Essay #1: Source-Based Essay on Genre, Audience, & Rhetorical Situation
Assignment Resources
- rhetorical situation
- purpose
- audience
- genre
- stance
- summary
- examples
Goal| Throughout the course, we want to develop your understanding of how rhetoric and writing function in social contexts. We
hope that you’ll transfer your new skills and understandings to other classes and the workplace. We also want to familiarize you with CCNY’s academic databases, which will expand the range of materials to which you have access across the web.
Task| For this assignment, you will write a source-based essay in which you will analyze and make connections between the
concepts of rhetorical situation, purpose, audience, genre, and stance. You will choose and analyze four sources that you have found on the subject of your choice. The sources should include:
- a web site (including social media posts)
- a magazine article
- a newspaper article
- a scholarly source
With the exception of the website, you should locate your sources within CCNY’s academic databases. We recommend that you use Academic One File, Opposing Viewpoints in Context, and the National Newspaper Index, but the choice is up to you.
For each article you will provide a rhetorical analysis, a brief discussion describing its rhetorical situation–how purpose, audience, genre, and the writer’s stance toward their subject create an argument in an ongoing conversation. Your discussion of the intermingling elements of the has two parts. When you identify, for example, the writer’s purpose, you’ll want to tell us both what that purpose is (to inform, to persuade, to argue, and what have you), and also what in the text tells you that.
If, for example, I think the article’s purpose is to inform, it’s likely because the article doesn’t really express any opinion on its topic. To complete your rhetorical analysis, you’re going to want to look at both the article you chose and the overall publication. Looking at the publication’s web site will give you a lot of information about your article’s purpose and audience. You will then make connections between the various articles that you analyze. Move beyond analysis of individual articles to make connections between articles–what are the similarities and differences?
Once you have completed your essay, you will also write a 2 -3 page reflection piece in which you begin to develop your own theory of writing, considering the concepts of genre, audience, and rhetorical situation, and how they connect.
Format| As in the examples above, you’re describing a series of articles. Instead of making an argument, as school essays often do, you’re exploring your sources from a rhetorical perspective. The essay should include:
- A general introduction, that tells the reader what your subject is
- Rhetorical analyses of four sources
- Your thoughts about the relationships between the rhetorical elements of your sources
- Length: 5-6 pages (1,250-1,500 words)
- Submission: Through Blackboard (we’ll go through the process in class)
Due| Sept 26, Final Draft of Essay #1 due on Bb
Oct 1, 2-3 page reflection due on Bb
Evaluation Rubric & Considerations| Use the following guiding questions as criteria when assessing your and your classmates’ essays. I will be using the same rubric when I grade the final drafts.
- Have you used four different genres for your sources? Do they come from valid sources?
- Identified and made comparisons between the various rhetorical aspects of your sources, including rhetorical situation, purpose, audience, genre, and stance?
- Have you considered how your source’s genre contributes to its rhetorical situation?
- Have you considered how your source’s subject and audience suggest the shape of its communication (its genre)?
- Have you maintained an analytical and professional tone in your rhetorical analysis of your sources?
- Have you cited your sources in-text and on a separate Works Cited page?
