, you are treading on rocky ground. Not that it’s a bad thing; just so you know before you start that the topic will have lots of heated debate in the current news. This could be a really good thing as far as planning and conducting your research goes. You won’t have a shortage of sources to study.

Gay rights is something that’s come into the forefront of the news in many countries and locally at the community level as well. Writing a research paper on such a topic is a good way to help people become more informed. On issues like this, most people tend to be firmly on one side or the other. You will find very few who don’t have an opinion or a stand.

Planning your research phase

Using some simple stages to walk you through the planning will speed up the writing process later on.

  1. Choosing your topic. You need to find an interesting topic that you can really put some passion into. It shouldn’t be too broad to cover in the scope of your paper. Focus it on a smaller detail. For example, this statement is too broad: Gay Rights in America. The second statement, How has gay rights in America changed in the past 5 years, is much narrower.
  2. Formulate your thesis statement. Take your narrow topic idea and formulate it into a thesis that you can take a stand on. There will be other people who disagree with your stand. That’s good because now you have an audience to convince.
  3. Find and select your reading sources. You will need to locate a variety of different types of research materials. This could include current newspaper articles, magazines and other periodicals, local articles about the subject in your area and talking to people who are directly involved with the issue.

Conducting the research for your paper

If you have decided to use unique and original research, you can conduct some interviews. Make sure you document everything. Your research subjects have to sign waivers to state that it’s okay for you to use their interviews.

Write an outline that incorporates all the main ideas that came out in your research. The outline will serve as a guideline for you to write your paper with.