DWRL Lesson Plans - Audience

Homework Assignment

Assignment Length:

Single Class Period

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Cultural Context

Historical Context

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

For students:

-Pen or pencil

-Worksheet (can be filled out on a computer through an LMS like Canvas or Blackboard, or in hard copy provided by instructor)

-The image and article to be analyze (either through a computer or in hard copy provided by instructor)

For instructor:

-Without classroom technology

-Hard copies of worksheet, comic book cover, and article for each student

-With classroom technology

-Projector to show image and article

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

The Captain America comic book cover published in April, 1942 features a larger-than-life Captain America physically subduing a stereotyped caricature of Japanese Emperor Hirohito. This cover appeared shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, a historical event depicted on the cover itself. Students will analyze the kairos (Pearl Harbor and WWII) and the presuppositions about American values (victory through martial power, strength, an in-group mentality, patriotism, etc.) for this comic book cover.

They will compare the American values lauded in the comic book cover with the American values mobilized by the Sikh artist Vishavjit Singh. In 2013, Singh dressed up as Captain America and walked through New York City. He catalogues his experiences in the Salon.com article "Captain America in a Turban." Students will analyze the kairos (the Twin Towers terrorist attacks, discrimination against Sikhs in America) and the presuppositions about American values (diversity, inclusivity, etc.) for this article/ performance.

After filling out the worksheet on kairos and ideology, either for homework or in class, students should be encouraged to share their answers in a group discussion.

This assignment allows students to clearly see the connection between kairos and ideology by demonstrating how the same fictional character (Captain America) can be used to mobilize very different presuppositions and beliefs.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Instructors should decide whether students will be given hard copies of the worksheet, the comic book cover and the article. Instructors should also be prepared to answer student questions about the publication dates of each source, the relevant historical context and the larger performance project of Singh.

Students should also have alread been introduced to kairos and ideology.

Students should first be given preliminary information about the comic book cover and the article. They should be provided with the publication dates for each and told about the medium in which each appeared.

Instructions For Students:

I have pasted the instructions from the worksheet below. Before filling out the worksheet, students will need to know the publication dates of each source. The worksheet is also provided below in Additional Resources. The two sources are also linked below. My students took about twenty minutes to fill out the worksheet. We spent the remainder of the class discussing their answers.

Kairos and Ideology Critique: Captain America and American Values Worksheet

Name:

Rhetorical Analysis defines kairos as “both the occasion for discourse and the surrounding conditions that present the rhetor with opportunities and constraints: opportunities or openings to say certain things in certain ways; and constraints that limit what can be said and how” (9-10). We can think about kairos partially as the historical context for a controversy.

According to Rhetorical Analysis, ideology is “a set of presuppositions that influences most everything—people’s family lives, their political choices, their intimate and professional relationships. These presuppositions must be held by an entire social class, culture, or community” (185-86). Ideological analysis allows us to identify key beliefs and values held by a group of people.

Examine the Captain America comic cover from 1942 and the Salon article about the Captain America performance piece by Vishavjit Singh in 2013. Both sources are using the ethos of Captain America to make very different arguments. Answer the following questions:

What is the kairos for each source?

Are the sources “timely,” or, do they respond intelligently to their respective kairos? How so?

What does each source presuppose about American values? What values does the comic book cover ask you to share? What values does the performance piece ask you to share?

How do the values/beliefs about American culture in each piece match or mismatch the piece’s kairos?

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This exercise seemed to make kairos and ideology readily accessible to some struggling students. The widely-known historical events of World War II and 9/11 helped clarify not only kairos, but audience as well. We talked about how the recent attack on Pearl Harbor helped create the audience for the comic cover and how an awareness of 9/11 made Singh's performance all the more relevant and powerful.

I did find it important to emphasize early on that the WWII comic cover uses racist imagery to make its argument. We had a very productive discussion about how the dehumanizing of Hirohito effectively concealed certain American ideological values like diversity while emphasizing others like exceptionalism and martial power.

Additional Resources:

April 1942 Captain America War Propaganda Comic Book Cover (Captain America punches a Monstrous Emperor Hirohito while Pearl Harbor Unfolds at their Feet)

Sept. 2013 Salon.com "Captain America in a Turban" (Sikh artist Vishavjit Singh describes his experience dressing up as Captain America and walking the streets of New York City)

Worksheet for Students:

Kairos and Ideology Critique: Captain America and American Values Worksheet

Name:

What is the kairos for each source?

Are the sources “timely,” or, do they respond intelligently to their respective kairos? How so?

What does each source presuppose about American values? What values does the comic book cover ask you to share? What values does the performance piece ask you to share?

How do the values/beliefs about American culture in each piece match or mismatch the piece’s kairos?

Course Type:

Course Description:

I used this lesson plan in RHE 309k: The Rhetoric of Superheroes, an intermediate writing course with special topics chosen each semester by the instructors. Students are taught writing, research, rhetorical analysis, and invention.

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Ethos and Online Dating 2.0 - Incorporating Visuals

Cate Blouke — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 15:54:10 +0000

Author:

Cate Blouke

Image Credit:

Image from The Dating Game scene in Mallrats. Found on The Baltimore Chop website.

Brief Assignment Overview:

A remix of a previous lesson plan, this exercise asks students to analyze the ethos of an online dating profile and then pair it with an appropriate image - drawing on the relationship between written and visual rhetoric.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Social Media

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This works as a great introduction to the concepts of ethos, audience, and/or visual rhetoric.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

In theory, you could do this assignment without classroom technology, though an internet connection and projector would be ideal.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Early in the Semester

#A - twocentsworth. "Studious." Flickr.com. 3 June 2008.

Full Assignment Description:

This is an update on a previous lesson plan: Teaching Ethos Using Online Dating Profiles, which relies strictly on textual analysis. As I explain in that plan, "Perhaps more so than any other piece of writing, and even more so than my students' facebook pages, the self-summaries presented in online dating profiles are fundamentally arguments of ethos. Regardless of specific rhetorical aim (a casual hook up, a future spouse, or something in between), at heart, each of these texts is saying to readers, 'this is who I am, accept me.' So they seemed like a great source text to get my students really thinking about how and why they evaluate people: what sort of snap judgements they make, how they read into things without even realizing it."

In this version (re-designed for my Introduction to Visual Rhetoric course this semester), I ask students to draw connections between written ethos/self-presentation and pieces of visual rhetoric. I offer them a written profile alongside a series of pictures of eligible "bachelors" to choose from. They then had to make the case for why they thought a particular image fit the written profile.

For this specific class, we had just begun a unit on style, and my students had been reading excerpts from Barry Brummett's A Rhetoric of Style and Stuart Ewan's All Consuming Images. Our discussion, therefore, focused a lot on the stylistic choices in the images and how those might be read as reflections of particular values indicated in the written profile. While those readings and that framework aren't necessary for this exercise, they did help to get my students grounded in the way they read people's visual style. Without this kind of foregrounding, you may end up having to do a fair bit of extra wrangling to get students to articulate why they draw the conclusions they do (i.e. how they connect mustaches with driving a Vespa). But that can be a great discussion - forcing them to confront/explain the assumptions they make.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

I spent a fair bit of time compiling a set of "bachelor" photos from creative commons liscenced images that I found on the web, rather than using people's actual OKCupid profile pictures. I'd recommend just using the ones I've put together (see below), though you're welcome to make your own. The idea of using actual images from OKCupid profiles didn't sit well with me, even if they are publicly available. It seems like an invasion of privacy (in a way), or at least a kind of appropriation that I'm not comfortable with. The written profile I excerpted was previously a public page but has since been taken down/made private - which means if you have students do this as a homework assignment or on computers, they can't just google some key phrases to find the actual profile (one of the downfalls of the previous lesson plan).

I tried to compile a diversity of styles that nevertheless might fit with the written profile, as well as some that I thought clearly didn't fit. However, I was surprised by my students' responses. There were multiple votes for five of the seven images - a much wider range than I anticipated.

Instructions For Students:

In our introduction to the concept of style, we also talked about the idea of "ethos" - the character, or sense of authority, that one presents to the world, either through writing (as you may have addressed in previous rhetoric courses) or (for our purposes) through style.

This unit is all about thinking through the assumptions we make about, or (more kindly) ways in which we read, both the styles of others and our own styles. What we think of a particular style or clothing item isn't necessarily the same as how others view it.

There is, perhaps, no clearer instance of an argument based on character (and style) than online dating profiles. Each person's profile essentially makes the argument that "you should date me because of who I am." These arguments are paired with a selection of images, presumably chosen to cast the author in his or her most favorable light. On the free online dating site OkCupid, users combine images of themselves with written self-summaries in order to convince potential matches to give them a chance.

For this exercise, read over the written dating profile below, and then review the potential images. Your task will be to pair the written profile with one of the possible images. We'll assume that all elements of the image were carefully crafted/selected for this particular purpose/venue.

