What would the creative project look like?

Well, it’s sort of up to you. You have tons of choices so long as the creative project makes a fairly transparent point about your topic. For instance, you could devise a plan for a cinematic adaptation. This would actually be pretty fun. You would need to figure out what your characters would be, who would play them, what the plot would be, create dialogue. Basically, then, I would expect you to type out a plot description (narrative), describe the characters, what actors would play them, and give me example dialogues from the screenplay. Of course, you won’t write the entire film. Folks are apparently making a new Star Wars movie. You could create Rhetoric Wars or something. Hell, I don’t know. Another idea–you could write a dramatic monologue in the voice of any character that might grow out of the reading and/or our class discussions. You could generate a monologue in the voice of Plato, Aristotle, etc… Here, then, I would expect you to write the entire dramatic monologue. You could write a children’s book, a dialogue like Plato’s stuff, a comic book, a script for a sit-com “Everybody Loves Aristotle” (as a spontaneous example), a reality show “Greek Survivor” or “The Biggest Sophist” (other random idea), etc. “The Big Cicero Theory”… The choices are really quite endless. But, of course, other artistic expressions could work like arts and crafts something or other, a painting, a drawing, a poem, a song, etc. I urge you, indeed beg you, to be very creative here and really get fired up about it. Creativity counts big! But, whatever you do, I also expect it to be pretty good, clever, etc. You need to, more than anything else, make a point, make an argument! I want a good script, a good monologue, a good poem, whatever– But not only that, a good monologue that makes a point and/or argument about your specific topic. So, this isn’t a just throw something together and call it creative art kind of thing.

So, I just have to do this creative project thingy, and that’s it?

Nope. Sorry. Whatever you decide to do, your project must include a brief (3-5 pages)) explanation of your rationale for the project and how it helps you and your readers or audience members (basically me and your peers) come to a deeper understanding and appreciation of your topic (the person), his or her contributions to the study of communication and your point or evaluations about all that. The first part of the paper should discuss your topic and his or her contribution to the study of communication and your argument, and the second part should very carefully describe each creative choice you made with your “art product” to convey that information from the first bit.

So what will I turn in when this thingy thing is, like, due?

What I’ll get from you will look like a packet of stuff, with the actual creative project (the script, story, picture, whatever…) and the rationale in some sort of folder or another. Do I have to do any research?

Yep. You’ll want to move beyond our book and read up on your topic. And, you might find some information on your artistic medium.

Rationale Paper

This should be very clear, well written, and sophisticated. Again, this is the nuts and bolts of what you are doing with/in the creative product. You need to specifically articulate the creative choices you made and why you made them! Why did you decide on your specific topic? What are all the very detailed choices you made and why did you make them—what point are you trying to make, etc.? One way to do this is to get outside yourself a bit, and ask yourself every question you could come up with as to why you did this or that, and then attempt to answer those questions in the rationale, though the rationale should be structured as an essay. First part will convey the information; second part will convey your artistic choices. Moreover, part of the 40 points here includes your writing. This should be very, very well written. Again, this needs to be 3-5 pages, but closer to 5 Cite at least our book using MLA or APA.

Overall creativity and quality of your project

Here, I will allow, in part, the medium to help me with my grading. If you’re doing a film screen play, I need to find it interesting– interesting plot, quality monologue that flows, has humor, seriousness, etc. Indeed, again I would urge you to do research into the creative medium you venture. What makes a good screenplay? What makes a good monologue? Go do some reading! I wish I could give you more information here, but it’s hard to detail this; and it will be hard to grade it. I simply urge you not to throw something on a piece of paper (or a canvas) and assume that I will consider it a glorious artistic achievement. The most important thing, though, is that the project have a message, a thesis, you are saying something about the history of comm studies! And I want that thesis or point to be pretty easy to decode.

Other (like diligence, something that strikes me as particularly interesting, or not, something strikes me as going the extra mile, or being lazy, etc)

I have found in the past that some students really get into this, while others, well, don’t. Believe me, I can tell when students put a great deal of effort into something. I think this has the potential to be a tremendous opportunity to engage a particular aspect of the history of Communication, but you need to sort of get fired up about the process.

4 days ago