Library Guides: ENGL 015: Rhetoric and Composition (Greater Allegheny): Choosing a Topic

Choosing a Research Topic

Pick a topic that interests you, but make sure it's workable too. You want something that is broad and current enough that other writers and scholars are talking about it, yet focused enough that you can cover the topic thoroughly within the limits of the assignment.

Choose a topic
A great tutorial that walks you through the whole process.
How to narrow your topic
A brief video tutorial on shaping a research question based on preliminary research and the parameters of the assignment.

Topic Shopping

Having trouble thinking of a topic that interests you? These resources will help.

Opposing Viewpoints
Click on "browse issues" for hundreds of topic ideas. Also provides persuasive essays, news articles, and other resources for each topic.
Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center provides research and background information on social issues. The database contains the essays from the Opposing Viewpoints series, supplemented by statistics, primary documents, links to websites, and full-text magazine and newspaper articles. Keywords: hot topics, current events, social issues, social trends, English 15, CAS 100, background information, general interest, contemporary issues, overviews.
Global Issues
Similar to Opposing Viewpoints, but looks at social issues outside of the U.S.
Offers current, international news and perspectives on a variety of topics and events throughout the world. It brings together an array of sources to explain the historical and contemporary conditions in a wide range of subject areas, including sociology, civics, politics, science, economics, cultural/religious studies, women's studies, and human rights. Updated daily.

Research Topics | Pew Research Center
Provides survey results and research reports on a long list of current and interesting topics.
ProCon.org
A website funded by Brittanica with the mission, “To promote civility, critical thinking, education, and informed citizenship by presenting the pro and con arguments to debatable issues in a straightforward, nonpartisan, freely accessible way.”
AllSides
Displays news coverage from "left", "right", and "center" sources. Use with caution as the categories are generated by users and reflect public perceptions of each news source rather than any actual bias in the individual articles displayed.