The ENGA14 Finnish Institutions Research Paper is a required
course in the ETI curriculum. ENGA14 exploits the expertise of
native-Finnish students in the society and culture of Finland in the
production of a supervised research paper. Selected papers will form an
on-line archive in Finland Studies for both general and professional
readers.
Required Courses Prior to ENGA14
For Spring 2013, the writing, digital editing and web publication of the
ENGA14 paper employs skills learned in PK5 Digital
Literacy and PK6 Academic Citation &
Documentation, both of which were required in the previous English
Translation curriculum. Students must have completed TRENPK5 and
TRENPK6 prior to FIN-1. ETI students should also have completed ENGA13
[or the former TRENAK2]
Basic English Professional Writing prior to ENGA14.
Topic Selection and Course Objectives
Paper topics may be selected by each student, but must be presented in
class for discussion and approved by the instructor. Topics should be
chosen from areas in which the student has a personal interest and ideally
prior involvement. An optimal topic would be of personal interest to the
author while also of professional interest to translators and interpreters
and the general academic community.
Topics must focus on Finnish 'institutional' phenomena. Students
normally write on topics which have not been previously covered, but may
also compare or expand papers or topics used by past students which are in
the paper archives, or create annotated
references or specialized terminology glossaries dealing with Finnish
topics.
The primary objective of ENGA14 is to illuminate or clarify perspectives
on Finnish phenomena via an English-language research paper while
demonstrating knowledge of academic writing per se, including the usage of
MLA citation style. The paper will be a learning experience in academic
exposition and citation, as well as digital editing and [optionally] web
archiving. As such, the paper will exercise multiple foundation skills of
direct relevance to the student's degree work at Tampere University.
In brief, the four basic course objectives are:
- Writing a supervised, multi-draft English-language academic research
paper, using the style and procedure commonly employed for such a paper,
as required by the ETI B.A. curriculum;
- Expanding the student's native knowledge of Finnish culture and
'institutions' and forming an archive of information on Finnish Studies
material in English of use to both present and future students and the
broad international scholarly audience;
- Demonstrating the student's competence in MLA academic citation and
documentation [Spring 2013 students], building on the previous-curriclum
PK6 foundation course;
- Demonstrating the student's competence in the HTML publication
[optionally for extra credit in Spring 2013] of a specified 'house style'
of the finished paper, building on the previous-curriclum PK5 foundation course.
A further key aspect of the course, connected to the first two
objectives above, is the accurate depiction of Finnish phenomena in the
English language. Emphasis will be placed on documenting 'official'
English terminology for Finnish phenomena. As terminology may differ
between national variants of English, students will identify their papers
as being written in either American or British English, with attention
given to accuracy and consistency of terminology and spelling, grammar and
punctuation within the chosen English variant.
Deadlines and Credits
FIN-1 is intended to be completed in one academic term (two 'periods').
The first period of the term will include class background meetings, plus
initial research and writing of the paper. The second period following
the mid-term break is for independent work on and guided completion of the
paper.
ENGA14 papers which have been fully completed on schedule, with papers in DOC format, will receive
5 ECTS credits. Optionally for Spring 2013 (matching the previous
TRENAK1 option), papers which have been (a) completed on schedule and
(b) published in HTML format following the PK5/ENGA14 'template' which
(c) include an approved [optional] independent research component will be
awarded an additional five credits, thus bringing the total to 10. Such
additional credits may be used as part of the student's ETI studies. In
all cases papers will receive a number grade.
The optional research component requires separate approval. Approval
will be granted only after the basic paper (which would determine possible
need for the research) has undergone several drafts and is largely
complete. In short, students should first write the basic paper. If time
remains and the need exists, approval may then be sought for the
research component.
