The Assigments
1Description of your public
Describe your public. Your public should be related to your profession (or future profession). If you have no idea what your future profession is, choose one that is interesting to you. If you have a public but are planning to switch careers, you can use these assignments to become more familiar with the profession you hope to enter.
Your description should include:
Why is this public interesting to you? Who the people/organizations (stakeholders) that constitute your public? What makes this public unique—what do they share in common that holds them together? What assumptions do you have about this public? What assumptions do people outside your public have about your public?
This assignment should be no longer than one page (12pt font, 1" margins, single spaced).
2Directions:
1. In one document, for each of the articles you find relating to your public, write a brief summary (3-5 sentences). Title each summary so I can tell which article the summary speaks to. At the bottom of the document include a centered heading that says"Works Cited" and under it list each article in APA style. For help on how to list references in APA refer to the topics which begin with "Reference List" in the left side bar at this site: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/05/
2. Use the attachment feature to upload your summary document and copies of the articles you have read regarding this public.
3. Undergrad students should have a total of at least at least 3 academic journal articles. Graduate studentsshould have 6 or more academic journal articles. Feel free to
upload supplementary articles, but remember they will not count toward the required number.
3.For one hour observe your public (or a section of your public) in a space which your public frequents. This requires you to spend time out of the classroom around town/campus/country/etc. Look for patterns in behavior, shared characteristics, differences, common events, etc.
Take lots of notes. Sketch if that is helpful. If you take photos, do not take any photos that have children (<18 y/o) as that gets us in trouble with University ethics as children are protected and we would need permission from the University.
Please submit a ½-1 page (single spaced) summary of your observations/notes
To do this assignment I ask that you create a twitter account with a professional sounding name. Please do not use your, or your work's, existing twitter account. If your work prohibits the use of social media, like twitter, or you are in a sensitive position in life where anonymity is necessary, please contact me and we will figure out a way for you to complete the assignment without creating an account.
Follow the accounts you've identified as being your public for 2 weeks and write a single spaced paper (1 page for UG, 2 pages for Grads) summarizing the different views, players, arguments, concerns, plans, etc. that these members of your public are tweeting about. Try to think about how they are ordering things. What is the reason they are saying what they are saying? Use these tweets to map (figuratively) the 'discourse' of your public... by discourse I mean the practices and knowledges that make it possible for us to talk intelligently about a topic.
Remember! You need to convey the information you have learned from the tweets, not describe the assignment or rehash what your public is. How you organize the tweets will inform how you write about your public. Some people will use lists with each one being a category informed by their readings, some organize by themes/topics/events that are common in the tweets. Some people like to use mind maps and others like spreadsheets. Some folks like calculus—if you try to summarize your findings in some crazy advance statistical model, I will ask you to rewrite it. Yet, If you want to add a page that has descriptive statistics or correlations of word frequency or hashtag postings, feel free to. That page would go after your list of twitter feeds you are following and doesn't count toward the assignment's page length. Some stats are informative, so if you want, go right ahead.
Your assignment should follow this format:
[Title] (very short description of public)
*Your name
[blank line] Your Essay (1 page for Undergrads, 2 for Grads)
[New Page]
[Title] "Twitter accounts and Tweets"
Name of twitter account Real world name of account holder
List of tweets from account during your time frame (cut and paste from twitter)
Name of next twitter account Real world name of account holder
List of tweets from account (cut and paste from twitter)
[repeat for each account] Optional: Additional information which may include important pictures or graphics the account linked to. Statistics.