Questions to consider in making your choice: What kind of person does this profile describe? What does he value/care about? Which image do you think best reflects those values or that style?

Write a few sentences explaining your choice. Be sure to offer evidence for your analysis. Why does this image/person seem most fitting to you? What kinds of things about the man's style do you infer from the image? How, specifically, does that connect with the written description? You might also include your rationale for eliminating other potential options.

Keep in mind that you want to think about the "big picture" of this profile. While one or two aspects of the written part might point toward a particular image, is that image wholly congruent with the rest of the profile?

The Written Profile:

I have a yearning to explore different territory. To frolic in a refreshing mist atop the Yellow Mountains of Mainland China. To play with other great musicians. To watch shows in the opera house of Lyon, with an intermission of French kids break dancing outside the hall. To cook my own recipe in a Paul Bocuse culinary. These are things that most of my homies won't touch. Lest we forget, I am an abnormal guy; and I am looking for an extraordinary girl.

I want a girl who can be fun and adventurous. The kind of girl who isn't too afraid to suddenly break out of a three-day isolation and take a road trip across the country on a 1987 Vespa which I am convinced can take at least another hundred thousand miles.

Interestingly, my most passionate relationships involved completely contradictory personalities. Speaking of character--unfortunately, not all of us can be satisfied with pixellated photos and interview format autobiographies. Call me old-school, but coffee and a heated intellectual conversation beats the hell out of a 9 day back and forth email chat marathon. If you want to get to know me, call me. Tell me about yourself. Talk to me about politics. What is really important to you? I never get tired of meeting new and inherently good people.

The Potential Bachelors:

Bachelors.jpg

Image Credits:

#B - Mosborne01. "Ashs-student-playing-guitar." Wikimedia Commons. 1 July 2010.

#C - torbakhopper. "Cool Dude." Wikimedia Commons. 10 Nov 2011.

#D - Chris Hunkeler. "Running with Music." Flickr.com. 5 May 2013.

#E - siuhonglo. "Singapore Flyer." Flickr.com. Aug 27 2011.

#F - connerdowney. "7 - Meditation." Flickr.com. 08 Jan 2009.

#G - sadly, I have lost the citation information for this one. I know it was CC licensed, though. I will post citation if I can find it again.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This was in in-class exercise, so it wasn't evaluated.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students really enjoyed the exercise, and I was surprised by the arguments they made for one image over another. It fostered a lively conversation about stereotypes and assumptions (particularly the way they read the image of bachelor #C).

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE 315 - Introduction to Visual Rhetoric

With the rise of new media and network television, Americans are exposed to thousands upon thousands of images on a daily basis. From our facebook streams to our television viewing choices to our personal email accounts, we are bombarded with images: of celebrities, of politicians, of consumer goods, of natural disasters, of… cats. And we must filter through it all in order to make sense of our world.

In this course we will explore the ways in which images can be read, analyzed, constructed, and manipulated. We will interrogate how images inform our reading of historical and political events, of personal identity, of public and private spaces. We will think through issues of self-presentation: how our stylistic choices convey messages to the world around us, and how we interpret the choices of others. We will look at the spaces we frequent and consider the rhetorical effects of everything from the architecture to the furniture to lighting. In short, we will investigate how the visual (non-linguistic, non-textual) world conveys its messages.

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The (Selling) Powers of a Good Cry

lazhu — Sat, 08 Mar 2014 05:31:18 +0000

Author:

Lily Zhu

Image Credit:

A popular meme

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students will look at a series of popular, “sad” advertisements and discuss the ways in which certain commercials have successfully tapped into elements of rhetoric specific to viral videos. Through this, students will expand their understanding of argumentation to include the very relatable perspective of consumerism.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Assignment Length:

Partial Class Period

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Citation

Writing Process

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Audio

Multimedia

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This assignment acts as a transition point from Unit 1 (summary) to Unit 2 (analysis), ideally introduced the day Paper 1.2 is turned in. Since this activity functions primarily as an introduction to Unit 2, students will be expected to apply Unit 1 concepts – such as summary and kairos – with an additional, analytical dimension. Though not all students studied rhetorical analysis in high school, a brief overview of ethos, logos, and pathos will suffice for this assignment. They will be paying particular attention to intended audience and the ways that it might impact choices in rhetorical strategies.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

As long as the instructor has access to a console/projector, that should be enough.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

This can be both an informal or formal exercise depending on the instructor’s preference.

I split the students into two groups and showed students two video advertisements with vastly different strategies. Half of the class focused on visual rhetoric and the other half focused on verbal, written, and aural rhetoric. Each student was given a table where they would cite a piece of evidence from the text and then explain, in detail, how it contributed to the company’s persuasive effectiveness based on intended audience. Students presented their findings in a back-and-forth fashion between groups and eventually came to understand that rhetorical strategies often work as a cohesive unit rather than measurable, separated components (whether that’s ethos, pathos, and logos working together, or visual, verbal, and aural interactions).

The first advertisement was Chipotle’s high-budget “The Scarecrow.” The ensuing discussion included not just the ad itself, but Chipotle’s situated brand, its parent company, and the smartphone game app associated with the video. In addition, there is an edited version of this same advertisement,“Chipotle Scarecrow (Honest version),” which critiques the hypocrisy and consumerist qualities of the original; this commentary is a nice complement and is a good example of the analytical thinking necessary to writing Paper 2.1.

The second advertisement (“Giving is the Best Communication”) is from Thailand, funded by a massive communications company (True Move H) and contains very little dialogue and text, but makes great use of lighting, music, camera angle, etc. Students have to think a little more creatively to truly analyze it. Many of the students enjoyed viewing and discussing this one and even offered suggestions for further videos to dissect, including “Silence of Love” – a Thai advertisement for life insurance. Life insurance is obviously a sensitive topic which makes this commercial even more interesting. Be warned, half of my class teared up/cried after viewing it.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Watch through all of the commercials so you have a sense of what overlapping strategies are used, how cultural relativism may tie in, etc. There are too many points to cover with these commercials, so be sure to prepare and pick out what you think is most important and relevant to your syllabus.

Instructions For Students:

Watch and take notes on each commercial.

Decide on the intended audience

The notes should be detailed and organized as follows:

Evidence from the commercial – corresponding analysis

Prepare for a discussion about the advertisements’ effectiveness based on audience/kairos

Evaluation Suggestions:

Participation and/or worksheet completion

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

Students really took to this, which is unsurprising. The advertisements chosen above went viral because they’re engaging to watch. This eventually grew into a larger conversation about advertisement tropes (in particular, those involved in car commercials).

Course Type:

Course Description:

Rhetoric 306 is a course designed to introduce students to the fundamentals of research and argumentation. They are asked to research a controversy, summarize and analyze the arguments of the major stakeholders in that controversy, and then develop their own arguments.

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Inventing Audience: Lessons from the Marketing Department

Wise — Mon, 23 Sep 2013 21:57:24 +0000

Author:

Beck Wise

Image Credit:

Image by marc f c, CC BY 2.0 (source).

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students work in groups to invent a person with a complete backstory, to whom they'll address an argument. This assists them to think about identifying a clear and specific ideal audience, as well as how they might tailor an argument to best address their reader.

Type of Assignment:

No Classroom Technology Required

Assignment Length:

Single Class Period

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Audience

Invention

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Invention

Pre-Writing

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Collaboration

Presentations

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Some way for students to write collaboratively and display their work to the class; I usually use big sheets of papers and markers, but you might also have students compose digitally and display their work using a projector at the front of the classroom.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

Students are asked to work in small groups to invent a single person to represent their ideal audience for some argument they wish to put forward. Their person should have a name and comprehensive backstory, and students should be able to identify which of their person's attributes make them a potentially receptive audience for their argument. They'll invent their person in groups of 3 to 5, then nominate one person to present to the class.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

Identify an issue about which you want students to make (well, plan) their argument; this might be related to the course topic or a current local issue. I select and bring to class one or two short informational articles about the issue to ensure everyone is on the same page.

You should prepare one or two example 'people' in advance to offer students a model; I generally go with one fairly straightforward example and one that's a bit more off-beat.

Last semester, I did this exercise the week Google Fiber announced plans to expand into Austin, so I adopted that as my theme for the exercise. I invented two people who might be interested in Google Fiber and prepared dot-point summaries of their lives, which I presented to the class as informal narratives:

Stefan, aged 36, is a father of two and has recently returned to work after primarily working in the home for a couple of years while his kids were tiny; now that they're old enough to be in the less-expensive toddlers room at daycare, he's trying to get back into his old field as a web developer, but finding it a bit tough after only booking a couple of freelance gigs in the last five years. In the meantime, he's taken a 30-hour-a-week retail gig to bring in some extra cash and is taking online courses (maybe a MOOC, maybe through the local community college) to refresh his design skills. His partner is a high-powered lawyer, working full-time with a long commute -- and she got accustomed to having Stefan at home the last two years, so tends to bring work home or slack off completely when she gets home. Stefan still carries the main burden of household labour and child-rearing, so dude is BUSY! He tries to keep up on current affairs in tech -- since that's related to his job -- and reads Wired, but generally only catches the in-brief sections in between kid demands, so I'd target my argument there. He'd be interested in Google Fiber to make his online course-taking easier, as well as for the opportunity it offers to park the kids in front of streaming cartoons while he does homework or housework -- it'd also allow him to cut his cable bill in favour of streaming options, saving the household money that could go towards childcare (immediate need) or the kids' college educations (long-term) ... or maybe a much-needed holiday!

