Senior Thesis Guidelines

Please note that these guidelines are intended to complement information about the Honors Program at Wesleyan maintained by the Registrar’s Office. This document represents the University requirements for all Honors candidates, including those in the Department of Religion.

A thesis at Wesleyan represents a very serious endeavor that will produce an original work of scholarship based on extensive independent research and fashioned through deliberate methodological and theoretical choices. Sources might include media, textual, and ethnographic, and other materials. It will be evaluated with the rigor reserved for this level of scholarship.

The advisor works to guide the writer, but not direct her or him. The writer bears responsibility for determining the pace of the research and writing, although she or he may ask the advisor for help in establishing milestones throughout the project. The writer and advisor will determine how they will structure their interactions, although the writer bears ultimate responsibility for maintaining the pace of the project’s progress.

A senior thesis differs from a senior essay in the matters of length and honors. Essays have tended to be 30 to 50 pages long. Theses ideally range from 80 to 150 pages in length. Only senior theses, not essays, are eligible for departmental honors.

Proposing a Thesis

Candidates must declare their interest in writing a thesis and a general idea of their topic in a 2-3 page proposal and a bibliography, to be turned in to the Department chair by the last Friday in April. The proposal should be a description of the intellectual problem of the thesis and the method to be used (whether it will be historical, ethnographic, etc.). Students should list three faculty members who would make good thesis tutors, in order of preference. Ideally students will meet with potential advisors so as to get feedback on the project. The department will determine which theses will move forward with which faculty, and may possibly reject some proposals (for reasons such as feasibility). Students will be notified of the department’s decision before classes end in May.

Please note that some faculty require or strongly prefer to work with candidates who have taken at least one course with them. Others may require coursework in the religious tradition to be investigated.

The student must have a minimum of a B+ (88.3) GPA in the department’s courses by the end of their junior year to proceed with the project.

First stage General Education requirements need to be completed by graduation in order for Honors or High Honors to be awarded. In order to qualify for High Honors the thesis should include significant theoretical and/or methodological reflections and not be limited to description alone.

Writers are recommended to examine previous theses completed in the department to discern some of what the work entails. These can be found in the department’s seminar room.

How to Get Started

While the process of researching and writing a thesis is done independently, you have five important resources at your disposal: (1) your course work, especially What Is Religion? and the Majors Colloquium, in which you learned about some of the methods and theories used in our discipline; (2) your thesis advisor; (3) the other members of the Department, any of whom would be happy to help you; (4) the experiences and suggestions of your present colleagues at work on their own theses; and (5) the theses of former majors available for your perusal in the Department’s seminar room.

So you Want to Write a Thesis?

Your thesis is an opportunity for you to develop and express an argument or idea that is important to you, in a manner that is clear, well organized, and supported by evidence. This is your chance to use the tools you have gained in your studies to conceptualize and execute an important and independent study.

Every department at Wesleyan has different goals and guidelines for the senior thesis. Here’s what we are looking for:

Depth. The depth of thinking and analysis in a thesis is much more important than its overall length. We expect that writers select specific topics that lead to a deep understanding, rather than broad, general topics. Methodological awareness is an important component of depth. This means that you demonstrate an awareness of how your thesis fits in with the general discourse of the academic study of religion and the scholarship on the topic of your research. How you approach your subject is as important as the subject itself. High honors is reserved usually for theses that include significant theoretical and/or methodological reflections and are not limited to description alone.
Originality. To be original, a thesis does not have to go “where no one has gone before,” discussing a group or tradition never before researched. You may, though, choose to look at familiar material in a new way, from a perspective that has not yet been widely considered. Or, you may opt to use tools and themes of religious studies to analyze a body of data that has not usually been considered from that perspective. Basically, the originality of the topic choice is a matter of degree. There should be something new about your work. Your choice of topic is in itself an aspect of originality. What will you build with the tools of our field? What results when you, rather than a professor, set the agenda for your work?
Structure. The overall structure you use to present your work is generally up to you. What we stress, however, is that your structure presents a sustained, coherent argument that develops a particular question or idea. Each of your chapters should contribute to the overall argument. All writers struggle with omitting material of great personal interest to them but of no practical utility to the thesis. A longer thesis sometimes is a weaker one because the writer has substituted erudition for argumentation or material of interest to them but perhaps no one else. Argumentation helps make the material interesting by demonstrating how it evidences your conclusion. The Department is concerned with the quality, not the length, of your thesis; we would much rather you revise and perfect an 80-page thesis than submit a rough 150-page thesis.

