In the process of writing the paper, you should be able to:
Justify the artifact and your methodological choice
Advance and defend an insightful interpretation
Explain the relevance and applicability of the interpretation
Paper Format:
Introduction (5-10% of your paper length):
In this section, you should introduce your analysis. You should provide a bit of background, identify your research questions(s), and state your thesis for your interpretation.
This section should answer the reader’s question: what is this paper about and how is it organized?
Study description (15-20% of your paper length):
In this section, you should describe the artifact you are examining. In doing so, you should provide a description of the rhetorical situation/background of the artifact. You can discuss why the artifact is worth analyzing and/or talk about the consequences of the artifact (was it positively or negatively received?). After discussing the artifact, you need to talk about your method. In explaining how you approached your study, you should describe what theory of criticism you used as well as what steps you took to generate your data. For example, if you looked at multiple texts, explain how you determined which texts to examine.
This section should answer the reader’s question: what are you studying, why is this artifact worth studying, and how did you study the artifact?
Analysis (40-60% of your paper length)
In this section, you should explain and discuss your research findings. Remember that you are making an argument for your interpretation, so you should use evidence from the artifact to back up your analytical claims. There is no standard way of organizing this section since it will depend heavily on the nature of your artifact and study. However, you might try to organize this section according to your findings. For example, if there are three main metaphors you found in your artifact, this section could be broken up into a discussion of each metaphor. As you discuss your findings, you are generally doing two things: proving that the finding exists and explaining what the finding means for your critique.
This section should answer the reader’s question: what are your findings and what do they mean for the artifact?
Implications and conclusion (15-25% of your paper length)
In this final section, you should take a step back from the close reading of your texts and talk a bit about the larger implications of your analysis.
This section should answer the reader’s question: how do your findings apply to other artifacts?
Deliverables:
There are multiple deliverables associated with the Research paper.
Video Recording: Summarize your findings in 2-5 minutes video.
Students can use a variety of video recording cameras and editing software (Microsoft MovieMaker, iMovie, Adobe Premiere).
Prioritize recording high-quality audio. The further the microphone is from you, the worse your audio quality will be. Recording indoor in quiet spaces for capturing high-quality audio.
Paper: Paper length should be 8-10 double-spaced pages not including title page, references, or illustrations and tables.
Requirements:
Papers must be 8-10 pages/approximately 2500 words in length, typed, double-spaced, 12-point Times New Roman font.
Students will use APA documentation style for this paper. All papers will end with a list of works cited, prepared in APA format.
Papers must be original. Plagiarism will result in an F.
Papers must be free of spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors.
Use APA citations throughout the paper. If you are not familiar with APA citation, check out the tutorial APA Guidelines for Citing Sources at the end of the course syllabus, course overview and reference examples.
Include a separate Referenluvce page at the end of the paper.