My research paper is based on the mythology of the night sky as in how the constellations got their names, and it is also about the ancient meaning of the stars and how they were used in everyday life.  The purpose of this research project is to help the reader and myself better understand and appreciate the stars.  The reason for me writing this research paper is because it is a major part of my grade, and if I intend to pass the class I must write the paper.  Some specific points that I plan on writing about in the paper are how the Greek came up with the different names and shapes of constellations, and also explain how important the stars were to people who used them like a map.

Throughout my paper in also believe it will be sufficient to use rhetorical appeals such as logos, pathos, ethos and kairos.  For example, if I was to use pathos I would use great emotion to persuade the reader even if that may be persuading the reader to go out and look at the stars more often because they are taken for granted.  With the topic of my paper, it is not going to be very easy to use these appeals, but I will find a way after doing my research.

A small portion of my research will come from the documentary film "The City Dark" although there were not an abundant amount of information having to do with mythology or ancient meanings of the night sky.  Although, astronomer Jeff Kuhn says, "Astronomy is the oldest of the sciences.  We can trace the development of our inquiry into the universe to the ability to look up to the sky and see things that you don't understand, that you want to be able to touch and to understand.  Every civilization that we know about built a science around explaining the sky that was above them that they saw at night".  To me this in a great quote, explaining the importance and ancient history of the night sky.  Now days many people do not take the time to realize just how important the stars were in ancient time because now there is so much technology it is taking away from such things.

Most of the information for my paper will be coming from Internet sources and online articles and/or papers.  So far I have managed to find five different articles from the online library sources, but I plan on finding a couple more sources from Google scholar this week.  I do not plan on doing any personal interviews because there is not much that I can ask on this topic.  The research that I am working so diligently on is going to better help me understand, and elaborate on this paper to make it the best I can possibly make it.  In doing this research paper I will end up having a greater appreciation for the stars myself, and will also be able to understand the history behind the stars which I find very interesting.