This holiday, I’ve done a lot of research on my topic of
women involved in the criminal justice system and the mechanisms for their
re-entry. I’ve put in a lot of work so far, but I still feel like I have so
much more work left to do. The more I learn, the more I feel that I need to
know in order to write a comprehensive research paper. Studying the intricacies
and complexities of the U.S. prison system and particularly women within in it
always bring me to the edge of knowledge about one aspect of it, then makes a
hard left turn into a whole new question about the prison system that needs
further researching.
It’s good that I’m truly interested in what I’m researching,
but the challenge now is to narrow my topic so that I could do that topic
justice (ha! Justice!) in just 20 pages. What I need to decide is what very
specific angle I want to approach this issue from and how to incorporate the
more academic aspects of my research with the advocacy part without losing the
depth of the analysis I’m trying to construct. I also need to collect more
sources on the issue globally.
As I try to pull together this first draft that is due soon,
I have more work to do, but I’m still excited about engaging with this topic.
In the following weeks, I should aim to seek more support from my mentor and
other support from WomenNC and from my partner organization, InStepp.
Mina
Mina, Yes, the global aspects will also be very interesting and probably enlightening, or maybe scary! Interesting that almost every blog post this week is talking about "narrowing" down the topic, the result of selecting a compelling topic.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to hear more about InStepp. Happy New Year.