I am going to go a bit easy on you at the end of this semester. Rather than ask you to both compose a final Thomas paper and craft a “Kalman with a side of Rice,” I will instead ask you to combine these two activities into one project.
For your final project this semester, I will ask you to:
“Make me a PechaKucha that addresses rhetoric”
This is a bit different than what I had originally planned, but I believe it focuses attention back on the goals of the entire course: to survey the range of rhetoric(s) informing contemporary rhetoric.
Anticipated Questions:
What is a pechakucha?
A pechakucha is a presentation format that can be executed in any number of different programs or mediums. For this project, I will ask that you use either Microsoft Moviemaker or Apple iMovie. Please do not use PowerPoint. Your final project can be any combination of still images and video clips. It should also include an audio track narration of your argument.
The pechakucha presentation format is 20×20: 20 slides lasting 20 seconds each. This works out to be 6 minutes and 40 seconds, which works out to be about 4 pages typed and double-spaced.
Learn more about the pechakucha format here.
What do you mean “addresses”?
I don’t know. I choose this word because it is ambiguous and thus gives you space to interpret and navigate as you see fit.
How many readings/sources should I use?
I don’t know. But I think I would like to see you make an attempt to tie together the material we have worked through in class. You have all worked with a slightly different collection of materials.
We opened this class with you writing definitions of rhetoric. I still have those definitions. I think I’d like to have a sense of how you might define rhetoric now. What would the one sentence definition be? How would you thread that definition through our readings?
And, since I am combining this assignment with the final Thomas paper, I will ask that your final project address Latour, Davis, Rickert, Rice, and Rice. How does their senses of rhetoric align? How do they differ? How do they compare with your definition of rhetoric? Where is the place of the postmodern tradition for you/them/us (as in, our class or our discipline or our society our or planet)?
Can I use material from outside of class?
Certainly.
Do I have to use material from outside of class?
No.
I’ve never used Moviemaker before. Should I be freaking out?
No. Moviemaker is ridiculously easy to use. There’s a million quality Internet tutorials that can walk you through it.
The only thing I would highlight upfront is the difference between SAVING A PROJECT FILE and EXPORTING A FINISHED MOVIE. When you are working in Moviemaker, you are creating a project file. You need to store that file in the same place as all the images, video clips, and audio clips you plan on using in your movie. They all belong in one place. If you save the project file to a flash drive, but save all the project components to, say, the desktop in a library computer, you are screwed. Save everything you will use for the project in one folder.
When you are done with your movie, you need to export it into a video file or upload it to YouTube.
Here’s a walkthrough I composed a few years ago as part of USF’s Teaching With Technology workgroup:
http://www.marccsantos.com/video_workshop/web_video_presentation.html
