Assignment III

Assignment III: Production Kit

Creative Remix & Digital Remediation

Multimodal work with writing component (approximately 2–3 double-spaced pages per student of writing) | 20% of course grade

Due Dates:

    • Artifact proposal and group labor contract due 4/29
    • First draft of materials due 5/8
    • Presentations 5/13 and 5/15
    • Note: Portfolio due 5/13

 

Assignment Goals: Use a variety of media to compose in multiple rhetorical situations. Apply rhetorical knowledge in your own composing using the means of persuasion appropriate for each rhetorical context (alphabetic text, still and moving images, and sound), including academic writing and composing for a broader, public audience using digital platforms. Digital remediation is “re-mediating”—adapting a message from its current page-based medium to some other medium using digital technology. This part of the course and assignment sequence asks you to consider how techniques, audiences, language use and other qualities change as they adapt to new media.

As a group, decide upon the core artistic work you want to co-create. Here’s the deal: You aren’t actually going to make it. You’re going to propose—pitch—it to potential stakeholders. Note: You can make it for extra credit (4 points—of the 100 total—per student, with its own labor contract).

You’ll need to describe it, and come up with a plan to release, promote, and sell it. You’ll put all of your materials on a website you build together.

Each member of your group should propose and then complete a multimodal (as in, uses a variety of semitic modes—sound, video, audio, and text) Production Kit for your project. You should each have a specific, concrete individual product that you are making. You will propose to your group and me what that slice of the overall pie will be.

Your final assignment will be completed in individually divided parts, then assembled to form a group project.

It should incorporate the following:

  • information about the product
  • information about how the product is informed by your research (assignment II)
  • information about how your design of the product and choices of detail are informed by your investigation of thematically similar products (assignment I)

Think about the medium, genre, and sub-genre(s) of the work. Consider the compositional elements of the medium (scenes, songs, images, prototypes, etc.) and conventions and tropes of the genre/sub-genre(s) (conventions: narrative arc, track organization, business style) (tropes: slow-motion explosions in action films; shoutouts in hiphop songs; wormhole time travel in science fiction)

Submit a ~350-word proposal of what artifact you are going to pitch and why (remember you’re not making the artifact—unless you want to for extra credit; you’re just pitching it to be made to investors)

Submit a draft of a contract of what kind of work each member of the group is going to do. Each group member should do approximately an equal amount of (a) writing and (b) making of other materials related to the product. You should prepare a way to present your final product that is NOT an essay but includes your writing is somehow multimodal (as in it uses a combination of more than one textual, aural, linguistic, tactile, performative, and/or visual material). For examples, please review the Assignment 3 information at the bottom of the Assignment Sequence Overview.

Work between group members should be evenly distributed.

Grading Criteria
(2 points each, 20 total)

  1. Submit all writing, including planning and draft deadlines, on time.
  2. Create, agree to, and stick to a labor contract for the project.
  3. Product a written component per group member (~3–4 pages of writing).
  4. Produce a multimodal component per group member.
  5. Incorporate elements of all of your group members’ first assignments—clearly and effectively.
  6. Incorporate elements of all of your group members’ second assignments—clearly and effectively.
  7. Present your work to the class—with a participating role for every member (10-15 min per group).
  8. Describe your proposed product with detail and style. Have an aesthetic, or a “Brand.”
  9. Explain how your work appeals to a specific current cultural zeitgeist.
  10. Put your work on a website.

Seth’s 1960s example:

Seth’s group has decided that their desired cultural product is going to be an album. The songs on the album will be about a felt Generation Gap in the 1960s, and be based on the key research his group members conducted, and subtopics they explored. The lyrics will explore Generation Gaps in the contexts of employment, political attitudes, social behavior and lifestyle, and consumer behavior. Additionally, the music itself will incorporate the styles of the popular 1960s move towards the electric guitar sound—a sound that older generations sometimes found repulsive or devilish.

(Okay let’s pretend the internet existed in the 1960s for a second.) Tino has decided to write the descriptive text that will accompany the album. The text will explain what tropes or aesthetics the album will either combine or evolve. Since the album text is digital, the page for Tino’s section will include sample sounds from different musical acts and explanations of what styles in each the music will borrow from. The page will rely heavily on the criticisms Tino and their group members wrote of other musical acts, as well as research on musical trends of the time.

Ujulti will offer some sample lyrics and describe how these lyrics reflect political attitudes of the 1960s. The album, Ujulti claims, is very much a political album, and Ujulti’s commentary offers a descriptive analysis of how it comes together and what arguments it makes. Ujulti has additionally offered to produce sample album artwork for the site.

Normine has decided to produce a podcast interview with the musician. Because the musician is fictional, Normine is going to use voices to be both the interviewer and the musician. Normine’s podcast will offer some sample moments from a song or songs, and an interview about the musician’s choices of style and lyrics. However, much of the interview will focus on the musicians overall lifestyle, and how they attempt to portray that lifestyle through music. What are the musicians own views about the spirit of the 60s?

Seth has opted to write a plan for the sale and distribution of the album and turn it into a visually appealing “Media Kit.” He researches what record labels might be interested based on the kinds of material they’ve produced, where they are located, and how this new artist might complement the label’s discography. He offers an explanation of the target demographic based on research of consumer behavior.