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Tips for Picking Topics
- Focusing your topic is key. With religion topics especially, it is easy to get overwhelmed with the amount of sources about one particular topic. Pick a theme, event, or idea and start there. You can always broaden if needed. (See suggestions for narrowing your topic in the left column).
- Be careful if you choose an ethical issue to explore. You probably won’t want to pick something you have strong opinions about. While you can personally interact with the topic, remember this is still a research paper. Picking a topic you are passionate about might make it difficult to keep personal opinions in the background of the research.
- As you are browsing sources make sure the theories and arguments presented are manageable to use and read in your paper. There are many resources that are seminary/theological-focused. If you are finding lots of resources with high-specialized language and theories, you might want to find another source or topic.
