PROJECT 1: ANALYSIS OF A COMMUNITY PROBLEM

 

 

PART 1:  PROBLEM ANALYSIS

In this project, you will select a problem or an issue related to a community you are a part of.  This could be your local community where you live or your professional community where you work.  You will research this problem and write an analysis of it (supported with research) in a specific genre or form (e.g., formal report, journal/magazine article, newsletter, educational website) for a specific target audience.  Your analysis may take the form of a cause/effect analysis, a comparison/contrast analysis, or a classification/division analysis.

 

Note, you should not focus on solutions in this project.

 

Definitions and Purpose: 

As defined in Chapter 8, an analysis examines a complex problem, situation, or relationship by identifying the parts that make up the whole.  You can gain a clearer, more in-depth understanding of a subject when you break it down and look closely at the individual pieces that constitute the whole.

 

An analysis is often an opportunity to help your readers understand a familiar topic in a new way. Whatever your topic, you will need to consider why you want them to gain this understanding.

For the purposes of this assignment, a problem is an issue, a situation that currently has a negative impact in your local community or current career/workplace, whether it is something ineffective, harmful, uncomfortable, inefficient, costly, etc.

 

Example:  Let’s say you work as a server in a restaurant in Tempe and want to examine the reason for low wages in the service industry. Your analysis would require you to examine many different aspects of the issue, such as the history of wages for restaurant workers in the city and state, the effect of tipping on the wages in the industry, and the role of municipal and state governments in setting wage limits.

 

In the example of wages for Tempe restaurant workers, the problem might have something to do with how the industry’s reliance on customers’ tipping service workers impacts the minimum wage.

 

In the process, you would need to take into account the perspectives of all the stakeholders, including restaurant owners, service industry workers, and industry regulators.

 

Topic Selection:

Choose a problem or an issue that interests you from your local community or professional life.  When choosing a topic, be sure to draw on experiences that have directly impacted your life, whether within your local community or at your job.

 

Topics to avoid include any topic that is too broad or is debated at a national or international level or is based primarily on personal or religious belief rather than on researchable evidence.  Additionally, the following topics are prohibited, as they either a) are too generic or common, b) are debated at a national or international rather than a community level, and/or c) are much too general in scope:

 

Gun control, abortion, legalization of marijuana, euthanasia, death penalty, global warming, homelessness, vaccinations

Your next project in this course is a solution argument that asks you to propose a solution to a community or career-related problem, so it would be helpful to research an issue in the first project that you can continue to write about further in the second one.  This is not a requirement but highly suggested so that you don’t end up researching a new problem from scratch.

Length:  1000-1500 words of typed text (not including References at the end) submitted as a Word document in doc, docx, or rtf format.  Pages and Odt files are not compatible with Blackboard.

 

Rhetorical Considerations for the Project:

In an analysis, you break down the problem into parts/categories to help your readers understand it clearly.  Considering your rhetorical situation helps you understand which details you need to look at closely and develop them in detail.  For example, which stakeholders, current laws, recent events, etc. have shaped the issue at the level of the local community or career/workplace in which you are analyzing your topic?

• Audience: Although your teacher and classmates are the initial audience for your analysis, they are not your target audience.  Find an appropriate, specific target audience that is within the context of your local community or workplace to tailor your writing to.

 

To start, determine who will benefit from your analysis.  What specific individual or group needs to gain a deeper understanding of your topic/problem?  Think about the existing knowledge of your target audience.   What do the audience members probably already know about the topic?  What will you need to tell them?  In the process of the analysis, you would need to take into account the perspectives of all the stakeholders.

Example:  Your analysis of wages for restaurant workers in Tempe could be addressed to members of the City Council who are in a position to change the wage.  Or, depending on your purpose, the analysis might be addressed to a group of low-wage workers in the city.  The general public, all Starbucks partners globally, or all national customers of a particular establishment are not specific enough audiences.

• Purpose: By researching and analyzing your issue, you will help your readers understand it thoroughly and provide them with an analysis that will allow them to make more informed decisions.  What do you hope to change or accomplish by presenting your analysis to your target audience?  The analysis is to help your audience understand a familiar topic in a new way.  Therefore, you will need to consider why you want them to gain this understanding.