Refining Your Topic

Of course, you already will have had to do this when you submitted your proposal to the Department. However, faculty anticipate that the topic will likely change either somewhat or a great deal once the writer pursues more in-depth research. The most important consideration is that your topic is something in which you have an interest and on which you will enjoy researching (because you’ll be doing a lot of that!) You will have to spend significant time with whatever subject you select, and only natural interest will sustain you through the drearier aspects (every project has them) of the overall work. With that in mind, here are some suggestions:

You might re-work and expand an existing paper using a much greater degree of depth and methodological awareness. If you still have “unfinished business” in relation to a subject you loved but had to leave too quickly, the thesis is an excellent opportunity to take that material to a higher level. The paper does not have to have been for a Religion course, but it does have to be about religion and/or a religion (or two, or more). However, the existing work does need to be reworked substantially and not simply reused verbatim.
If you wish to work on an entirely new area, we ask that you select a topic for which you already possess sufficient background – in terms of courses taken – to allow you to complete the thesis in a reasonable amount of time. If you have to learn about an entirely new culture, time period, or approach for your thesis, it is unlikely that one year will allow you enough time, unless you are planning to do nothing else (like sleeping).

Thesis Timeline

Spring of Junior Year

Submit a 2-3 page proposal and a bibliography to the Department chair by the last Friday in April.

Summer

Writers are encouraged to pursue research during the summer, although this is not mandatory so long as the writer has significant background in their topic already.

Summer research money may be available for your project. Please consult with your Dean of Students.

Fall of Senior Year

Upon registration for the senior thesis, the writer should carefully read the guidelines provided by the Honors Program at Wesleyan page for important information regarding all steps of their project, including the specific schedule.

First several weeks. All thesis and essay writers must either schedule a meeting with a research librarian or attend one of the workshops provided by Olin Library in late Spring of Junior year or early Fall of Senior year at the latest.

Early November. Presentations of initial findings will occur in the first week of November in a thesis writers’ workshop. This intends to provide each writer with feedback and suggestions early in their project. Each writer will be asked to give a ten-minute presentation on her or his project and answer questions.

Upon registration for the senior thesis, the writer will receive “The Jellybean Papers” from the Registrar’s Office. The writer should read these guidelines thoroughly for important information regarding all steps of their project.

All thesis and essay writers must either schedule a meeting with a research librarian or attend one of the workshops provided by Olin Library in late Spring of Junior year or early Fall of Senior year at the latest.

Presentations of initial findings will occur in the first week of November in a thesis writers’ workshop. This intends to provide each writer with feedback and suggestions early in their project. Each writer will be asked to give a ten-minute presentation on her or his project and answer questions.

Spring of Senior Year

Start of spring semester. At least one completed chapter must be handed in by the first day of classes in spring semester, or at an earlier date if the supervisor deems it appropriate. This will be evaluated to determine whether the project should continue as a thesis or end as an essay. If it ends as an essay then the student will add a 4th class instead of taking a second thesis tutorial.

Final due date. The completed thesis is due no later than the date given for thesis submission noted on the Honors Program website. Please follow carefully the directions there governing submission. The advisor will communicate the result of the evaluation to the writer within two weeks of the deadline for submission.

May. Toward the end of spring semester, writers will gather with faculty and interested students to present their findings and engage in conversation. Each presentation is expected to be 10 to 15 minutes long. A presentation is required in order to be eligible for High Honors.

Evaluation

The thesis will be evaluated by the advisor and two readers – one of whom comes from outside the department, both of whom the advisor chooses – to determine its grade and whether it should be awarded no honors, Honors, or High Honors.

High Honors is reserved usually for theses that include significant theoretical and/or methodological reflections and are not limited to description alone.

Overall

Writing a thesis can be the culmination of the liberal arts experience. All members of the department enjoy working with students in this endeavor because of the intellectual insights and growth the thesis affords. It is an opportunity to draw together strands of earlier work and/or explore entirely new horizons. Please let us know how we can help you to make the most of this experience.

Don’t forget to thoroughly review the information from the Honors Program website for important information regarding all steps of your project.

If you have any questions regarding Department requirements, please ask your advisor about them. Requirements vary among Wesleyan’s departments.