PREP Blog Post #3-Another Shift

Just as I thought everything in my research was going well and I was on my way to finishing soon, another big change happened. As I was finishing reading my book "Selma to Saigon" by Daniel S. Lucks, I realized it would be impossible to subjectively place influential leaders into one movement or the other. Because of the timeline, the Civil Rights Movement starting then overlapping with the Anti-Vietnam War movement or a few years and then ending makes it extremely difficult to work out a way to place the leaders in either movement when they took apart in both. On one hand this was an exciting realization, the movements are so connected that I can't even separate the political activists into one movement or the other. Then on the other hand it was incredibly disheartening because this creates a giant flaw in my project and basically renders my supposed data as useless and not credible. Because of this major problem, I had to shift the direction of my project.

Because this shift is occurring so incredibly late in the research process, I needed to think of a plan quickly. I talked with Mrs. Dobos and two of my classmates who are also doing history based research, and they helped me think of a new plan. The new plan is I could select figures who were prominent activists in both time periods and look at a speech/document/statement they put together in the Civil Rights Movement and then another in the Anti-Vietnam War Movement and compare them to look at common themes the two speeches share. Through reading my book, I have found common themes between the two movements so I could look for these in the speeches. If the speeches share these themes it would show how the movements were similar, and vice versa. In doing this project I have realized that not all historical research can be put into numbers. I think it would be wrong of me to try and push my last idea knowing that.

Now, my foremost priority is going to be watching speeches and doing analysis on them to look for underlying themes. I have to be diligent in this work so that I can get my data together. Along with this, I may have to alter my overall research question.

This is a big setback in my research yet I am looking forward to continuing on with the research a little longer and also looking at the problem through a different perspective. The help that my mentors have given me throughout this process is invaluable and I am grateful for all that I am learning throughout this process.