1. What is the general area in which your study is located? This section requires that you locate your project with respect to a larger area of research. For example, for Linguistics you may have a general area of “stress rules in Spanish,” “discourse markers,” “non- manual marking in ASL syntax,” or “language development in Williams Syndrome” that are general topic areas that do not, in themselves, constitute research questions. But it’s a good idea to briefly introduce the reader to the general area in which you’ll be working. Approximate length: 1 paragraph 2. What previous work in this area has led you to your specific question? In this section, you will set the stage for your research question. Indicate what important problem(s) previous researchers in this area have identified, including what has been discovered or agreed upon. This is essentially a literature review. Then move to what has NOT been successfully solved, or what gaps remain, or what questions have not been asked. This section may include a discussion of research that deals specifically on the question you are posing, or it may be more general, depending on the state of research in your topic area and on the type of proposal you are writing. Approximate length: 1 – 2 paragraph(s) 3. What specific research question(s) do you intend to address about this topic? In this section, you will introduce your specific question(s), making sure to include enough detail so that the reader can get a clear sense of what you want to find out. Approximate length: 1 paragraph 4. Provide a rationale for looking at your research question. Why should we think that your questions deserve to be looked at? Why are your questions interesting? Who will care about the results? This section may seem redundant with section 2, but here is where you put together all the reasons, theoretical and practical, that make your question an important question to ask at this point in the history of research on your specific topic. Approximate length: 1-2 paragraphs 5. Specifically, how will you address your research question(s)? What data will you use? How will you get the data? What methods of analysis will you use? What theoretical constructs will you rely on? What will you do first? What will you do next, etc.? Approximate length: 2 paragraphs – 1 page 6. What is the potential broader significance of your proposal? When you have answered your question, what will we know that we did not know before? Will this enable us to ask or answer any further questions? If so, what are they?

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Sample solution

Dante Alighieri played a critical role in the literature world through his poem Divine Comedy that was written in the 14th century. The poem contains Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. The Inferno is a description of the nine circles of torment that are found on the earth. It depicts the realms of the people that have gone against the spiritual values and who, instead, have chosen bestial appetite, violence, or fraud and malice. The nine circles of hell are limbo, lust, gluttony, greed and wrath. Others are heresy, violence, fraud, and treachery. The purpose of this paper is to examine the Dante’s Inferno in the perspective of its portrayal of God’s image and the justification of hell. 

In this epic poem, God is portrayed as a super being guilty of multiple weaknesses including being egotistic, unjust, and hypocritical. Dante, in this poem, depicts God as being more human than divine by challenging God’s omnipotence. Additionally, the manner in which Dante describes Hell is in full contradiction to the morals of God as written in the Bible. When god arranges Hell to flatter Himself, He commits egotism, a sin that is common among human beings (Cheney, 2016). The weakness is depicted in Limbo and on the Gate of Hell where, for instance, God sends those who do not worship Him to Hell. This implies that failure to worship Him is a sin.

God is also depicted as lacking justice in His actions thus removing the godly image. The injustice is portrayed by the manner in which the sodomites and opportunists are treated. The opportunists are subjected to banner chasing in their lives after death followed by being stung by insects and maggots. They are known to having done neither good nor bad during their lifetimes and, therefore, justice could have demanded that they be granted a neutral punishment having lived a neutral life. The sodomites are also punished unfairly by God when Brunetto Lattini is condemned to hell despite being a good leader (Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). While he commited sodomy, God chooses to ignore all the other good deeds that Brunetto did.

Finally, God is also portrayed as being hypocritical in His actions, a sin that further diminishes His godliness and makes Him more human. A case in point is when God condemns the sin of egotism and goes ahead to commit it repeatedly. Proverbs 29:23 states that “arrogance will bring your downfall, but if you are humble, you will be respected.” When Slattery condemns Dante’s human state as being weak, doubtful, and limited, he is proving God’s hypocrisy because He is also human (Verdicchio, 2015). The actions of God in Hell as portrayed by Dante are inconsistent with the Biblical literature. Both Dante and God are prone to making mistakes, something common among human beings thus making God more human.

To wrap it up, Dante portrays God is more human since He commits the same sins that humans commit: egotism, hypocrisy, and injustice. Hell is justified as being a destination for victims of the mistakes committed by God. The Hell is presented as being a totally different place as compared to what is written about it in the Bible. As a result, reading through the text gives an image of God who is prone to the very mistakes common to humans thus ripping Him off His lofty status of divine and, instead, making Him a mere human. Whether or not Dante did it intentionally is subject to debate but one thing is clear in the poem: the misconstrued notion of God is revealed to future generations.

 

References

Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). Dante’s inferno: Seven deadly sins in scientific publishing and how to avoid them. Addiction Science: A Guide for the Perplexed, 267.

Cheney, L. D. G. (2016). Illustrations for Dante’s Inferno: A Comparative Study of Sandro Botticelli, Giovanni Stradano, and Federico Zuccaro. Cultural and Religious Studies4(8), 487.

Verdicchio, M. (2015). Irony and Desire in Dante’s” Inferno” 27. Italica, 285-297.

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