Please Read Direction carefully!
Individaul option: Write an analysis of a multimodal text
Using concepts and approaches covered in this class, write your own original analysis of a multimodal text of your choice.
Your options for choosing a text are very open: you can choose a scene from a movie or television show, a meme, an advertisement, a YouTube-style video essay, a Twitter thread, website, etc. Choose something that you feel is worth of a rich analysis of in terms of multimodality. If the text is “short” (an image or video shorter than 5 minutes, for example), include the text or a link to the text in your paper so I can see what you are analyzing. If the text is longer (a longer video, for example), include summaries, quotations or paraphrases in your analysis or find a way to otherwise show examples of how your analysis applies (screenshots of scenes you then explain and analyze, for example.) As we have seen in class, even short multimodal texts like videos can lead to long analyses, so I recommend choosing something like a scene from a movie rather than an entire film.
Topic examples: exploring the presence of neoliberal ideology and hauntology in a pop cultural text via a multimodal analysis; analyzing how a scene from a movie produces certain ideological meanings multimodally.
You do not have to strictly follow this organizational model, but your paper should do the following:
Introduction:
Introduce the text you are analyzing and its context so that your analysis can be understood. Use the concept of rhetorical situation to explain how writer, audience, purpose, topic and context contribute to shaping the text.
Briefly summarize the main points you will flesh out in your paper.
Define/explain ideology: pulling from the course texts as appropriate (utilizing quotations, paraphrases, summary and citing sources clearly as you go), explain mostly in your own words what ideology is. Since this concept will play a central role in your analysis, it is important that you show a clear understanding of it first.
Present your analysis
Identify what modes (linguistic, visual, aural, spatial, gestural) are at work in the text
Analyze how each of those modes function to produce specific ideological effects/meanings
Remember to address: What modes are foregrounded in the text? What modes play minor roles? How do modes interact or work together to produce meaning?
Make sure to explain your analysis in terms of what you observe about the text with references to specific portions as supporting evidence
You may want to explain some aspects of the use of modalities without reference to ideology (for example, explaining how the music creates a mood for a scene in a movie), but remember that this is not only a paper about multimodality but also about ideology in texts.
If you are analyzing the influence of social conditions shaping the text (finding aspects of neoliberalism or “hauntology”, exploring how socioeconomic norms are subtly represented in texts) etc), show/explain specific examples at work in the text in different modes and explain the significance
Conclusion
Summarize the conclusions of your analysis of the text
Refer to class readings where appropriate with citation. Outside research is not necessary, but if you refer to other texts, obviously also cite those.
MLA format (yes, that means double-spaced), 6 pages minimum. No bibliography is necessary unless you are working with outside research, but introduce class texts in your writing clearly enough that I know what you are referencing.
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