Instructions For Students:

Your task, as a group, is to invent a person to whom you might address an argument about our class topic -- which of course means first deciding what argument you want to make. Give your person a name and a backstory, sketching out aspects of their life that give an idea of what kind of person they are and what might make them receptive to your argument.

Write your person's story on the big sheets of paper provided and nominate one group member to introduce your audience member to the class.

Evaluation Suggestions:

This is a zero-stakes in-class exercise in my classroom and stands in isolation; some students carry out this same exercise to invent an audience for later assignments, but I don't require students to make the argument they sketch out in class, nor address the same person.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This lesson plan is adapted from an exercise I employed frequently as the editor of a popular lifestyle magazine and as a marketing consultant for sports organisations I've participated in. As an editor, I used this exercise in new writer orientations and creative/editorial meetings, identifying our core consumer in order to better target our content (and our marketing department did the same thing in order to pitch advertisers); as a marketing consultant, I used it to identify potential new audiences and brainstorm techniques to reach them. I've found that sharing these proven real-world applications increases buy-in substantially.

This also offers a useful lead-in to talking about media kits -- publicly available documents publications produce for potential advertisers which lay out the 'average reader'. These kits are based on both these kinds of exercises and demographic data obtained through consumer surveys, and offer a very clear, very specific idea of the ideal and actual audiences (publications attempt to minimise the gap between the two as much as possible) for a specific publication.

I encourage students to be as creative as they like in both inventing their person and in presenting them; as long as they can justify the inventive choices they've made, they're good to go. For example, in the Google Fiber version of this exercise given above, students invented people ranging from not-so-tech-savvy grannies wanting to Skype family members abroad to West Campus residents sick of their 'net access being slowed down by four roommates all watching Netflix separately, to DJ SparkleBootz, a community college student and strip club DJ who needed superfast internet to keep up with the latest musical trends and to download samples. (This last was presented to the class with a soundtrack selected from someone's smartphone and ended with the revelation that there IS a DJ Sparkleboots living and working in Chicago.)

Course Type:

Course Description:

This lesson plan was carried out in RHE306, Rhetoric and Writing -- an introductory course in writing and argumentation.

Tags:

Audience

Marketing

Teaching Audience and Stakes With the Colbert Report

Mercier — Tue, 20 Nov 2012 20:30:01 +0000

Author:

Aaron Mercier

Image Credit:

David Shankbone

Brief Assignment Overview:

This exercise asks students to work in groups to move past a working summary of a text's rhetoric to consider the goals of an author and their strategic approach to audiences. It uses PBworks' collaborative potentials to bridge the gap between two connected class discussions.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Homework Assignment

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Cultural Context

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Collaboration

Software

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Encourage students to think flexibly about the stakes of any given argument and the various goals an author might pursue.

Get students thinking about the relationship between rhetorical goals and persuasive strategies.

Continue to emphasize the central role of research in developing sound rhetorical analyses.

Begin thinking about transitions and their rhetorical function as a critical reader (anticipates later lesson on transitions considered as authors).

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

One clip of the Colbert Report, digital projector, computer classroom, PBWorks or some other collaborative website to which all students have access.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

This exercise incorporates elements of full-group discussion, small-group work, collaborative writing, and oral presentation.

I used the 10/2/2012 episode of the Colbert Report as the assigned reading for the first of these class periods. I asked my students to watch the opening segment, paying particular attention to the way Colbert set up for his interview using punchlines as transition sentences to string together several topics having to do with the presidential election, campaign finance, special interest advocacy, and religion. This episode is a particularly rich one, but you can use any more current episode that features a "hostile" or oppositional-type guest.

At the beginning of class, I led a brief discussion of the clip, asking: what is Colbert's argument? What is Garlow's argument? What were they trying to acheive with their audiences? Were they addressing the same audience? Once we had agreed upon some very basic answers to these questions, I replayed the segment. I then started asking about transitions. How did Colbert's monologue prepare the audience to react to Garlow? How does Colbert link Garlow and his Pulpit Freedom Sunday movement to other political operatives like the Koch brothers, and what are the implications of such a connection?

Once we've got these questions resolved at a fairly basic level, I break the class down into 5 groups of four and ask them to

Use internet research to get context on Garlow, his movement, and the argument that he and Colbert have. The references to political figures, laws, the constitution, and the US tax code fly thick and fast in this segment, both before and during the interview, so there's plenty for them to pick out and focus on.

Come up with a coherent summary of Colbert's argument and Garlow's argument, each considered as separate texts. Use direct quotation to support the summary.

Getting to this point takes most of a 75 minute class. For homework, I ask each group to post a page of text to the PBworks website. In this page they must make a claim about both Garlow and Colbert with regards to what audiences they are addressing, what they want those audiences to do/think/take away from the interview,and support their claims with both direct reference to the Colbert segment as well as secondary information. On the following class day, each group presented their work to the class in a two minute prepared talk, outlined collaborative via pbworks.

The students seem to get quite a lot out of Colbert's humor, and are consistent in surprising themselves by discovering additional nuance in his argument. Four out of the five groups concluded that Garlow "wanted to convince more people that preachers should be able to talk politics from the pulpit" and supported their claim with direct quotation from Garlow on the issue of free speech. These groups invariably concluded that the appearance was unsuccesful for Garlow because Colbert won the argument, capitalizing on his friendly audience and attacking the obvious gaps in Garlow's logic and evidence.

One group, however, found that Garlow's organization had edited his appearance and put up a clip of just the interview portion of the segment, with none of Colbert's introductory monologue. This editing, together with the caption beneath the embedded video, led the fifth group to conclude that Garlow's goal in appearing on the Colbert Report was simply to gain exposure for his upcoming protest event by any means necessary. They point out that Garlow's whole intention, as he states on the Colbert Report, is to antagonize the IRS by preaching politics from the pulpit in unison with other preachers on one Sunday in October. This antagonism is meant to force the IRS into a legal showdoqwn with the Pastors in which the Pastors can show the government attempting to limit free speech and challenge the conditions of tax code's religious exemptions in the Supreme Court. The fifth group, then, concluded that Garlow was just as successful as Colbert in this segment, because his goal was never to win the argument, but to win more attention for himself. This idea led to a full class discussion about the various possible payoffs of "exposure for exposure's sake" in today's news environment.

This in turn led back to Colbert's transitions/punclines in the opening monologue. Using the quotations and summarized evidence transcribed by the various groups, we spent the rest of the second class period creating an outline of Colbert's argument from opening joke to introduction of Garlow, placing particular emphasis on how Colbert's jokes stimulate a process of association in the audience's mind that links Garlow to superPACs and wealthy conservative donors like the Koch Brothers. One student proposed we think of Colbert as attempting to undercut Garlow's "rhetoric of victimhood" and re-construct the preacher-activist as a plutocrat.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

This is a fairly low-prep lesson. You'll need to select and take notes on a Colbert segment, follow through on a couple of the research opportunities before class, and that's about it.

Instructions For Students:

For watching the video as assigned reading before the first clas period:

watch the opening segment, paying particular attention to the way Colbert set up for his interview using punchlines as transition sentences to string together several topics having to do with the presidential election, campaign finance, special interest advocacy, and religion.

For small group work:

Follow up on as many references and "factual" claims made by Garlow and Colbert as you can. Give yourself context and check to see how and to what purpose each speaker is deploying evidence. Evaluate what kinds of evidence are being used, and try to locate gaps or assumptions in the logic of each speaker. Generate a summary of each speaker's argument that accounts for how they deal with problematic evidence or cover over holes or assumptions in their reasoning.

For homework

Based on what you have now found out about Garlow, Colbert, and the issues they discuss, make an argument about what each speaker is trying to accomplish with the segment, amongst which audiences, and how they go about accomplishing it.

Evaluation Suggestions:

No portion of this assignment is graded, it is meant to stimulate conversation about a complex text and to provide low-stakes practice in invention, research, and the organization of an argument.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

This exercise generated some of the best conversation we'd had so far in the term, and a lot of students seemed to turn a corner in their struggles with "analytical vs. topical argument" when they ran up agains the idea that rhetorical goals can be specific, narrow, and complex.

