The purpose of this assignment is to have you analyze how others have written about identities (marked by various experiences of difference among other things) for different audiences. How do these professionals analyze identity-making through the exploration of any combination of such shaping circumstances as language, gender, race, sexuality, class, ethnicity, religion, age, ability, and so on? Working on this project will help you in developing your own written response to, and analysis of, professional writing for different audiences in different contexts.
You will need to engage 3 sources that deal with any identity shaping aspect in which you are most interested: one scholarly article in a discipline of your choice located through UAlbany library, one news article from a popular and reputable news outlet (New York Times, The Guardian, and so on), and one source of your choice (e.g. a blog post, a short story, non-fiction story, and so on). Much like with the first paper, we will use Google Drive for working on the drafts of the assignment and for giving and receiving peer feedback.
Step 1a: Follow the analytical summary of each source by your analysis of the given source, addressing all of the following questions (credit for some of the questions goes to Paul and Elder 2008):
i. What is the key question the author is addressing/raising?
ii. What facts, data, or experiences is the author using to support and develop their claims? (Remember to always go BEYOND supporting ideas, not stop there).
iii. What is the key argument the author is making through their claims?
iv. What are we invited to make of the author’s argument and in what context?
v. What are the implications of the author’s argument?
Step 1b: Give an analytical summary for each source in 2-3 sentences, following the below guidelines:
i. Open your introductory paragraph stating what the author argues. Make sure to include a strong reporting verb (argue/claim/maintain/contend/posit) to introduce the most significant idea(s). Explain why these are the most significant, by giving important reasons, factors, or aspects that the author(s) discuss(es) in the source (by doing this you are determining the hierarchical structure of the source).
ii. After mentioning the most significant idea(s) and explaining why they are the most important in the first one or two sentences, explain how they fit together (by doing this you are keeping the logical sequence of the source).
Please note, that through your analytical summaries you are giving a quick roadmap of the source, while in your analysis you are delving deeper to gain a more insightful understanding.
Step 2: Put the analyses of all the sources together. Remember, the goal of this assignment is to help you – through your own analysis — engage professionals in a conversation. Engage the authors in a dialogue and engage in a dialogue with them (not literally, rather, look for similarities among their perspectives despite their differences, and difference within similarity), instead of plugging in sources. What does each of them contribute to the discussion of this topic? Focus on representative ideas. Move beyond what the authors say regarding their ideas, explore the logic. If the authors have similar approaches, is there a difference within the similar approach the authors take? If they treat the issue differently, is there a similarity despite the obvious difference? Develop or apply what a source suggests, rather than agreeing or disagreeing with it (Rosenwasser and Stephen 2012). You can use one source as a lens for understanding the other two sources. Make sure to put the word count at the end of your final draft.
In your introduction address the following questions:
1. What issue are you (as the author of Tweeting with Experts) examining and why?
2. What sources are you engaging to examine this issue?
3. In what context are you examining the issue?
In your conclusion address the following questions:
1. What is your most evolved final understanding of the question raised in the intro?
2. How has your analysis enriched your understanding of the issue raised in the intro?