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ENGL 103 (King): Assignment

Information Literacy Instruction Goals

  • Search WorldCat Discovery to identify books and other materials owned by the library; find a book on the shelf using its LC call number.
     
  • Search multidisciplinary databases to find full text articles on a topic; use "Find It" links to find full text of articles.
     
  • Cite sources using a citation style.

Assignment and research approach

Unit 2 is going to have you select and investigate how a term is used. However, while in Unit 1 we used interviews to discover how various good writers view or define a writing feature, Unit 2 is going to use rhetorical analysis to understand how the use and meaning of a specific term changes across different texts

Overview of the Project:

  1. Choose a term whose meaning is somewhat vague or unclear to you—or that you notice you hear used in various ways.
  2. Find 3 texts that use that term. These texts can represent various genres—from a TikTok to a newspaper article to government documents.
  3. Code the texts’ use of the terms: identify all moments where the term is used, and how/its meaning in those moments. Compare 3 texts’ use and meanings.  (Find Primary Sources)
  4. Examine each text’s rhetorical situation: understand how each factor of the Rhetorical Situation--rhetor, audience, text’s message and exigence, and constraints--influence the text.
  5. Form a hypothesis (preliminary argument) about the term’s meaning and its slippage, and why that matters for your readers’ awareness.
  6. Research necessary background and secondary information, pertinent to your argument. (Find Scholarly Articles)

In writing your paper and the annotated bibliography, you will use want to utilize a proper citation style (Citing Sources).

Manage & Organize Sources

ProQuest RefWorks is a citation management tool that can help you organize and cite your sources and create bibliographies.

Sign into your RefWorks account. Keep RefWorks open in a tab at the top of your web browser.

Consult the RefWorks Guide for additional help.