WGSS Capstone Project and Senior Thesis

In the first two weeks, the Fall Senior Seminar is focused on helping students design their topics through brainstorming assignments. In class, students will engage in partnered activities to share and refine the topic they will explore in their capstone project. Students will then collect secondary literature and engage in secondary source assignments. For example, students will pick 5 or 6 sources and write summaries of them and how they would contribute to their project. Such assignments help students shape their topics, and allow students to see themselves as scholars in conversation with other scholars whose work has influenced them. 

It is also during this period when students must begin reaching out to potential outside readers. An outside reader is an expert in the field of the student’s topic, who can provide consistent and critical feedback on the student’s capstone draft. Students will receive feedback on their capstone drafts from the outside reader in addition to the senior seminar instructor. Outside advisors can be from any department, any field, and any school (including outside Barnard/Columbia), so long as they hold some expertise in the student’s topic.

After the first few weeks of brainstorming, the Fall Senior Seminar features writing workshops, where students learn how to structure a long academic paper and skills for communicating as effectively as possible through written work. For example, as an exercise, students will analyze works from previous years and secondary scholarly texts to locate core elements of the texts such as: the argument and thesis, methods section and literary review, how the writer uses archives and explains the connection between archives and secondary sources, how the writer introduces evidence and sustains an argument, etc. The seminar also features workshops on databases and research methods. Students who have to conduct research that involves human subjects must also complete an online ethics training course and obtain a certificate per the Barnard Institutional Review Board guidelines. 

Most of the Fall Senior Seminar class time is devoted to workshopping class assignments and early drafts of the capstone project. Students partner up and complete a peer review worksheet where they give and receive focused feedback on assignments (such as the brainstorm and secondary literature assignments) and early drafts. Once students begin producing longer amounts of writing as the semester progresses, much of the class time is devoted to making space for students to talk through struggles they are having and encouraging the class to collectively try to figure out next steps and provide support. While students meet in the seminar every week for the first half of semester, in the second half, meetings are staggered as students will use class time to work on their projects, meet with their outside advisor, and meet 1-on-1 with the senior seminar instructor.

Generally, the format of the capstone and thesis is as follows: an introduction including discussions of methodology and evidence, 1-2 substantive chapters that engage with primary evidence and critical scholarship, and a conclusion. Students’ primary evidence most often consists of ethnographies, interviews, cultural analysis, or autoethnographies (where students use their own life story as a window into bigger social issues). The format of the capstone project can be flexible and is open to any genre or medium, though it is critical that students budget the time, effort, and, if applicable, the necessary skills needed to pursue such formats. An example of a conventional capstone project might include a literary analysis written in Chicago style. Examples of nontraditional formats might include film or art projects, projects which incorporate performance, theater, or poetry, etc. Regardless of the format, projects must include a research question, use secondary scholarly literature to analyze results, and articulate the scholarly arguments students are intervening in. 

Since many WGSS students engage in interdisciplinary work, they may also wish to intervene in other fields, especially if students double major in an additional field, or pursue a combined major. For example, students may wish to interrogate questions in biology, environmental science, or art history through a feminist lens. Students are welcome to pursue an interdisciplinary capstone, though they must ensure that the project contains a strong WGSS component. Double majors with one combined thesis and students pursuing a combined major must consult with their advisor or department head of their non-WGSS major to ensure that they are meeting the senior requirements for that department as well. Each department has their own guidelines regarding double and combined majors.