The subject matter must be historical, meaning there must be some issue of temporal context or development.  Topics must lie at least 15 years in the past.  You are strongly encouraged to explore farther back.  It is short-sighted to imagine that only recent phenomena are interesting. 

Your goal is to find something of your own to say, not to rehearse a story already known (to others, if not to you).  So you will need a topic that is small enough for you to make your own contribution (and manageable in a paper of this length), but also interesting and significant enough to speak to broader issues.  A good approach is to start from some general subject that interests you, read around a bit in secondary sources, and narrow down to a specific topic.  Examples:

• Interested in education:  examine the use of the calculus in textbooks and course materials from some past era here at Berkeley.
• Interested in philosophy:  compare an essay from Planck's collected works with one from Heisenberg's.
• Interested in Einstein:  read and analyze his doctoral dissertation.
• Interested in the atomic bomb:  trace the development of the detonator for the plutonium bomb.

You need to develop a thesis about your materials and indicate and significance of your subject.  State your thesis in the introduction and organize the paper around it.  A thesis is interpretive, but it is more than just an opinion;  your paper must be persuasive, which means backing up your analysis.  Support the thesis with concrete evidence (and respond to counterevidence).  Be sure to provide specific examples and illustrations;  don't leave it with generalities.  And since the paper is an argument, the narrative must serve that argument.  DO NOT IGNORE THIS, AND DO NOT IMAGINE THAT IT DOES NOT APPLY TO YOUR PAPER.

Finding a thesis:  Take a problem-oriented approach — if something is not problematic, it's not worth writing about.  In the end, a thesis is an answer to an open question.  A good way to find a thesis is thus to ask a question:  why something happened (as long as the answer is non-trivial), why it is interesting (as long as the answer is not:  because it's new to me).  You have more leeway in articulating a thesis if the topic itself is novel or creative.  Some things that are not theses:

• Scientist X was intelligent
• Institution Y was important

Your paper should give a sense of why your topic is important and where it fits into a larger story.  This is an analytical paper, however, not a stirring narrative of triumph over adversity or ignorance.  You do not need a grand, global, "History Channel" introduction or conclusion with the verbal equivalent of inspirational music.  Pronouncements about man's eternal desire to know or the glorious future of physics are not necessary.

In addition, you must use at least one primary source, a piece of documentation originating in the era you are studying.  Examples include journal articles, textbooks, letters, manuscripts, oral histories, autobiographies, etc.  Berkeley has excellent collections of primary sources for the history of science, whether in the main libraries, the branch libraries (Physics, etc.), the Bancroft Library (manuscript, interview, and archival materials), or the Office for History of Science and Technology (Archive for History of Quantum Physics).  Also examine the links below.  You can often find primary sources through secondary sources.  If you prefer, however, you can also scan library shevles or catalogues to find primary sources that catch your fancy.  For suggestions on research with primary sources see the research guide from the Teaching Library (also available in the library in printed form).

Your paper must use sources critically.  Ask who wrote them, when, for what purpose;  consider what biases they may show.  These strictures apply to secondary sources as well.  Secondary sources, after all, are produced by the same process that you are engaging in.  Do not take them as gospel truth.  In constructing your own argument about the past, you need to do more than reiterating the views of your secondary sources.  Don't simply cite primary materials as ornamentation to a narrative already laid out in your secondary sources.  Think about them, make interpretive use of them, and build them into your argument.

Be warned:  There is a great deal of garbage out there on the history of physics, particularly on the web.  Don't expect to go surfing the web at the last minute and find adequate sources.  Websites are not always subject to the editorial oversight that assures some minimum standard of accuracy in books from reputable presses.  Ask who put up a site and why.  For examples of good sites see the course assignments.  Much secondary source material on the web is available in print in a more reliable form.

For citations to primary material not covered in MLA or Turabian, you should provide information sufficient for a reader to track down the original document.  For second and later references to already-cited materials, you need provide only the author's (authors') last name, shortened title, and page number (no pp., pg., etc.).

To lend direct quotations more effect, use them sparingly.  Save them for instances when the exact words are memorable or important.  If paraphrase is equally effective, use it.  Frame quotations with your own words to show how they support your argument.  Remember that paraphrases need to be footnoted, too.  The library guide to citation styles includes helpful guidance on avoiding plagiarism.

The paper is due at the beginning of class on May 7.  (You may of course turn it in earlier.)  Standard penalties for lateness apply:  each day reduces the paper grade by 2/3 of a mark.

Revising with a few days' distance will help you strengthen your case and improve your writing.  Try reading the paper aloud or showing it to a friend.  An argument, in the end, must be persuasive to the reader, so try to get comments from someone else.  The Student Learning Center offers drop-in writing tutoring.

AIP Center for History of Physics
Selected classic papers from the history of chemistry (construed to include much physics)
Classic papers from the history of chemistry (and some physics too)

Introduction to the UCB libraries
Library instruction and tours
Library research guides
Guide to primary source research
Assistance from library reference staff
Introduction to citation styles (you may use either MLA or Turabian)
Student Learning Center drop-in writing tutoring