Your research paper should focus on a slice of infrastructure in the city and make an argument about the way it functions socially. In other words, your paper will address the themes we discussed in the first part of the class – what is the relationship between infrastructure and society? How do infrastructures facilitate or impede life for some and not others? How does infrastructure become a conduit for violence and suffering? You can use a question from our books – How does state power materialize through infrastructure? But you must have some sort of argumentative thesis statement. This will help you greatly in structuring your paper.
The thesis statement does not have to be groundbreaking, just argumentative…meaning that you can debate it with someone else and you can produce and frame evidence (your readings and observations about infrastructure in the city around you) to bolster your argument. For example, a thesis sentence may be something seemingly obvious to you, like: Transportation in Brooklyn exacerbates inequality. Then you can use your evidence to argue that and convince someone (me) that you are correct. Don’t try to get too complicated.
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