Course Type:

Course Description:

Rhetoric 309k: Rhetorics of Truthiness takes most of its material from the news cycle as it emerges week to week. Using core theoretical readings assigned early in the term and selections from a writing textbook, students are asked to develop expertise on a timely, compelling, controversial topic through independent research and several interconnected writing assignments that move from summary to synthesis to rhetorical analysis. Much of the focus of the course is on teaching students to develop a tolerance for and facility with conceptual complexity, and to explore complex issues without attempting to generate a reductive, totalizing "answer" to questions of rhetoric and policy.

Tags:

Teaching Ethos Using Online Dating Profiles

Cate Blouke — Sat, 20 Oct 2012 02:53:14 +0000

Author:

Cate Blouke

Image Credit:

Screen shot of the plan author's faux OkCupid profile, taken by the author

Brief Assignment Overview:

Students analyze portions of profiles excerpted from the free online dating site, OkCupid, in order to talk about ethos, values, ideology and goodwill. The exercise, in turn, encourages students to consider their own online presences, their values, and the ways in which rhetoric has “real world” applications.

Type of Assignment:

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Close Reading

Cultural Context

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Style

Summary

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Creative Commons

Social Media

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

To introduce the concept of ethos in a rhetoric classroom. To introduce students to the implications of online writing and the ways in which our writing reflects a particular image of ourselves to different audiences. To encourage students to reflect on their own online identities, as well as the ways in which they shift their self-presentations based on their perceptions of audience and genre.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Internet access would be ideal, but this could easily be implemented using simple hand-outs prepared in advance.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Early in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

Perhaps more so than any other piece of writing, and even more so than my students' facebook pages, the self-summaries presented in online dating profiles are fundamentally arguments of ethos. Regardless of specific rhetorical aim (a casual hook up, a future spouse, or something in between), at heart, each of these texts is saying to readers, “this is who I am, accept me.” So they seemed like a great source text to get my students really thinking about how and why they evaluate people: what sort of snap judgements they make, how they read into things without even realizing it. And it also served as an excellent talking point about the public nature of the internet - how just because we don’t anticipate particular audiences doesn’t mean our intended audience will be the only readers.

As I pointed out to my students, the internet is very much so a public place, regardless of the sometimes flimsy, sometimes more strict privacy settings of a given website. We never really know the uses to which our words will be put, and especially when asking students to share and compose in digital spaces, it’s important to get them thinking about how online identities and compositions might be read.

OkCupid profiles offer a glimpse of more pragmatic, everyday ethos: how a person's general presentation or demeanor reflects an image back into the world. Looking at their compositions encourages students to focus on how people generate (or fail to generate) goodwill, and how they convey particular values through their writing.

After students break off into groups to assess the ethos presented in the profiles they are given and write short descriptions of their candidates, then we discuss their assessments as a group.

As a follow up assignment, I ask students to go home and write their own self-summaries to be posted on the class blog. To encourage students to think about audience, you might give them different audiences for which to compose these summaries. For example, how would they summaraize themselves on a job application versus a student-body election? For their parents versus their friends? For their classmates versus their teammates?

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

The site requires that you create an account in order to search for users, but the account is free, requiring nothing more than an email address. So, if you would prefer to find example profiles on your own, you'll need to open an account. However, I will include a number of potential sample profiles below in the "additional resources." As my students discovered, these profiles can be easily found by "googling" phrases from the excerpts below (at least when I initially used them - users may have since set their profiles to private). I didn't use the full profiles as part of the class discussion, though I'm toying with the idea of doing so next time around.

Should you seek out sample profiles to excerpt, here are my suggestions:

seek outside of your geographical region (to avoid selecting someone that your students could possibly know)
avoid using profiles that are overtly outrageous (this might be difficult as there are some ludicrous profiles on the site, but it will help to keep the exercise less unruly if the examples are more "reasonable")
try not to select profiles which you expect your students to respond to in a particular way (they will inevitably surprise you)
select profiles that have enough writing to afford a fair bit of analysis, but not so much that they students get lost (a good-sized paragraph should suffice)
double check to see if the profile is set to "public" by copying and pasting the url into a separate browser (in which you are not logged into the site)

Instructions For Students:

There is, perhaps, no clearer instance of an argument based on character than online dating profiles. Each person's profile essentially makes the argument that "you should date me because of who I am." On the free online dating site OkCupid, users are asked to write a "self-summary" which is the first thing people see when visiting their profile.

For this exercise, you will analyze a person's ethos based on their self-summary. You'll then play match-maker, deciding amongst four candidates who would make the best match with your bachelor or bachelorette. However, you'll need to justify your choice based on both parties' presentation of ethos.

In groups of three, you'll be assigned to a particular bachelor or bachelorette below. You'll first analyze your bachelor or bachelorette's ethos, writing an evaluation of their values and character based on evidence from their self-summary. Once you have a clear sense of your person, you will make an argument as to why they "fit" with one of the matches provided - again, based on character and shared values. Here are some questions to consider:

What makes this person a "good" dating candidate?
What kind of person are they?
What do they value?
What do they like to do?
How do they address their potential matches?

For any of these questions, you will want to provide a specific example/quote/evidence to explain your assessment. If you have an immediate reaction to the person's profile, try to identify what sparked the reaction. Think about word choice, tone, and level of formality. How does this person generate (or fail to generate) goodwill? Is anything in their profile alienating? What is it and why do you think you have that reaction?

Evaluation Suggestions:

The in-class discussion was not evaluated, though it may require some careful moderating. Students will likely have a lot of fun with the exercise, but both times I've implemented the plan, I have had to work to keep the conversation from devolving into making vun of the profile in question. It's important to remind students that these are "real" people.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students love this exercise. They find it thoroughly memorable and enjoyable, although I'm not sure that makes it the most pedagogically valuable lesson I've taught. So I would love feedback in the comments section if you try this plan in your classroom.

Additional Resources:

Here are a few of the sampels I used in my class - at the time of the exercise, all of these profiles were publicly viewable. Summaries have been excerpted verbatim (all spelling errors and grammar issues are original). I would recommend formatting them into some sort of chart (so as not to impose a vertical hierarchy), but for accessibility's sake, I'll simply post the text here.

Here are the options I gave to the first group:

---

Bachelor #1

Well I’m one of the good guys, a sweet heart that’s only here in hopes to find that awesome someone to share in life's sweat adventures with. No really it's true, not all guys are dumb assholes...Surprise. but lets be real, most are. Ha

They are some strange people out there that much is curtain so lets not think it's only you ladies that get weird messages from people. The first person to contact me on this site, turned out to be a homeless stripper. O_O Gross! Anyways I'm just saying I'm not like that or here for that.

I'm not to serious a person, more carefree and laid back if anything so being able to make fun of people without hating on them is a must. I'd much rather do sometime fun than sit an complain all day about how messed up the world is.(Cause we all Know it is.) I do like to have intelligent conversations, deep discussions, and learn how to connect with the earth and universe more but I don't let things bother me that are out of my control if you know what I mean.

What I’m really interested in is someone that can love me for who I am and not try and make me out to be someone else and that's how I treat people in return.

I live alone and love it, my house is my sanctuary but like everyone else it gets lonely and I can use a best friend to hang with me and have some fun.

My heart and spiritual well being is very important to me, that being said I take good care of myself and my relationships with others. Having a negative attitude about anything isn’t worth my time and its just not my style.

I’m in no way a pacifist as I love a good debate and would jump in a second to save someone from a robber, bully or zombies. Fuck War! But sometimes even the monks must fight and stand up for the weak. That’s me.

I live by one simple truth that “The focused mind is the most powerful force in the universe, meaning what the mind can conceive and truly believe by will alone it shall achieve.”

However, the mind can only take so much and sometimes needs help form others. Everybody needs somebody sometimes. Sometimes its a shoulder you need and sometimes its a slap in the back of the head. I guess that’s why I’m here, no ones perfect even though I see a lot of people trying to be. So hit me up if you feel like I do.

---

Bachelorette #1

My name is Josephine, I studied fine arts at France and then moved to South America to finish a post-graduate program on Linguistics.

Nowadays I work as a drawing teacher and occasionally as a model for the faculty students. I have acted on the past too, I have always been very passionate about filmmaking, I even ended up making a film about five years ago. But that passion I left it behind to replace it with music.

I am very much into exotic instruments. Koto, tabla, sitar, harmonium, buzuq, etc etc. These interest of the exotic came to me through my Romanian origins. I have a strong Gypsy bloodline on my family. I have played in several Manele bands during the late two years (since I re-established in England).

Hmm... what else could I tell you? Vegetarianism is very important to me. I work hardly everyday to become a vegan and I'm expecting to totally achieve it by this year. That is why I have had to learn to cook vegan, which I succesfully achieved. I have the best Romani vegan dishes you'll ever taste (if we ever meet).

I like psychedelic sixties bands. I love The Doors, I think the ultimate party would be dancing around a pyre drinking sake to the rythmn of Five To One. I also love, of course, popular 'gypsy' music like Goran Bregovic, he did a great song with Iggy Pop called In The Death Car, for the film Arizona Dream, you should check that out.

