WRA 145 Spring 2013
Dr. Cheu
Multi-modal Literacy Assignment, a.k.a. the Remix assignment
Recasting Men in Popular Discourse
Due Dates: March 26, 2013 (papers, 2 pages, works cited is not required)
Presentations: March 19th, and 21st 2013 (as needed)
The purpose of the Multi-modal literacy assignment is to work with your writing in another "mode" and to think about the different ways that writing can have an effect an audience. Also, in the global society and economy in which we find ourselves now, many of you will have to work with writing in different ways in the workplace, and many of you already do. For example, most of you know that what and how you write when you text someone or on a Facebook wall is fundamentally different that what you write and how you present yourself in a cover letter for a job application. Likewise, if you were to take a paper that you have written and have to "covert" it to a Powerpoint presentation, most of you would not simply cut and paste text verbatim, but you would condense your writing into bullet points for each slide and then talk about them. For this assignment, we will work particularly on thinking about skills of delivery or presentation, and on thinking about audience.
This assignment has two components: a reflective essay which will be graded individually and a group presentation. We will discuss later whether it will be easier to assign groups or for you to choose your own.
For this assignment, I would like you as a group to watch an episode or collection of scenes from a "male" television show (see list of choices below) that exemplifies issues of men and masculinity and to re-write or "re-mix" the scene to make it more in-line with today's ideas regarding the above. As we have seen with films and television over time, the roles and expectations of men have changed over time. Re-writing stories to fit more current social views or trends is something that many film and television studios (the tv remake) often do.
So that's an idea that I would like you to engage in here, and then present your scenes to the class.
You may choose from the list of possible shows below:
• Mad Men
• Two and a Half Men
• Blue Bloods (CBS Cop Show)
• Guys with Kids
• Arrow (CW Superhero show)
Two are comedies, two are dramas and Mad Men is a period piece. With the more current shows, (Two, Guys, Arrow and Blue Bloods) are current in their portrayals of masculinity, so your job there is to think about what male stereotypes are being exploited, and to re-work those into something more "PC" Mad Men uses older stereotypes of men, so that ought to work out fine. Be prepared in your presentation to explain the original scene and what and why you changed it.
Presentations should run about 10 minutes long. If the group is large, not everyone has to act a character but everyone should have something to say even if it's just explaining the scene and the re-mix.
Everyone will receive a single group grade for the presentation. Grades will be based on whether everyone participates as actor, speaker, or both, and whether the changes re: character, race/gender, etc. has a clear purpose. You may bring/use props and costumes if you like but you are being graded on the content of the presentation , and the delivery of it, not how "showy" it is.
*Each group should provide me a copy of the script/skit in written form, prior to the presentation.
Reflective Papers
Everyone must turn in their own individual paper
Papers should be two pages in length, and should be a coherent reflection addressing the following:
• Why did your group choose to make the changes you did re: race/gender, etc., and what did you personally learn from doing so about issues of race/class/gender etc.
• Thinking about delivery of presentation and the audience, did you learn anything about how "acting" your words can impact an audience? This is not a question about how good or bad the acting was; rather, given that many of you may have changed the dialogue of your scene to suit present-day social views, how did discussing how that character had to change and lines had to be delivered impact your understanding of how characters work and the impotence of emotion, intonation, inflection, enrich the character and your understanding? The people acting in the skit ought to be sure particularly to address this.
• Given that you also had to think about movement and what an audience will "see" did you learn anything about performance? *This question is optional*'
• What is the value of "re-mix" here, i.e. what did you learn, and do you think these continual re-makes and adaptations of films and television serve a purpose and should be done? Why or why not?
You may also address group dynamics/division of labor issues, etc. re: the project if you wish. 