 

• Point of View: When analyzing an issue close to a community to which you have a strong connection, it is easy to be biased.  In order to reach a target audience, however, you will want to show that you have analyzed your topic as objectively and fairly as possible.  To best accomplish this, be frank with yourself about your own preconceptions on this topic.  If you feel you know all the answers on this topic, then your topic won’t lend itself to a research project.  However, if you are still curious to learn more about the topic to gain a deeper understanding, all while remaining passionate about it, you have probably found a topic that is a good fit.  On which aspects of your topic are you certain and on which can you still explore more?

 

• Genre: For this project, rather than an academic essay, pick another genre or format that might be more suitable for your rhetorical purpose and the specific audience you are targeting.  Consider how your analysis will be used and what will be the most effective way to present your analysis to your audience.

Suggested genres:  You can compose your project in the form of a formal report, journal/magazine article, newsletter, or educational website.  Think about your audience and their expectations to determine which form of text would be more appropriate to use.

• Organization: An effective, original analysis gives a balanced portrait of an issue, calling attention to the most overlooked or misunderstood aspect(s) of the topic most useful in changing (hopefully by enriching) the target audience’s perspective on the topic. While the author’s purpose is often to change the target audience’s understanding of the topic, the tone of an analysis is usually matter-of-fact.  An example organization plan for an analysis is outlined

Research and Documentation:

Incorporating Sources:  When you cite the sources you have considered, be sure to use signal phrases to attribute them properly so that readers can distinguish between your own ideas and the sources you have summarized, paraphrased, or direct quoted.  Use APA documentation for citing ideas and quotations in the body of your text and for creating a References at the end.  Be sure to refer to the Documenting Sources folder on the left-hand course menu for video explanations and examples.

 

Note:  What is important is how you incorporate your sources effectively to support your ideas and cite them in the body of your text and on the References page according to a citation guide – APA for this course.  Beyond that, how you overall format your entire document, for example formal report or newsletter, according to APA style is less important, hence not required.

 

PART 2:  MULTIMODAL COMPONENT AND ANALYSIS (to be submitted with the rough and final drafts)

Make sure to read Chapter 18: Communicating with Design and Visuals to learn how to apply design expectations effectively.

 

Integrate 2-3 visuals (e.g. charts, tables, graphs, images, or photos) and/or other media (e.g. audio or video clips) into your text to support your analysis.

 

• First, think about the target audience, purpose, and genre of your analysis. Then, decide what visuals or other media (audio/video support) would be appropriate to include in your text.
• The expectation is not to include all media but make purposeful selections based on the specific needs of your target audience and genre selection. Assess their function/rhetorical purpose in terms of evidence for your analysis and design/composition.
• Position them strategically and describe their relevance in your paper so that readers don’t skim over them.
• Include a caption or brief description that explains how each visual and/or audio/video clip contribute to your analysis. The caption should include an in-text citation in APA format.
• List the complete source information on your References page.
• Multimodal composing is about composing in different media, so you are encouraged to compose these elements (e.g., charts, tables, graphs) yourself rather than just downloading and inserting them into the text.
• Images/photos should be ones you have created or taken yourself or your composition of images/photos with free licensing found on the Internet. More on licensed images can be found here:  https://asu.digication.com/get_help_asu_eportfolio_resources/find_images2

 

 

Multimodal Analysis

Write a 500-750-word analysis of the multimodal components addressing the following questions:

 

• How do your selected visuals (e.g., charts, tables, graphs, or photographs) and/or other media (e.g., audio or video clips) specifically address the needs of your target audience?
• Which rhetorical appeals (ethos, pathos, logos) are demonstrated in the multimodal components (e.g. images, audio/video clips, design choices, genre/format) included in your analysis?
• How does the use of visual media communicate in a way that is different from written language? What were you able to show through imagery and/or audio/video clip that you were not able to explain in text?  What challenges did you encounter in tying these visual and audio/video sources into the context of your analysis/argument?  How can you apply these skills in other areas of your life?

 

 

PART 3:  REVISION ANALYSIS (to be submitted with the final draft only)

When you submit the final draft of this project, please also submit a 250-500-word revision analysis in which you:

• synthesize the feedback you received from your instructor, peers, writing mentor, the ASU writing center
• identify the source of each type of feedback
• discuss how you applied the feedback in your final draft

why you made the revisions you did