Ok, I guess I already did this too long. Excuse me.

---

Bachelorette #2

Me, well, I'm a fat-bottomed girl and I make the rocking world go 'round.

I'm a woman. I enjoy womanly things like getting my nails done and putting makeup on. I do these things because they make me feel great, not because I'm high-maintenance or girly.

I'm pretty smart in my mind. I read a lot, enjoy a good movie often and listen to music all the time. I hate that I say "like" so fucking much, but it's one of my adorable quirks.

I'm a tactile person. I show affection by touch. However, I'm not a touchy feely person. Which is pretty fucking odd, I know.

At this point, I'm looking for someone I can actually do stuff with. Go to a play. Rock out to a band at a bar. Try a new restaurant. Drink!!

<*If all you're looking for is a bang buddy, I am not the girl for you.*>

So essentially, I'm looking for someone who is fun, outgoing, and mature. It's odd looking for female friends, but I'm really trying to meet new PEOPLE not just men.

Likes:

SHORT Beards (on men)

Tattoos

Dancing

Men who play a musical instrument...I get so weak in the knees!

A man with some meat on his bones (and if you decide to be a smart ass and message me with, "I got meat on THIS bone," I will hunt you down and smack the shit out of you.)

A nice smile

Brazilian Fart Porn. Funniest shit I've ever seen.

A good, open sense of humor

Chivalry

Dirty minds

Dislikes:

Mindfuckery (Can you feel my dick in your mind right now?)

Aloofness

Facetiousness

Too much gook in a guys hair

Men who wear flip flops, eeeew

People who lack ambition and imagination

LIARS- I know that sometimes you have to wait until a precise time to mention something...just don't lie.

---

Bachelorette #3

I am very family oriented. So I would start off by saying that I am most passionate about my family and friends. Beyond that, I love traveling, reading and learning foreign languages. I think that these things can open doors to new people, cultures and better understanding of the larger world. I also am passionate about learning new things. I love taking goofy classes, or reading up on something I don't know about. I think that knowledge really is power, and I love using my imagination and creativity to explore different aspects of the world. I pride myself on being street smart. Though formal eduation is very important, arming oneself with useful everyday knowledge can sometimes be even more valuable (aka I am thankful that I possess common sense!) I am a quick thinker and believe myself not to be naive. And while keeping an open-mind and an open-heart, I love that I am comfortable relying on my independence.

On a less serious note, I love laughing and I LOVE Steelers football! I'm always up for a road trip and love to go anywhere warm (especially during the winter months!) Oh yeah, and I have started to train for a Triathlon Sprint coming up this summer. (I'll let you know how that goes... it's early yet, so I'm still quite optimistic!)

Lastly, some things i believe:

* Everything happens for a reason.

* That there is a heaven. I'm not so sure however, about hell. ... I'll get back to you.

* That no talent ass-clowns should not be glorified on MTV, VH1, E! or otherwise.

* "Beauty is only skin deep" is said only by people who have never been ugly.

* Accents and foreign languages are sexy.

* Singers and musicians are sexy.

* Happy-endings do exist.

* There is a lid for every pot.

* Everyone needs to know how to laugh at themselves.

* Life's too short to sweat the small stuff.

* There is no such thing as an accident or a mistake.

* Boy Meets World could have been and may always be the best show to grow up watching.

* We never stop learning.

---

For the second group, I gave them these options, and it was interesting to see if the two groups paired up the same bachelor and bachelorette.

---

Bachelorette #1

My name is Josephine, I studied fine arts at France and then moved to South America to finish a post-graduate program on Linguistics.

Ok, I guess I already did this too long. Excuse me.

---

Bachelor #1

The a geek, and proud of it. When I get passionate about something, I can't shut up about it (which is either endearing or extremely irritating, depending on your point of view).

I'm left-wing. A sceptic (in matters of science, although I'm sorry to say I'm quite gullible on a personal level). A militant atheist. It must be said though, that I'd like to think I have a pretty good sense of humour about those topics, even if I am passionate about them.

I'm an artist (I draw and paint). I love the English language, although my own writing talents are somewhat lacklustre. I like learning. There's nothing better than discovering something new and fascinating and being able to share it with other people.

I think Stephen Fry is God.

I think Batman and the Doctor are perhaps the greatest fictional characters created by man.

I think music was perfected in 1879 withGilbert and Sullivan's Major-General Song.

I think comic books and cartoons are perfectly legitimate artforms, capable of producing genuine human drama and emotion. On the other hand, I can't resist a good Talking Gorilla vs. Killer Robot fight.

I seem to think a lot of pretty silly things, huh?

I am geeky, smart...ish, and quirky

---

Bachelor #2

---

Bachelor #3

What I’m really interested in is someone that can love me for who I am and not try and make me out to be someone else and that's how I treat people in return.

I live alone and love it, my house is my sanctuary but like everyone else it gets lonely and I can use a best friend to hang with me and have some fun.

I live by one simple truth that “The focused mind is the most powerful force in the universe, meaning what the mind can conceive and truly believe by will alone it shall achieve.”

Course Type:

Course Description:

I've used this exercise in both my introductory literary studies course (as a means to explain the "real world" implications/applications of close reading) as well as in my intermediate rhetoric course.

Tags:

Audience Appeal - Making Commercials with Animoto

Cate Blouke — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 16:07:55 +0000

Author:

Cate Blouke

Image Credit:

"Blank Billboard" by mediaboytodd

Brief Assignment Overview:

Using the extremely user-friendly online video creation tool, Animoto, students create short commercials pitching (potentially) odd combinations of products to target audiences (pianos to businessmen, running shoes to retirees, etc.)

Type of Assignment:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Assignment Length:

Single Class Period

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Writing:

Invention

Organization

Synthesis

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

The primary goal for this assignment is to encourage students to think about audience - how to construct appeals catered to particular audiences. However, it is also useful for thinking through visual rhetorical choices (which images and pre-set video themes to use), audio choices (which song to accompany the video), and arrangement (how to structure the appeals/advertisement).

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

To do this in-class, your students would need computer access (either a technology-based classroom, or a number of students could bring in their personal laptops) and access to an Animoto account. For one month of service, Animoto only charges $5 (a relatively minor investment for a really fun classroom activity) and your students could all work in the same account. The DWRL has a yearly subscription ($30), and lab instructors should contact Will Burdette or one of the ADs for the login information.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

As an in-class exercise, students select a generic product from a set of options either provided by the instructor or generated by the students themselves and then re-distributed at random. Some example products might be: running shoes, sports cars, toothpaste, laptops, etc. Students then select a target audience (or "market") for thier product - also at random from a pre-determined set of options. With their basic product and target audience, students are then asked to produce a short commercial advertising their product using Animoto.

Students are required to make a number of rhetorical choices linking their product to their audience - selecting an appropriate brand name, generating a catchy slogan slogan, creating a short sales pitch, and choosing appropriate images and music to accompany their appeals.

Animoto allows users to insert small amounts of text in between images and/or video clips, constructing a short "commercial" or video trailer with predetermined "themes" and a limited selection of music. Unlike iMovie or Windows Movie Maker, Animoto does not offer a large amount of user-agency (in terms of timing, transitions, etc), but, as such, it also requires little (or no) instruction. Students are generally able to sort out how to use the tool in under five minutes and can easily complete their commercial with time to show the final product to the class and discuss it. The class discussion, then, provides an opportunity to discuss the freedoms afforded by more complicated editing programs. So, Animoto is an excellent "baby-step" towards more sophisticated video creations - particularly for students who are wary of technology.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

The assignment is made particularly exciting through the element of chance - so I bring a number of generic products (sporting goods, frozen dinners, tupperware, etc.) written out on slips of paper, and a set of audiences (parents, the elderly, businessmen, etc.) written out on separate slips. Students are divided into groups (usually of 3-4) and each group draws a product and an audience from the slips. The incongruity that tends to result from this random selection makes the exercise both challenging and engaging. I've also let my students come up with the product options, though this did result in the rather silly pairing of selling "underwear" to "mothers." So, you may want to come up with your own options if you feel this might disrupt the classroom.

Instructions For Students:

As we've discussed, making effective rhetorical appeals is all about discerning the relationship between an author and his or her audience. This exercise is designed to get you thinking about how to cater your appeals to a particular audience - which can be especially challenging if you are confronted with a potentially hostile or disinterested audience. How will you approach them (i.e. effectively cultivate your ethos) if your audience isn't necessarily receptive to what you're pitching? How would you sell a given product to an audience that (normally) might not be inclined to buy it?

