Unit Four: Multi-Media Text (Group Assignment), History of a Public Controversy

Working in a group of 3-4, students will create a 7-9-minute multi-media text that explores, depicts, and makes an argument about the history of a controversy. The multi-media text will be created using iMovie, which is available on Macs in the Multimedia commons, or some other platform. Part of the group’s task is to develop facility with the chosen platform through self-training.

The objective of this assignment is three-fold:

1. to integrate the rhetorical skills you have been developing thus far in the course, especially with regard to the variety of rhetorical modes available in a digital context
2. to work as a team researching, designing, and presenting an informative text to the class
3. to develop basic facility with a variety of multi-media tools

Your first job as a group will be to settle on a controversy that you will research. The main goal of the multi-media text is to present new information about the history of this controversy to the class in a lively, compelling, and well-organized way. The text your group produces should incorporate more than one medium–e.g., podcasts, video, photographs, and/or written text.