Junior Theme Blog #3

This week, I ran in to a few speed bumps with junior theme. My most pressing issue so far is my interview. First, I contacted an organization that connected me with a possible email interview candidate. I emailed her a couple questions, but the responses were pretty short. I'll have at least one or two quotes I can use in my paper, but I thought I should probably get another interviewee to supplement my paper. So far, I have emailed 11 candidates from Northwestern, Loyola University, University of Chicago, and other locations across the country, and none of them have responded. Very frustrating since we're supposed to have the interviews done by the end of next week. Hopefully I get a response soon.

My second problem is in structuring and beginning to write my paper. I began to write out possible points I could cover in my paper before spring break, but when I came back I realized that they are much to broad and I'm going to have to cut a lot of things out to make the paper fit in the 5-7 page range. For example, I was covering both the medical ethics of assisted suicide (having to do specifically with doctors and the healthcare system) and personal ethics (having to do with the patients and their families) within the same point. There is no way I could get all my information in that one paragraph.

Luckily, I've been finding some really great new articles and sources while I've been trying to start writing. One thing that I would really recommend is the library's new database, Project Muse. The first time I typed in my topic, I found a document giving the entire history of my topic. Of course I will have to corroborate my information, but it will be a great place to start putting together my historical look back.