Formal Analysis of a Website
Select a website for your analysis. Please include the web address in your assignment.
Construct and support a claim (stated in a thesis statement) about how the website uses elements of its composition strategically to construct meaning (e.g., how a banking web site anticipates anxiety about online banking by creating the impression that it the site is secure).
ENGL 2325.2 The Media in Everyday Life
Final Analytical (Essay) Project (25%)
Due: March 26
Length: 4-5 double-spaced pages, MLA format
Choose one of the following topics for this final analytical essay project that deals with both digital texts and cultural discourses about digital technology.
- Formal Analysis of a Website
Select a website for your analysis. Please include the web address in your assignment.
Construct and support a claim (stated in a thesis statement) about how the website uses elements of its composition strategically to construct meaning (e.g., how a banking web site anticipates anxiety about online banking by creating the impression that it the site is secure).
The central argument of the analysis should be clearly stated in a thesis statement and supported with the analysis of specific formal evidence from the website. Be sure to explain in your analysis how the evidence that you select supports your central claim.
Your analysis should consider elements of composition and layout, using the correct terminology from semiotics and website form (see CP 124). Your analysis of the website can focus mainly on the homepage, but it should consider how hypertext and other factors suggest movement and meaning beyond the page. Your analysis should be focused, systematic, and insightful (i.e., it should go beyond the obvious).
- Analysis of an Advertisement for a Digital Technology
Find an example of an advertisement for a digital or computing technology (e.g., a Mac computer, Google glasses, virtual reality technology). The ad can be contemporary or historical, but you should know (and state) the original source and context in which the ad first appeared. Construct and support an argument (thesis) about what utopian idea the ad is suggesting that the digital technology will bring about. How do the formal elements of the ad convey this meaning? Your analysis should be focused, systematic, and insightful (i.e., it should go beyond the obvious).
- Analysis of a Representation of Computers or Digital/Social Media in a Moving image text
Find a compelling narrative representation of computers, or practices related to digital/social media in a feature film or television show. You may choose, for example, WarGames (1983), or an episode of Black Mirror. Construct and support an argument (thesis) about how the representation conveys a cultural idea/belief/anxiety, or offers commentary about a technology, platform, or media practice. While you should consider the function of the representation in the film or TV show as a whole, focus and support your argument by doing close analysis of the way the technology, platform, or media
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