You will use a simple on-line video creation tool (Animoto) to generate short "commercials" for your product. You'll select a generic product from the options generated by your classmates. You'll then select a target audience from options that I've compiled, and it will be your job to create a product and commercial aimed at that audience. This will entail a number of rhetorical choices - from brand name, catch-phrase/slogan, specific appeals, visual rhetoric (the images you choose to employ), and the music that will accompany the commercial. For each one of these, you will want to consider your company's ethos (why this audience should buy your product), pathos (what emotions or values might convince them to buy it), and logos (do your appeals make sense).

While I'm hoping that the random selections will result in odd combinations, be sure to take this 'seriously.' It might be tempting to use humor, but be careful not to alienate your audience by making light of them or their interest in the product. You'll present your finished product at the end of class, and as a group we'll discuss what makes the commercials rhetorically effective.

Here are the requirements for your commercial:

You need to select a brand name for your product
You need to come up with a slogan/sales pitch for your target audience (e.g. "Beef: It's what's for dinner" or "Milk: does a body good" or "Just Do It," etc.)
You need at least three images connected to the product you're pitching, and three images connected to the audience (though you're welcome to add more than this)
Select music that seems appropriate for your audience, product, and sales pitch
The commercial should be "real" - as in, take it seriously and avoid egregious rhetorical fallacies (no scare tactics or ridiculous promises)

Evaluation Suggestions:

I typically give my students 20 minutes or so to put together their commercials, then we watch them as a class. I ask them to consider what makes the commercial effective, and to point out the qualities they see as particularly appealing (to that given audience). Then we try to think through some possible objections that the audience might have, and we discuss how the commercial might have been more effective. This usually revolves around questions of ethos (product reputation and reliability) and the logos of the commercial (is it making unsubstantiated claims; does it make sense). Adittionally, we talk about what the groups hoped to accomplish and the challenges they faced.

Students will often express frustration at the textual limitations of Animoto (it only allows for lines of 20-30 characters), and/or the limited amount of agency in terms of timing and transitions. This opens up a space to talk about these aspects of video editing/composition, which is especially useful if future video editing projects are on the syllabus.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

My students love this exercise. It's a low-stakes and fun way to introduce the concept of audience, and it inevitably produces a range of high quality of work. After I tried this exercise the first time, it was quite helpful to show my next set of students an example before turning them loose.

Course Type:

Course Description:

I've used this exercise in both my introductory writing course (RHE 306) and my intermediate course (RHE 309K) with similar, positive results.

RHE 306 – Rhetoric & Writing is a course in argumentation that situates rhetoric as an art of civic discourse. It is designed to enhance your ability to analyze the various positions held in any public debate and to advocate your own position effectively. Your work in this course will help you advance the critical writing and reading skills you will need to succeed in courses for your major and university degree.

Tags:

Teaching the Enthymeme with Restaurants

detweiler — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 01:02:16 +0000

Author:

Eric Detweiler

Image Credit:

Screenshot of Torchy's Tacos Website

Brief Assignment Overview:

This assignment requires students to think about how the enthymeme might function in practical argument—specifically, in convincing a group of out-of-town visitors to Austin to try one of the local restaurants. It serves as the tail end section of a two-day lesson on logical proofs, providing students a chance to apply and revisit some of the terminology we’ve covered.

Type of Assignment:

Class Discussion

Assignment Length:

One-Two Class Periods

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

Teaching students to utilize rhetorical logic—specifically enthymemes—in constructing an argument. The assignment also highlights the importance of considering audience, and revisits the notion of commonplaces.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

Access to online restaurant reviews or restaurant websites. Though I like having students research restaurants in small groups during class, this could work in a classroom without computers if the teacher were to either (1) bring printouts of reviews/websites to class, or (2) provide students with time outside of class to research.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

As a fan of classical rhetorical theory, I like to cover ethos, pathos, and logos fairly extensively in my 306 sections. I generally find logos the most difficult to teach. Not only is the set of terminology surrounding it (e.g. "enthymeme") tough; the entire epistemological frame required to think about "logic" in the nonscientific, probability-oriented way it's construed in classical rhetoric is often a new and tricky thing for students. I've found students tend to think "logic" must mean things like statistics and scientific facts. All this may be a story for another day, however.

So after introducing the concept of logos, I narrow to enthymemes. I start by writing a few examples of syllogisms—the relatively airtight chains of reasoning that enthymemes are not—on the whiteboard or document viewer. Since logos can be dry, I try for at least mildly interesting examples:

Premise #1: All sharks can detect the electromagnetic fields generated by their prey.
Premise #2: Genevieve is a tiger shark.
Conclusion: Genevieve can detect the electromagnetic fields generated by her prey.

Or, more germane to 2011-12's first-year forum topic:

Premise #1: All public schools receive government funding.
Premise #2: Lee High School is a public school.
Conclusion: Lee High School receives government funding.

I then shift into examples of enthymemes; examples that are based less on hard logic and more on probability and the commonplace beliefs of the audiences for whom their constructed:

Premise #1: Bigger bears are better.
Premise #2: Brown bears are bigger than black bears.
Conclusion: Brown bears are better.

Premise #1: Urban school disctricts in America are struggling.
Premise #2: Charter schools are the best way to reform struggling school districts.
Conclusion: We need more charter schools in America's urban areas.

(N.B.: As a way of reinforcing the ties between logic, ethos, and emotion—as well as the probabilistic nature of enthymemes in rhetoric, I like to show a clip from "The Promotion," the third episode of the sixth season of NBC's The Office. In the clip, one character—Jim—is attempting to construct a pro-con list as a way of making an important business decision. Another character, Michael, chides his logical approach, and Jim indeed ends up failing in presenting his eventual decision because of some presumed emotional baggage that undermines his ethos. The clip begins about 9 minutes into the episode, and I show it via Netflix. Jim's pro-con list can provide some additional examples of enthymemes that I've found students are often good at identifying.)

Once I've covered enthymemes, the activity unfolds as follows:

I put students into small groups—two or three students per. I then set out two bowls. One contains slips of paper, and on each slip is printed the name of a local Austin restaurant (obviously this is flexible, but I use Bite Mi, Torchy's Tacos, Madam Mam's, Trudy's, Homeslice Pizza, Wheatsville Coop, Kerbey Lane Cafe, Fran's Hamburgers, G'Raj Mahal, and Franklin Barbeque). The other bowl contains slips with the names of relatively well-known national chains (Chili's, Taco Bell, Five Guys Burgers & Fries, Wendy's, The Melting Pot, Olive Garden, Cracker Barrel, IHOP, Texas Roadhouse, Red Lobster, and Ruth's Chris Steak House). The locals are printed in italics and the chains in bold for easy differentiation.

Each student group picks one slip out of each bowl. I then present them with the following rhetorical situation: You are serving as a tour guide for a prospective UT student, who's coming to visit Austin and the campus with his/her guardians. The bold name indicates your tour group's favorite restaurant. The italicized restaurant is a local spot you're responsible for convincing the group to eat at during their visit. In order to think through this situation, construct at least one enthymeme you think would likely convince the group to eat at the local restaurant. Also think of at least one enthymeme the group might use to challenge your suggestion. In both cases, your first premise is likely to be a commonplace attitude towards food indicated by your group's favorite restaurant. The second premise is likely to be either a potential affinity or disconnect between that commonplace and an aspect of the local restaurant. Use the computers to research these restaurants and figure out what persuasive options might be available to you.

I don't provide examples at this point in introducing the activity to students, as I like the groups to puzzle things out on their own. But the persuasive enthymemes they construct—I hope—look something like the following (first with a Wendy's/Fran's combo, then with IHOP/Kerbey Lane):

Premise #1: Your favorite restauant, Wendy's, is known for their hamburgers.
Premise #2: Fran's is known for having excellent hamburgers.
Conclusion: While in Austin, you should try Fran's burgers.

Premise #1: Since IHOP is your favorite restaurant, you probably like breakfast food.
Premise #2: Kerbey Lane Cafe serves breakfast food 24 hours a day.
Conclusion: You should stop by Kerbey Lane Cafe this evening and try their breakfast menu.

I've had students draw on price, ambience, convenience—all sorts of interesting variables. The enthymemes I ask students to anticipate their tour group responding with might look like the following:

Premise #1: Red Lobster's menu consists mainly of seafood.
Premise #2: Franklin Barbeque does not have seafood options.
Conclusion: We don't want to try Franklin because they've got no seafood.

These response enthymemes can be thought of as concessions, elements in a larger rebuttal or refutation, or simply ways of considering one's audience carefully.

I give students 10-15 minutes to construct these enthymemes, and then have them share both their restaurants and their enthymemes with the whole class. They are myriad discussions that can emerge here. I might point out, for example, the mini-entyhmeme already present in the first premise of the IHOP/Kerbey example above, or challenge students to come up with a way of responding to their tour group's challenge enthymemes. Students often end up visiting various restaurant review websites (Trip Advisor, Urban Spoon), so a credibility-of-research-sources conversation can also take place here.

