Theses and Dissertation

1. Proposed Title of the Thesis: The title should be a short phrase that indicates your issue and standpoint. Make sure that you can define the key terms and justify the claim implied in the title. After you find an area of interest and narrow it down to a subject, you should again narrow down the subject to a topic. The title must be focused and specific, and researchable: it should answer some of the following questions:
a. Are there sufficient published sources of information on this topic?
b. Does this topic require research in a variety of sources, especially standard published material? If it needs only experience and personal opinion, it is not researchable.
c. Will the objective evaluation of sources and your analysis of the issue/ text lead to defensible conclusion?
d. Is the topic suitable for the available time and material, and the required length (say 50-100 pages)?
2. Introduction: Introduce the text or issue that you intend to research by saying what it is basically about; but do it in such a way that the very first sentence indicates your way of looking at it: introduce it from the viewpoint of your hypothesis. Because you normally take up a text on which there is some literature, the best idea is to begin by contextualizing the ‘issue’ you want to research: introduce your issue in the background of existing (available) body of knowledge on it. Remember that you rarely ever make an entirely original ‘research’ for MA thesis. Even if the text/ issue is relatively a new one, draw the reader’s attention towards the problem and perspective you will focus on and adopt in the light of the common parlance that most readers would take. In any case, in the very first paragraph of your proposal, introduce the problem and try to indicate your standpoint as you introduce the text.
For instance, you have felt or found that Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is not just a colonial story but an archetypal and allegorical journey into Everyman’s unconscious, a quest for conquering and understanding others which turns out to be an ironic quest in which the main character encounters and understands his own animal self. You see that the so-called problem of ‘colonial quest’ is more significantly, if more broadly, human being’s ever-repeating or archetypal quest for learning and conquering the world and other people, which ironically turns out to be a shocking revelation, especially to the civilized man in this case.
Now, you may begin by claiming that though Conrad’s Heart of Darkness is almost always considered as a story of the colonial mission and just that, quite another problem (your problem) is by far a more important one for a proper understanding of the text (or a particular issue in it). Then, you may also claim early on that the commonly discussed problem of ‘quest’ should be analyzed and understood from a psycho-philosophical perspective. Indicate what you aim to explore.
Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness tells the story of a white man named Kurtz who turns out to be a savage after living in the hinterlands of Congo. Most critics have emphasized how Marlowe, another white man, learns a lesson about how the ‘civilized’ colonizer is vulnerable to same human weakness of being inhuman when they are in the ‘savage’ situation. But, the quest and the illumination of Marlowe, as the narrator of the story tries to convey to us, should be seen as a quest into man’s inner self. In order to understand the central problem of the vaguely defined ‘quest’ more properly, it is necessary to look at it from a psycho-philosophical perspective and understand it as an archetypal-allegorical quest of the human race, which they begin with some ideal purpose and end with an ironic revelation about their own innate and invincible inhumanity, their animal instinct.
3. Statement of Problem: After you have introduced the problem and your perspective, raise the issue more critically and also clarify your perspective. The Statement of Problem is a critical introduction and problematization of the issue that you have found and which you want to research. After you tell the reader what the text is about, you should not only say what the writer/ text says but also state clearly what you think it must be understood as. This means that by problematizing an issue in the text, you should go on to say from what perspective you will to look at the problem, and what you intend to justify. In the Statement of Problem, you may do the following things:

• After having introduced the text, the problem and your perspective in the first section, now you may discuss the ‘problem’ more critically.

Marlowe’s journey into Congo is on its surface one that is made by a ‘civilized’ man into the heart of a country of the so-called savages. Mr. Kurtz, who has allegedly "civilized" the natives and brought them education, is enshrined by the Belgians as a being of supreme intellectual power and the principal representative of the forces of civilization in the Congo. But in the course of time, he has begun to demand worship from the natives while he instigates and partakes in unspeakably savage rites. By seeing this change of Kurtz, Marlow recognizes the decay and corruption of colonial imperialists. He sees how corruptible even the civilized man is. His ideals irrevocably corrupted, Kurtz's soul – not Africa – is the true heart of darkness. In other words, Charlie Marlow's voyage into the depths of the "Dark Continent" parallels his voyage into the heart of an immense darkness, into the collective unconsciousness of the human race. The voyage for learning about the exotic lands and the dangerous savages becomes a descent into an underworld of the universal savagery of all human beings.

• But as you do so, you should give sufficient (though not elaborate) evidence for your claim. That is, say on what ground you are making your claim, or on what ground you will prove it. Also indicate your focus and delimitation.

Conrad universalizes the nature and process of corruption of Kurtz, and the way he makes Marlowe’s quest symbolize the archetypal human quest that ends in self-knowledge. Conrad uses a variety of techniques to imbue his narrative, like a parable, with a quality of universality. The technique of the narrative frame, while looking like the medieval tale-telling strategy, allows the narrator to be a distant observer of events he had witnessed. And because the tale is related by an anonymous narrator who identifies so strongly with Marlow, the two characters’ identities merge. Conrad's highly charged and sometimes poetic language, clearly hints at the effect of exterior setting upon the interior landscape of the soul. His journey symbolizes every human being’s quest for knowledge, and therefore, he comes to. Similarly, as Marlowe gradually comes to take Kurtz more seriously – as representing all corruptible human beings – we see that the story is not a superficial indictment of the western man. Marlowe accepts that everyone of us are bound to accept the veil of Maya, the garb of social manner, and some mendacity, in order to sustain what we call civilization.

• If you think you have some relevant issues that you have not yet understood, you may ask them in your statement of problem. But the question(s) should not suggest that you are simply puzzled about the problem. You should indicate that you have a significant problem, which you have not yet fully explore. But, in order to understand the issue/ problem, you should also arrive at the answer(s) of one or more question. In fact, after asking the question(s), if any, you may suggest what you think the case is and how you think you should look at it.

Why does Conrad charge the voyage with several symbolic meanings? Why is Marlowe made to eventually sympathize with Kurtz? The present will justify that Marlowe understands and sympathizes with the savage inside man because he finally understands and accepts the indomitable animal force in men, including the civilized ones.

• You may even state your objective here, because there is no separate “Purpose of the Study” or “Aim of the Study” section. Read More...