english 1302

English 1302 Research Paper

Instructions for Essay

Mandatory submissions

1. the research paper, including the annotated works cited entries for the sources specifically used in the research paper, all as one document

2. PDFs of the sources used in the paper (unless they are video, in which case the link to the video should be included in its work cited entry), with the actual material used clearly and distinctly highlighted or marked; if the source is a video, the time of the selected material used in the essay should be noted in the annotation for the source.

The Essay

The essay itself is a minimum of 2500 words long (not including header, first-page information, title, parenthetical citations, and annotated works cited entries).

The Topic

You are making a persuasive argument about the nature of how media coverage of a current event impacts the manner in which an individual understands and values that event, why it is done, why it matters, and what your reader can do about it.

Ultimately, you want your reader to WANT to agree with your argument.

To accomplish this you must

get your audience to relate to you as the author – create a sense of trust and/or common ground between yourself and your readers

get them invested in the idea of your investigation as affecting them

give them a context for your argument and then make your case

present them with your evaluation of the media impact

persuade your readers to agree with your conclusion regarding how to deal with this media impact

To accomplish these goals, you must

use appeals to manipulate and attempt to control your readers’ responses to what you write

use evidence to convince them of your authoritative ethos

organize your essay to achieve the maximum effective impact upon your audience (deductive v. inductive reasoning, to delay or not to delay your thesis, etc.), much of which depends upon your accurate conception of your audience as sympathetic or hostile to your ideas

You must use sources to help create that authoritative ethos

a minimum of 6 sources from your annotated bibliography must be cited in this essay, while the maximum is 8 sources; an individual source may be used multiple times, if you’re using one as evidence of several claims. Outside of these 6 – 8 sources, you may use Aristotle’s essays

sources should be used by you to help bolster your ideas – as evidence of your knowledge of the manipulations and their potential problematic nature(s) (the creation of common ground / trust between you and your readers), to support your argument for the viability of your conclusion (statistics, reports, etc.), etc.

use Aristotle’s On Rhetoric, Nicomachaen Ethics, and On Politics to strategize your argument; they work as a theoretical framework for your argument and your attempt to persuade me how things work and why they matter. You do not need to quote directly from them, but you should use parenthetical citations when using then and have works cited entries for each one. These, alone, of your source material, do not need annotations

You need to keep in mind that everything about the paper affects how your readers perceive both you as the author and your ideas. To that end, you must

follow exactly MLA specifications for research papers (double spacing, parenthetical citations, annotated works cited entries organized and formatted properly, 1” margins on all sides, correct first page information, correct headers, a useful and informative title for the essay, correct title for works cited, etc.). If the submitted essay is not fully compliant with all aspects of MLA formatting and citation standards, it will receive an automatic zero for its grade and the author will absolutely not have the opportunity to resubmit a revised essay for a potentially higher grade.

proofread extremely effectively – get help from someone if you need it, as mechanics impact your ethos as the author.

These are the aspects of the paper that will receive specific points towards the overall grade:

Proofreading 10pts

Properly annotated works cited entries 20pts

see instructions for the annotated bibliographic assignment

Content of essay

Introduction / thesis / setup / establishment of tone 10pts

Engaging your audience 10pts

Establishing your ethos by displaying knowledge 10pts

Using source material to support your argument 10pts

Presenting your evaluation 10pts

Persuading reader to agree with your evaluation 20pts

MLA format is mandatory.

Failure to submit PDFs of all sources with the material used in the essay properly and clearly noted will result in an automatic 0 (zero) on the assignment.

Failure to parenthetically cite source material correctly per MLA specifications will result in an automatic 0 (zero) on the assignment, as that is plagiarism. This is something you learned in English 1301. IF you are unfamiliar with it, use the Purdue OWL (http://owl.english.purdue.edu/) to double-check your parenthetical citations; also, remember that my Learning Web page has instructions regarding citing material in and for your research essay.

Failure to turn in any other item specifically listed as required will adversely affect your grade; failure to use the minimum or exceeding the maximum number of sources will also adversely affect your grade.

By the time this essay is due, all of these elements of the essay will have been covered in posted lectures in Eagle Online:

organizing an argument means that you use Toulmin strategies (claims, warrants, evidence, counterarguments/rebuttals, etc.)
connecting with your audience means that you use both Rogerian strategies and appeals to manipulate and control the reader’s response to your ideas
you’ve already turned in an annotated bibliography, and you’ve been given materials about how to do these assignments properly; here, you’re using an annotated bibliographic entry for each source you cite in your essay, so you need to follow the instructions given for the annotated bibliography assignment (refer to the handout you were given at that time), but your “conclusion” should be an evaluation of how this specific source was actually, specifically valuable in and useful to your research paper

On Rhetoric, available at http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/rhetoric.html

Nichomachean Ethics, available at http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/nicomachaen.html

Politics, available at http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/politics.html