As a bonus, I like to think of this activity as one teacher's small way of keeping Austin weird.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

The most difficult part of this activity for me is keeping the definitions and limits of such rhetorical terms as "logos" and "enthymeme" straight. Students often have very good questions about what does or doesn't qualify as an enthymeme, and the more clear definitions and examples I'm ready with, the better.

More practically, you just need to have the slips and the bowls ready.

Instructions For Students:

You can divide students into groups yourself, or have them form pairs and/or trios. My speech, mostly quoted from above:

"Once you're in your groups, have one member come up and get one slip of paper out of each of these two bowls."

Wait for this to occur.

"Here's your rhetorical situation: You are serving as a tour guide for a prospective UT student, who's coming to visit Austin and the campus with his/her guardians. The bold name on one of your slips of paper indicates your tour group's favorite restaurant. The italicized name is a local restaurant you're responsible for convincing the group to eat at during their visit. In order to think through this situation, construct at least one enthymeme you think would likely convince the group to eat at the local restaurant. Also think of at least one enthymeme the group might use to challenge your suggestion. In both cases, your first premise is likely to be a commonplace attitude towards food indicated by your group's favorite restaurant. The second premise is likely to be either a potential affinity or disconnect between that commonplace and an aspect of the local restaurant. Use the computers to research these restaurants and figure out what persuasive options might be available to you. You have about 10 minutes, at which point your group will share your enthymemes with the class."

Evaluation Suggestions:

I don't formally evaluate this one, though I do try to keep it in mind as a way of providing examples to students who struggle with logical proofs and enthymemes in their major 306 papers.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

Students seem to get excited and like learning about Austin culture. Maybe not good if you have particularly hungry students and you want them to stay focused on enthymemes.

Additional Resources:

Explanation of enthymeme via Silva Rhetoricae

Urbanspoon website (for Austin)

Course Type:

Course Description:

RHE 306 - Rhetoric & Writing is a course in argumentation that situates rhetoric as an art of civic discourse. It is designed to enhance your ability to analyze the various positions held in any public debate and to advocate your own position effectively. Your work in this course will help you advance the critical writing and reading skills you will need to succeed in courses for your major and university degree.

Tags:

Special Topics Blog Post and Presentation

alyea — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 03:20:58 +0000

Author:

Ty Alyea

Image Credit:

Image by Matt Hurst

Brief Assignment Overview:

Once students in my literature class achieve a basic skill set in textual analysis, I require them to take the reins of the course by providing the class with a blog post on the upcoming reading and presenting their findings to the class. Three weeks into the class, they pick a date to contributie a special blog post on the discussion board, which they post two days before an appointed class period. The student then leads the class for a ten-minute presentation, delivering their findings to the class and responding to their peers' discussion of the topic.

Type of Assignment:

Major Course Project

Assignment Length:

Semester-long Project

Pedagogical Goals - Literature:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Multimodal

Open Access Software

Presentations

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

This project encourages students to write and revise their materials in two different contexts, using the technologies available inside and outside the classroom to reach their peer audience.

Media Requirements:

Required Materials:

This assignment requires a blogging platform and adequate presentation tools. Tools such as Powerpoint or Keynote are encouraged but not mandatory.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Full Assignment Description:

This assignment requires a student to pick a selection from the assigned reading, examine it closely, and provide a formal/cultural/historical lens for looking at it. Two days before the class date, they will write a 500-word blog post on the class discussion board and I write an email to the class, encouraging the other students to take a look at it and, if so moved, respond. During the class, they will provide a brief snapshot of their argument about the text and use it as a basis for open class discussion.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

The most important thing to do is make sure the students know what you expect from the presentations--included below in the "instructions for students." I usually encourage the presenters to have the class material for that date read well ahead of time. In the week before, I contact them to gauge their level of preparedness, floating concepts and resources by them to help motivate them. Once the student has posted, I let the class know that the material is open for discussion. I also ask them to send whatever digital materials they need to use along so we can get rolling as soon as the bell rings.

Instructions For Students:

At a scheduled date during the second half of the semester, you will be starting off the class with a (1) blog post and (2) a (8-10 minute) presentation geared to help kick start the class discussion, drawing attention to a cultural, formal, or historical aspect of the readings assigned for the class date on which you are presenting and relating it to key passages. Taken together, your presentation (5%) and blog submission (5%) will account for 10% of your final grade. Special topics blog posts will not count as one of your open “discussion board posts.” Replies to these posts will count as discussion post/reply credit. Extra replies and posts in a given week will count favorably toward your participation grade.

Blog Post Deadlines:

If you present on a Tuesday, have your post up by midnight on the preceding Sunday

If you present on a Thursday, have your post up by midnight on the preceding Tuesday

In the week that you are scheduled to present, you will first submit a blog post of at least 450 words to the class discussion board at the course website.

Major Steps:

On The week before:

1. Read the assigned reading at least a week in advance and identify some of the most significant elements of the text. Find key passages that you find especially interesting, provocative, or that might foster interesting discussion.

2. Take a quick look at research resources to find information about the author, text, or the cultural/historical backgrounds that the text intersects with and find the ones that might be most useful to bring to the class’s attention.

Some Research tips:

Search the library book search and article databases (like Academic Search Complete or the Dictionary of Literary Biography) for materials that discuss your text or an aspect of its historical/cultural background. You might find that another critic has found a compelling way of looking at the reading that you would like to share. Or research cultural references that are brought up in the text: for example, a presentation on The Bluest Eye might look into the novel’s many film references, accounting for their significance in the book.

Communicate with me about potential topics before Friday on the week before you present.

If there are other people presenting on the same week (and especially on the same day), contact them so you can coordinate your presentations to prevent overlap or promote better conversation.

On your post date:

Post a new entry (450+ words) on the blog by midnight on SUNDAY for a Tuesday presentation or by midnight on TUESDAY for a Thursday presentation. This deadline will give your classmates a day and a half to examine your post or begin to discuss topics that you will address in your presentation.

In the subject line of the post itself, write “SPECIAL POST: [Title of presentation]”

You must engage (interest, fascinate, politely provoke) your classmates in your blog post by giving them an interesting approach to the day’s reading, pointing them to at least 2 key passages and explaining why they are significant.

Close the post with (no more than three) questions that might prompt a response to your presentation. If you receive responses before the class date, feel free to reference them in class.

Cite page numbers from the text and external resources when appropriate. Include a Works Cited reference at the bottom of the post for external resources.

Since your audience is your classmates, please explain key terms and “jargon” that you use. Make sure your post is carefully polished.

During the Presentation itself:

You must address some formal, cultural, or historical aspect of the reading assigned for the class date.

Guide your readers through at least 2 key passages in the reading for that date. Alternately, you might focus on 1 passage from the current date and relate it to 1 passage we overlooked (or read in a different way) on a previous class date.
Try to minimize materials that other students have presented on AND AVOID MAJOR SPOILERS about readings that will come at a later date.
Try to keep the class engaged and attentive—make sure they know why the aspects of the text and/or historical/cultural background you are bringing to their attention matter.
Pose some questions for the class to consider. You don’t have to necessarily be able to answer them, but they should compel discussion that extends beyond the length of your presentation.

Presentation Length and Structure:

Your presentation should be 8-10 minutes.

You may structure your presentation any way you like. You might begin by:

Pulling up the blog and discussing your entry and any comments
Loading a presentation (Powerpoint, Keynote, etc.) with key passages or a context you would like to discuss. Alternatively, you can use the document camera.
Passing out a handout with key passages from the text, quotes from a critical or historical document, and/or questions for the class to consider.
Presenting a related cultural text (image, song, etc) and discussing its relation to the reading.

Email me copies of any digital materials you wish to use to supplement your presentation (powerpoints, images, short (<2min) Youtube pieces, etc.

Evaluation Suggestions:

You must set standards for written student work, but also have in mind criteria for a successful presentation. My major criteria is the level of student engagement the presentation elicits, the coherence of the presented material, and the degree to which it provides a unique view into the text being read. As stated in the section above, the presentation and the blog post each equal 5% of the students' total grade.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course

Literary Studies Course

Course Description:

Reading Literature in Context is a literary studies course that encourages students to research formal, cultural, and historical approaches to literary works. As such, it requires students to share information about the texts and learn to articulate their textual analyses in a variety of forums.

For more information, visit my instructor website

Tags:

Designing an Online Commenting System

Wall — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 03:41:21 +0000

Author:

Amanda Wall

Image Credit:

Screen shot of student project

Brief Assignment Overview:

In this group project, students design a commenting system or other forum/method for conversation within a website, matching the system to the particular rhetorical goals of the site. Groups present their systems in a presentation and are required to turn in two documents: a visual representation of the conversational interface and a 3-5 page design rationale.

