A BA thesis is an original piece of scholarship that seeks to answer a manageable yet compelling research question. By answering this question, the author will help others to gain a better understanding of an important theoretical or practical problem. Students are responsible for developing their own research questions and they answer them by supplementing the knowledge that they gain from secondary sources with their own analysis of primary sources. In this way, a BA thesis contributes to an existing scholarly debate; it does not merely survey one.
Primary sources are the raw data that scholars use as evidence for their original claims. In other words, they are data that have not been interpreted by someone else (we find these interpretations in secondary sources). Primary sources might include, but are not limited to, philosophical or literary texts, government documents, court decisions, data sets, interviews, letters, speeches, films, and the contents of archival collections. Additional information about primary sources can be found here.
Please note that students who involve human subjects in their research, including as interview participants, may need to have their research approved by the University’s Institutional Review Board. You will need to plan ahead for this. Additional information can be found here.
The LLSO BA thesis takes the form of an academic journal article. Students are expected to write at least 8,000 words and they are strongly encouraged to limit their theses to 12,000 words (including notes). This translates to approximately 30–40 pages.
Your thesis should speak to the questions and issues that animate the LLSO curriculum while also reflecting your distinctive course of study. Although you are not required to write a thesis that grows out of your focus field, many students will be excited to do this. Others may have discovered a new interest through one of their courses that they would like to study in greater depth. Either approach is fine to take. We simply want to see you build upon the knowledge and skills that you have developed through your interdisciplinary study of law.
Typically, students write their theses in conjunction with the LLSO BA Seminar in the autumn and winter quarters of their fourth year. The final draft is then submitted at the end of the third week of the spring quarter. The BA Seminar prepares students to meet this deadline by requiring that they submit a 10- to 12-page research proposal at the end of the autumn quarter and multiple drafts in the winter quarter.
Students must be on campus to take the BA Seminar in the autumn and winter quarters of their fourth year, so it’s not possible to complete the LLSO degree while studying abroad during those quarters. However, it is possible to participate in a September study abroad program.
Although students can complete all of their LLSO requirements by the end of the winter quarter of their fourth year, graduating at that time will require them to submit their thesis in January because the thesis deadline is the third week of the quarter in which a student expects to graduate. This is about three months earlier than expected and it’s nearly impossible to write a successful thesis in such a short period of time. Therefore, students who are eligible to graduate at the end of the winter quarter of their fourth year should discuss the Extended Enrollment Status option with their College Advisers. This status allows students who have fulfilled all other graduation requirements to work on their theses during the spring quarter while remaining unregistered for classes. LLSO does not work with students to arrange Extended Status, and it may not be an option for all students.
Officially, no; but ideally you will have one. Faculty advisors supplement the support that you receive in the BA Seminar by providing specialized guidance and feedback. Because working with a faculty advisor will undoubtedly enrich your BA thesis experience, you are strongly encouraged to find one. Please note, however, that any student who plans to involve human subjects in their research, including as interview participants, must have a faculty advisor as a requirement of the University’s IRB process.
The best way to start this process is by determining which of the courses you have taken have had the greatest influence on your thinking about your thesis topic. The instructors of these courses are the best ones to contact. Any instructor at the University can serve as your thesis advisor.
You do not have to have a research proposal in hand in order to contact prospective advisors. It is enough to know the topic that you hope to study and to be able to explain why you are interested in it. Your prospective advisor might ask you to come back with more information before making a decision, but at least you will have gotten the conversation started and found out if working with that person is a possibility.
It is important to secure an advisor by the middle of the autumn quarter of your fourth year. However, you should contact prospective advisors as soon as you can, such as at the end of your third year or over the summer.
No. LLSO allows double majors and students in dual degree programs to write a joint thesis.
Not necessarily. Double majors may enroll in equivalent courses in another department. Equivalent courses are those that support students through the process of writing a BA thesis over at least two quarters. They are often called BA or Senior Seminars, Colloquia, or Workshops. Independent study courses, and quarters of a BA Seminar that are devoted entirely to independent work, do not count as equivalents. Students must take both quarters of the LLSO BA Seminar if their other major does not offer two quarters of classroom-based instruction and workshops.
Please be aware that, in some departments, the equivalents of BA Seminar I and II count for just 100 units combined, instead of 100 units each. If this is the case for you, then you will need to make up the missing units either by registering for LLSO 29900 BA Thesis Preparation in the winter quarter of your fourth year or by counting an additional elective or focus-field course toward your LLSO major.
All students who wish to take their other major’s BA Seminar sequence must submit the Approval Form for Equivalent BA Seminar Coursework to Sarah Johnson, LLSO’s Director of Undergraduate Studies (sej@uchicago.edu), by the first day of the autumn quarter of their fourth year. This form can be found on the LLSO website (see the Forms and Documents section of the Curriculum page).
BA/MA students must enroll in both parts of the LLSO BA Seminar or an equivalent sequence in another undergraduate major, if they have one. This is because the LLSO thesis deadline is earlier than the MA thesis deadlines. BA/MA students who write a joint thesis should therefore plan to submit an initial (but complete and polished) version of their thesis to LLSO in the third week of the spring quarter and then use their remaining time to develop and refine the paper.
In your second and third years, keep an eye out for grants and fellowships that support undergraduate research. Working as a research assistant on a faculty-led project can give you invaluable experience, while working on an independent project can help you to complete preliminary research for your thesis. A list of funding opportunities that may interest LLSO students will be posted on our program website.
By the spring quarter of your third year, begin thinking about the topic that you would like to write about. For advice on how to identify a topic among your interests, you can consult The Craft of Research (“From Topics to Questions,” pp. 35–48), which is available electronically here.
As you brainstorm topics, consider what kinds of primary sources you might use in order to explore them and whether these are available and accessible. For example, do you read the language in which these sources were written? Keep in mind that it can be very difficult to find good primary sources on a contemporary topic. It is usually more productive to develop a project on a historical dimension of that topic.
By the first day of the BA Seminar, you should have identified the topic that you want to work on and have some preliminary ideas about what your research question might be (the reading from The Craft of Research can help with this too).
Sarah Johnson, LLSO's Director of Undergraduate Studies (sej@uchicago.edu).