Please use simple English and deliberately keep some grammar and word choice mistake in the paper.

ALTERNATIVE MEDIA MDSC61H3

Major Essay Assignment

DUE DATES Proposal and Annotated Bibliography 5% of final grade Length: 1.5 pages (not including headers) PLUS annotations

Final Paper 30% of final grade Week 11 – Mar. 25 Length: 8 pages (not including headers and bibliography) ** Please know you may take a one week extension and hand your paper in week 12. Should you do so, your paper will be returned with minimal comments. Also please know that this only applies to the final paper and NOT the proposal.

This assignment is a standard academic essay. Your papers are expected to make use of original research (i.e. you MUST go beyond the readings listed in the syllabus), develop an original insight or perspective, and put forth an original and compelling argument.

Instructions for Research Proposal and Annotated Bibliography Your proposal should provide a brief outline of the topic you intend to explore in your final. A good proposal does three things: (1) it should identify and describe the primary research question animating your investigation; (2) it should provide a justification for why this question is relevant within the context of this course; and, (3) it should provide an outline of how your paper proposes to investigate this question. The annotated bibliography should have 3 scholarly sources, none of which are assigned as course readings (you can use course readings and/or non-scholarly as sources for your final paper, but NOT for the proposal). Each should provide a properly formatted bibliographic entry bibliographic entry, a brief summary of the source, and a brief description of how it is appropriate to your chosen research topic.

Suggested Research Topics （you can decide the topic） 1) Profile an alternative media organization of your choice. Pay attention to its historical development. What inspired its founders to create the organization? Does it cooperate with other similar organizations? What sort of challenges has it faced over the years? What, exactly, makes it alternative?

2) Compare similar alternative media organizations across national boundaries, history or technologies. For example, how is community radio different in Canada and the United States? How is pirate radio constituted differently in the UK and the US? How is alternative news podcasting different from alternative or community radio?

3) Do an historical overview of a particular alternative media practice. What are the origins of this particular practice? Are there related or similar practices in different media? Has there been any sort of social, cultural, legal or economic resistance to the development and proliferation of this practice? Be sure to provide a compelling argument as to why your chosen focus constitutes an alternative media practice.

4) Explore the definitions of, and possible tensions surrounding, the idea of alternative media. What do we actually mean by alternative media? Alternative to what? For whom? Be sure to reference at

least THREE definitions of alternative media (and the scholars who provide them) and include concrete examples to illustrate your argument.

5) How has the Internet helped transform a particular alternative media practice? How has it changed the conditions for practitioners or audiences? Has it made things easier, or more difficult? In what ways? Be sure to clearly identify the media practice you are talking about, as well as describe its history and the dynamics of change you are identifying. NOTE: This is NOT a general question about how the Internet has changed the media. Be sure to focus on an alternative media practice and be sure to provide a discussion of what makes this practice alternative in the first place.

6) Develop and propose your own topic. If you wish to do this, it is a very good idea to consult with me before either part of the assignment is due.