Week Five Overview: Start Here

Welcome to Week Five!

At this point in the Cultural Analysis assignment you have practiced locating and extracting textual evidence and you have a better understanding of how social norms are created and maintained. This week you will be reading examples of textual analysis and how it is used to create an argument, as well as selecting your topic and locating specific textual evidence to build your argument.  

Learning Outcomes for Week Five

• Read about textual analysis and perspective
• Write an overview of key points of the readings
• Select a Cultural Analysis topic
• Create detailed notes of cultural analysis topic
• Locate areas of analysis to create an argument
• Draft Cultural Analysis essay

Week Five: Reading Assignments

You have three reading assignments this week and all are provided to assist you with the current assignment.

1- Begin by reading "Selection, Slanting, and Charged Language" by the Birks. As you read this text, consider how your "lens" might impact your analysis and the ways language and images can be constructed or articulated for various purposes. 

2- Read the excerpt from Protocols of Reading by Robert Scholes. This is a difficult text, but it provides professional examples of close analysis based on textual evidence -- exactly what you will be doing in your Cultural Analysis essay. 

3- Read the excerpt from Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari.  It provides an overview of the differences between subjective, objective, and intersubjective knowledge. These concepts are key to the current assignment. 

Week Five: Discussion Board

At this point you should have selected a topic for your Cultural Analysis. Begin by viewing your text (movie, show, etc) and taking an abundance of notes on the "Areas of Analysis" provided on the assignment sheet. The more detailed notes you have the easier this assignment will be, as they will help you locate an argument (thesis) and will be the supporting information for all of your paragraphs. Then, post your notes online for your peers to see. Reviewing others' notes will help you see areas of analysis you may have missed. *Sample student notes are also provided. 

Week Five: Writing and Revising Essay

Once you have your notes, review them carefully and decide which areas of analysis you will use to create your argument. You may have taken notes on several, but you will likely only use 2-4 areas of analysis to create your specific argument. Instead of writing an introduction, you may want to begin your essay by turning your notes into paragraphs with tentative topic sentences. This will allow you to locate the possible purpose and impact of the information you located and your topic sentences will help define your argument. Once you have a clear idea of how your areas of analysis connect and evolve, you can begin building your specific argument (introduction) and connecting it to areas of analysis. Write, revise, write, revise, edit. *Make sure you have in-text citations for quotes and a citation for your primary source before submitting your essay.