Jour 389  College Scholar Project

Jour 390 Department Honors Thesis

Jour 391 Special Topics in Journalism

You can do a “content analysis” -- closely study newspaper articles, movies, television shows or ads.

You can do interviews with writers, editors, agency directors. 

You can do an historical study or biography. 

You can compose and distribute a survey.

SOURCES

Often students need to know the difference between primary and secondary sources.

A primary source is what you will study. A secondary source is the work of other people who have studied a similar topic.

For example, if your topic is to study press coverage of Hillary Clinton, you probably would first start by looking at other studies or commentaries about your topic. These are secondary sources. You might look at studies on news of women in politics; or studies about news of First Ladies; or you might even find some studies that also look at news of Mrs. Clinton.

You will summarize these secondary sources in your Review of Literature, which is discussed in the section on Organizing a Thesis.

Your primary source would be what you will study. You will add to the previous work, for example, by studying coverage by Time and Newsweek of Hillary Clinton during her run for the Senate in the year 2000.

Remember: Your primary sources -- what you will study -- can be as broad as the field of communication: music videos; CNN reports; editorial cartoons; advertising in magazines and TV; films; special interest magazines on sports, fashion, biking or any other medium.  You can do interviews or surveys.

Your work can also be historical. You can study back issues of The Brown and White when women first came to Lehigh. You can study Time coverage of Vietnam. You can look at back issues of The New York Times on any subject from Darwin to the 1919 Black Sox scandal. 

Ultimately, your method should flow naturally from your idea.