Instructions: For your paper proposal you will propose a potential artifact to rhetorically analyze for your final presentation. The purpose of this assignment is to prepare you for the final paper by practicing selection of rhetorical artifact, analysis of rhetorical situation, and gathering of relevant literature on rhetoric. Papers should answer the following questions.
What is your potential rhetorical artifact?
Choose a rhetorical artifact of interest to you and describe it to the class. An artifact, as discussed in the last assignment, is a specific instance of rhetoric that can be studied. When describing the artifact, try to describe the rhetorical situation it is found in (rhetor, audience, constraints, meaning, etc.) While the classic example is a speech, there are many other artifacts that you could choose, such as:
Movies, TV shows, audience reactions to movies or TV shows (such as reviews or comments), news media articles (op-eds, investigative journalism, etc), art/public art, monuments, songs/music, video games, blogs, tweets (either under a hashtag or a Twitter-based community), Facebook or Instagram pages, YouTube channel, TikToks, protests, social movements, legislation, legal cases, visual media like billboards, posters/flyers, or memes, Presidential or Congressional speeches (or any other speeches from members of the State), election debates, specific slogans or concepts, books, fandoms, etc.
There are many different rhetorical artifacts that are possible to choose for your final paper, so find something of interest to you. One other suggestion is that you could choose the artifact that you proposed as a possible artifact for your reading response paper, but that is not a requirement.
Why do you think the artifact is significant for rhetorical analysis?
Explain why the artifact you chose is significant for rhetorical analysis. Significance entails some sort of reason that your artifact is interesting – ask yourself why you were drawn to your rhetorical artifact, and what could be learned from analyzing this artifact through the concept you are potentially going to apply.
Significance can be demonstrated via the practical implications of analysis (could better understanding this instance, or instances, or rhetoric help people in some way?), the scholarlyimplications of analysis (has this kind of artifact been researched before? Would this analysis build on previous scholarly work in some way? Is this artifact interesting in a way that others have not been?), or the political implications of analysis (how might this analysis change how we act politically?). These are just examples of how significance can be demonstrated, so if you have another set of reasons just try to explain them thoroughly.
What rhetorical concepts do you think potentially apply to this artifact?
Name a rhetorical concept (or more than one rhetorical concept) that you think could apply to this artifact and briefly explain why you think it might apply. The rhetorical concept can come from the articles you encountered while building the annotated bibliography or for the reading response paper and from concepts we have discussed in class, such as:
rhetorical proofs, Burke’s pentad (act, scene, agent, agency, purpose), narrative, enthymeme, social movement, types of rhetorical devices (metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, identification, satire, irony, etc.), types of visual rhetoric (performing and seeing, remembering and memorializing, confronting and resisting, commodifying and consuming, and governing and authorizing) etc.
If you are especially interested in a concept that will be coming up in class, such as argument, political rhetoric, media, rhetoric of science, rhetoric of health and medicine, feminist rhetoric, or non-western rhetoric, you could take a brief look at the readings for those classes when they are put up and use them for this assignment.
Formatting
Papers should be Times New Roman, 12-point font, and double-spaced. Citations can be in any style guide you prefer (MLA, APA, Chicago), but you must be consistent.
Grading
Each section will be graded based on clarity, precision, and inventiveness.
Clarity refers to the ease of reading. Does the syntax/grammar distract from the content being provided? Does the paper provide topic sentences that summarize the claims? Does the evidence have a clear connection to the claim? Tip: Read back your sentences out loud after writing them to help test readability.
Precision refers to the accuracy to source material. Do the references to source material apply a reasonable description? Does the paper contain the various checkpoints in the outline? Does the paper use unnecessary language? Tip: Avoid beginning sentences with referent pronouns (it, its, them, their).
Inventiveness refers to the creativity in argumentation. Does the paper show some element of novelty? Do the connections between claims and evidence express additional meaning to the source material? Does the language utilize different tropes to the source material? Tip: Consider how the language explain abstract concepts into more concrete terms (metaphor, simile, ect).
Point Breakdown
Potential artifact – 15
Significance of artifact – 20
Potential of rhetorical concepts – 15