Prospectus
A prospectus is a formulation of your initial thinking for your final essay topic. This assignment gets to you narrow your project focus by proposing and articulating the initial claim (an assertion or hypothesis to be explored) or the guiding question you want to pursue for our larger out-of-class essay project for the course. It also helps you consider what you’ll try to cover, what you need to research, and why the topic is worth pursuing. You’ll need to develop a topic that is narrow, focused, worth exploration, interesting to you, and driven by your genuine curiosity and critical thinking.
As you discuss your proposed topic, include as much detail as you can (at this juncture). Essentially, this is your pitch to your “editor.” You’ll need to describe the focus of the project, why your readers will be interested in it, how your project is original, how you plan to conduct the research, and what exactly you will try to analyze as you pursue the project.
chosse a topic like this because u need to write the final essay about that.
Finding a Topic Focus
The focus of your final essay project should examine a particular subject or theme regarding visual
rhetoric. Along the way, you are required to make use of two of the major class readings: Lakoff, Sontag,
De Zengotita, Thompson. A particular claim or concept from one of these authors is likely the place to
start. That interesting idea/concept/claim is something that you can trace and consider further in a
project of your own. Likewise, return to the Short Essay Responses we’ve written. Particular analysis
you’ve started in one of those responses could be extended into a larger project.
Whatever you decide to pursue, the project should be original and seek to develop new knowledge and
new insights for readers. You main aim for the paper is conduct analysis to develop an insightful
argument (or theory/thesis) for readers, making use of source material along the way to borrow and
extend their ideas (and, with your research, provide additional context or concepts to develop your
discussion).
Use the following questions to help develop your prospectus:
What is your original, focused topic? How will it add to the ideas/theories/conversations started by (at least one of) the text(s) from class?
What is your guiding question to prompt your research/fieldwork? Or, what claim (assertion/hypothesis) do you think you will make about this topic?
What is your purpose in writing about this subject? Why are you interested in it?
Why might this discussion matter to others?
What is at stake in exploring this idea/focus? What do you think you can explore
here that is interesting and original to your essay? How are you going to do something that hasn’t already been done by another writer (at least, to your knowledge)?
Additional questions you might consider:
What is interesting, curious, or significant about this topic? What do you want to figure out?
What have others already said/written about your proposed subject/topic? How do you suppose you will be situated in this “conversation”?
What types of sources do you know you will incorporate into your essay? How do you plan on pursuing further sources (evidence) for your topic?
Use the following topic proposal as models for your Prospectus. Notice the comments on the sides to see the writing moves. As usual, these aren’t perfect (I actually wrote these as a student way back when!), but they will give you an idea of the genre and expectations.
Samples/Models: I attached the samples
Assignment Requirements:
Your prospectus should be a minimum of 250 words, typed, double-spaced, 12 pt. Times New Roman, with 1” margins and a MLA format heading. Include the word count at the bottom of your proposal.
Your prospectus should read as a stand-alone topic description and respond to the key questions above. For additional reference, see the samples above. The Prospectus will receive a letter grade based on how well you addressed the above features.
