Where research begins : choosing a research project that matters to you (and the world) Thomas S. Mullaney and Christopher Rea

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Part 1: Become a Self-Centered Researcher -- Chapter 1: Questions A Topic Is Not a Question TRY THIS NOW: Search Yourself TRY THIS NOW: Let Boredom Be Your Guide TRY THIS NOW: Go Small or Go Home SOUNDING BOARD: Start Building Your Research Network  You Have Questions -- Chapter 2: What’s Your Problem? Don’t Jump to a Question (or You’ll Miss Your Problem) Stress-Testing Your Questions TRY THIS NOW: Run a Diagnostic Test on Your Questions TRY THIS NOW: Use Primary Sources to Educate Your Questions TRY THIS NOW: Make Your Assumptions Visible TRY THIS NOW: Identify the Problem That Connects Your Questions SOUNDING BOARD: Get Leads on Primary Sources  You Have a Problem (in a Good Way) -- Chapter 3: Designing a Project That Works  Primary Sources and How to Use Them (or, Fifty Ways to Read a Cereal Box)  TRY THIS NOW: Treat Your Primary Source Like a Cereal Box  TRY THIS NOW: Envision Your Primary Sources  Connecting the Dots: Getting from Sources to Arguments  Sources Cannot Defend Themselves  TRY THIS NOW: Connect the Dots Using Your Sources (in Pencil)  Taking Stock of Your Research Resources  TRY THIS NOW: Decision Matrix  SOUNDING BOARD: Is Your Decision Matrix Complete?  Two Types of Plan B  Setting Up Shop  TRY THIS NOW: Get Money for Nothing (Prepare a Formal Research Proposal)  SOUNDING BOARD: Share Your Proposal with a Trusted Mentor (Who Understands How Preliminary This Is)  You Have the Beginnings of a Project -- Part 2: Get Over Yourself -- Chapter 4: How to Find Your Problem Collective  Identify Researchers Who Share Your Problem  TRY THIS NOW: Change One Variable  TRY THIS NOW: Before and After  TRY THIS NOW: Map Out Your Collective (Secondary Source Search)  Rewriting for Your Collective  TRY THIS NOW: Find and Replace All “Insider Language”  SOUNDING BOARD: Does the Lay Version of My Proposal Make Sense?  Welcome to Your Collective -- Chapter 5: How to Navigate Your Field  Find the Problems within Your Field  Read Your Field for Their Problems: Reimagining the “Literature Review”  TRY THIS NOW: Start Your Own “What’s Your Problem?” Bookstore (aka Organize Your Field into Problem Collectives)  TRY THIS NOW: Change Their Variables  TRY THIS NOW: Rewrite for Your Field  SOUNDING BOARD: Find a Sounding Board in Your Field  Welcome to Your Field -- Chapter 6: How to Begin  Don’t Worry. It’s All Writing.  TRY THIS NOW: Create “Draft 0”  See What You Mean: Writing Draft 1  TRY THIS NOW: Move from 0 to 1  Perfection Is Boring  SOUNDING BOARD: Talk to Yourself  Welcome to Self-Centered Research  What’s Next in Your Research Journey?  TRY THIS NOW: Find a New Problem and Start a New Project  TRY THIS NOW: Help Someone Else.

"This book leads you to your research project while keeping your own preferences, abilities, and values centered. The authors place a strong and welcome emphasis on finding a research project that is right for you and that matters to you. The book includes student-tested exercises and many excellent examples of how-to-do-it and how-not-to. Each chapter includes "Try This Now" exercises and games designed to help you achieve a specific set of goals: generating questions, refining questions, discovering the patterns that connect the questions together, and the problem that motivates you--and other researchers. "Commonly Made Mistakes" are highlighted, as is advice for when and how to approach a "Sounding Board" (a teacher, mentor, or other advisor). At the close of each chapter, the key tools and exercises are revisited, providing a clear sense of the benchmarks you've reached."