*drum roll*
I saved it as a word 2007 doc since I included a couple of graphics that would just be awkward on the blog. If you try to view it google's viewer they'll be messed up, so it's best to download it and then open it in word. Also, everyone in the "TO:" section has been emailed a copy.
So without further ado:
https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0BxkOVqHiahe1ZTdkZjA1NmItZjQxNi00NTJmLWJjZjUtOGMyOTFjNDhiMTc0&hl=en&authkey=CJ-DtsYH
*applause*
Thanks Matt,
ReplyDeleteIt looks like a complete Cap One proposal for an Integrated Studies thesis to me, and your tentative schedule for completion in the fall looks feasible. Given that your advisers are on board with this, you're ready to move ahead.
Two side notes that are more for you think about as you go forward, not requests for revision to this proposal:
1) in addition to the argument that the young are inherently more "liberal," which you seem to dispatch quite easily here, there's also the danger of a "so what?" response--that is, you might find that someone feels you're at risk of pointing out the obvious, inasmuch as the younger the Russian, the less % of her or his life was spent in contact with the old Soviet system; one way to address this may be to emphasize that the authoritarian traits you're studying have deeper roots in Russian culture than the Soviet era;
2) the statement that really jumped out at me was the comment about worldwide "biculturalism" of youth, with younger people identifying with a "global" perspective as well as a local perspective--this might be a far cry from mere old-style American hegemony and something new on the horizon that links events as disparate as those you are studying in Russia to the revolts in Egypt and elswhere in the Arab world; just something to think about for now.