ASSIGNMENT 2: (Weeks 3 – 4)
Assignment: Write a detailed analytical argument about an advertisement based on your own insights and at least one assertion from the assigned readings. Briefly explain what the advertisement is selling and to whom, but focus most of your paper on how the advertisement sells its product to that group. What strategies does it use to convey its message? You will need to consider both the images and the words the advertisement uses in detail. Look for both obvious and surprising evidence to support your claims.
Notes: You might start thinking about this assignment by reflecting on your own response to the advertisement you’ve chosen. What attracted you to this specific advertisement? Why did you choose it over others? Do you think other people would respond in the same way? How do the images and the words in the advertisement work together (or against each other)? How might the assigned readings for this unit affect your analysis of the ad? What cultural assumptions does the advertisement rely on or play with? The purpose of this assignment is to argue for a specific interpretation of the advertisement. Try to defend your interpretation by producing a series of interesting (perhaps surprising) assertions about the advertisement supported by evidence from the ad itself as well as from the assigned reading.
For this paper, unlike the first assignment, you are expected to defend anarguable, specific, and complex thesis, using a series of unified, well-developed paragraphs. Your final version should be well-organized, detailed, and carefully edited and proofread.Though your primary focus is on the ad rather than on yourself, you can use your own experience of the ad as a starting point for your analysis. It is therefore acceptable to use “I.”
Readings: The Writing Commons: Read “Language for Analyzing Ads”, then choose the units most useful to you:
Page Limits: 3-5 pages (i.e., 3 full pages minimum)
Due Dates: Typed 1 page exploratory draft:_____________
Typed working draft for peer review:_________________
Final packet: ____________________________________________