Type of Assignment:

Homework Assignment

Course Unit

Major Course Project

Assignment Length:

Multiple Class Periods

Course Unit

Semester-long Project

Pedagogical Goals - Rhetoric:

Pedagogical Goals - Digital Literacy:

Additional Pedagogical Goals:

In the Rhetoric of Flame Wars*, I teach that online comment posts, discussion boards, blogs, and other discourses constitute important sites of public discourse. These discourses are influenced not only by the traditional rhetorical components--audience, ethos, logos, and even then, in interesting and problematic ways--but by the technological and social systems that make possible and shape discourse online: interfaces, proferred levels of pseudonymity, moderation, and other processes.

The point of this assignment is to force students to step into the position of web designers, or, as we might also call them, dialogue designers. The design and governance procedures of websites help to shape the conversations and discourses that happen there in substantial ways, and what I hope to see reflected in students' work is an awareness of rhetoricity of interfaces and governing procedures.

*"Flame war" is a slang term for a vicious internet fight, usually between anonymous or pseudonymous writers; some critics of online communication argue that it is the inevitable result of every online discussion. I disagree.

Media Requirements:

Technology-Based Classroom (computers for each student)

Required Materials:

Ideally, students would have access to the internet and to image-editing software within the classroom so that they can begin work there. However, I believe this assignment is adaptable for classrooms without technology: students are quite capable of brainstorming internet concepts on paper, and I have specified that the images they produce can be produced through physical means (hand-drawn, in other words) if the digital means are not available to them. The point of this assignment is to force students to step into the position of web designers, or, as I would argue they could be called, dialogue designers. The design and governance procedures of websites help to shape the conversations and discourses that happen there in substantial ways, and what I hope to see reflected in students' work is an awareness of rhetoricity of interfaces and governing procedures.

Timeline for Optimal Use:

Dibbell, Julian. "A Rape in Cyberspace."

Late in the Semester

Full Assignment Description:

These are the instructions for the students; I think they give a good description of the assignment.

For this project, you will form groups of 3-4 people. Choose either a specific website or a particular type of website to design for. (So you could choose the New York Times, or Cracked, or BagNewsNotes, or UT's website, Obama's campaign website, or a more general type like a political blog, a gossip website, or a gaming forum. If you choose a "type," it's a good idea to find examples of that type of site.)

You will brainstorm the needs and problems of people who converse with each other on your website or type of website (need-finding). Based on those needs and problems, you will brainstorm many possible solutions in the form of different commenting systems. A "commenting system" includes all of the technologies, interfaces, policies, rules, guidelines, and moderation procedures that govern, support, shape, and otherwise make discussion possible. So you might need to talk about technologies separately from procedures/rules in the beginning of your brainstorming process. After you've come up with many options, you'll decide together which option (or combination of options) you want to pursue.

Something to keep in mind: by calling it a "commenting system," I'm already narrowing down the field. Commenting, after all, traditionally means comments by public audience members responding directly to single pieces of media that are posted on the site. But it doesn't have to look like that. Feel free to break the boundaries of the genre, to cross over into discussion forum or mailing list or wiki territory. There are many different ways of having a conversation. The only requirements are that a public audience must be able to converse with each other. That's it. Depending on the goals of your website and the kind of conversation you want to inspire, there are many different ways to accomplish this.

Creativity is greatly encouraged. Don't feel like you have to stick to "tried and true" methods. Experimentation is where all the great ideas come from.

This project has two required components:

1. One visual representation of the website with the commenting system clearly shown. If there would be more than one interface involved in the commenting system (for instance, if users had their own profiles), you are encouraged to mock-up that webpage as well for extra credit. Digital representations are preferred (because it's a digital environment), but physical art is also accepted. Examples of programs you could use include Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, MS Paint, MS Word, Frontpage, Publisher, GoogleSites, iLife (Mac), Gomockingbird.com, Ning, etc.

(If you are familiar with programs for creating illustrations, mock-ups, or actual websites and would like to give a short overview of the basics of that program for creating a visual representation of a website, you are welcome to do so! This is one way you could work on going beyond the course requirements.)

(If you want to put in some extra work and build a live website, that is also acceptable.)

2. A 3-5 page write-up describing the system.

- What is the purpose of the website, and what kind of conversation are you trying to generate on the website? You might go so far as to explain what the purpose of conversation on this website as you see it.

- How does does your system work? How do you imagine people will use it?

- How does it address specific problems people have or might have with the current system or with other systems?

- How might your system go wrong or be misused? Is there any way to ameliorate these problems? Do keep in mind that some negative side effects are expected and inevitable in any design.

- You are encouraged to use the rhetorical tools we have discussed in order to explain your system. Things like audience and ethos will probably be particularly important. You may also cite or discuss writers that we have read in class in order to back up your decisions.

Suggestions for Instructor Preparation:

This project comprises the entire third unit of my course. We spend about three weeks on it, giving the students time to brainstorm their projects in class and reading articles about debates in online spaces, moderation procedures, deliberative democracy, and social software design. We had already covered debates about anonymity and pseudonymity in the first unit, but some of those readings might be useful to other instructors. (For instance: the move of some websites to require commenters to sign in to Facebook in order to comment.) Some of the readings I've used are:

This article from the early 90s is great for a lot of reasons, but I've used it in this unit for its sustained description of a debate within an online community. It deals with such questions as: Who should resolve an online debate? The community at large via democratic vote or consensus? A moderator or other official? Or is an online community an inappropriate place for deliberation? These are questions that the students will have to decide about the websites that they design.

Shirky, Clay. “Group as User: Flaming and the Design of Social Software.” The Best Software

Writing I. Ed. Joel Spolsky. Berkeley, CA: Apress, 2005. Print.

Aside from a useful metaphor for the social web (the computer is a door to the social world, not a device-box for the individual, Shirky tells us), this article argues that designing for a social group is different from designing for individuals. I relate this to rhetorical ideas of audience. How might an audience evaluate a system differently if it perceives itself as a group instead of as individuals? This article also attributes designers' reluctance to design for groups to a "horror of censorship," which relates to the political issues raised in the Dibbell article.

Instructions For Students:

Creativity is greatly encouraged. Don't feel like you have to stick to "tried and true" methods. Experimentation is where all the great ideas come from.

This project has two required components:

(If you want to put in some extra work and build a live website, that is also acceptable.)

2. A 3-5 page write-up describing the system.

- How does does your system work? How do you imagine people will use it?

- How does it address specific problems people have or might have with the current system or with other systems?

- How might your system go wrong or be misused? Is there any way to ameliorate these problems? Do keep in mind that some negative side effects are expected and inevitable in any design.

Evaluation Suggestions:

In my course, I use the evidence-based portfolio system called the Learning Record. Using this system, it's easy for students to present their own contribution to the project and to get credit for going above and beyond expectations. Because mine is a rhetoric course, I focus on the extent to which students connect their design decisions to rhetorical rationales: does their design fit the purposes of the space as they conceived it? This rhetorical focus makes it possible to equally reward those students who are using MS Paint to create rudimentary images as well as those students who show off their pre-existing coding skills by building actual working websites. The Learning Record requires students to go "significantly beyond" the course requirements in order to earn an A, so students who spend time building such a website, or those who put in the time to learn Photoshop for the first time, or those who do extra research on the rhetorical reasoning of actual web designers to augment their design rationale, can all have their efforts pay off.

For those using more traditional assessment systems, I might recommend having students do a quick write-up at the end of the project describing their own contribution and creating a pie-chart estimating the distribution of work among the group. This gives the instructor a chance to compensate for an especially hard-working or recalcitrant group member.

Notes on Reception, Execution, etc.:

I was astounded by my students' projects this past semester. I only required three pages of collaborative writing and a single image, but every one of my students' groups, without exception, produced multiple images and incredibly thorough design rationales. Although I give students the option to redesign the commenting system of an existing website, every group chose to design an original website with specific rhetorical goals.

Let me give you a sense of the projects my students produced. One group produced a wide-ranging, utopian website that strove to stimulate public discourse by organizing discussions into "galaxies" of common topics (individual stories were "planets" and "stars"). It featured both synchronous and asynchronous communication and had robust moderation procedures. Another group went in the opposite direction: their website, "Belligerency," rewarded flaming, trolling, and other bad behavior with a complicated point system. I had to admire the rhetorical savviness of this profit-driven project, for the students clearly understood how particular kinds of conversation can feed back into website profits via ad sales. A third group had users communicating mainly through images, drawing on trends seen in websites like tumblr, Pinterest, and Canvas. A fourth group organized debates into columns of "for" and "against"; this strategy stimulated an interesting discussion amongst their peers about the relative merits of an unlimited but messy debate versus a constrained but organized one.

My last group contained a student with some coding expertise, and they produced an actual working website, with full log-in and comment functionality. They also created a static image in Photoshop to represent the front page of their website (see the attached image): on this gossip website, called The Grapevine, stories with many "likes" are featured in green grapes and those with many "dislikes" are featured in red grapes.

For some ridiculous reason, I only allotted one 90 minutes class for these five groups to present their projects, which left almost no time for discussion. Next time, we'll spread them out over two days.

Course Type:

Advanced Writing Course