For the afternoon/evening set.

2. TODAY
1) Research and you, Part I: Veracity of a
Source
2) The example
3) Inquiry 3 and free-writing
4) Bubbl.us Time!
5) “And my topic is…”
6) Homework

3. RESEARCH
Traditionally, a project like the one we are about to
undertake would involve a huge stack of books. But this is
new era, and we don’t generally do research that way
anymore. Much of your research will likely be done using
this thing we call the magical super-happy interwebz.
But this introduces an interesting wrinkle: the internet
theoretically represents total democracy, freedom at its
finest. So if anyone can post… you have to check for
the veracity of a source.

4. Veracity: from m-w.com
1) devotion to the truth : TRUTHFULNESS
2) power of conveying or perceiving truth
3) conformity with truth or fact : ACCURACY
4) something true <makes lies sound
like veracities>

5. SO THE QUESTION…
…becomes this: what out there is true and
what out there isn’t?
I used the word veracity because you’ll
hear politicians tossing it around this
week. But what I really mean is that you
must find out if a source is reliable or not
before you go incorporating it into your
paper.
Sometimes, bad sites are really obvious.

8. QUICK ANALYSIS:
THIS SITE IS… BOGUS.

9. SADLY
…not everyone will telegraph their Ethos for us.
So things to remember:
1. ANYONE with either some money or some form of
subsidized access (a local library, a school, a friend) can
put a website on the internet. There’s no gate-keeper.
2. There are, in this world, people who lie.
3. There are also, in this world, people who are ignorant.
4. Notice I said “ignorant” and not “stupid.” To
be ignorant is to not know. There are also
idiots, who know better but do stupid
things on the internet.

10. LET’S TEST A SITE
Let’s say we’re going to talk about great
political speeches as part of our Inquiry 3
project, tracing a line from Dr. King’s “I
Have a Dream” speech to George H.W.
Bush’s “Thousand Points of Light” and on
to… whatever we consider to be the best
speech so far this year.
We start with Google, because we’re cool
like that. And we type in “Martin Luther
King.”

13. CLICK!
OMG! It’s
martinlutherking.org!
This has to be
legit, right?

16. W. T. F. (what’s the facts?)
Down the page, we find this, the attribution.
The first rule of internet research: figure out who
posted/made what you’re looking at.
Hosted by Stormfront? Hmmm… that’s not a name
I have ever heard. Oh, it’s a link! GLORIOUS!
Let’s click it.

19. I sort of liked 2005

20. ON THE REAL…
I looooove Google. I do. And Google
knows, because they’re watching me type
this, archiving it, and will show it to
people later. 
But Google is an aggregator, which means
that when people search for something, it
tabulates that into the totals and ranks
the sites most often clicked when
searching for a word. Big nerd stuff=
martinlutherking.org gets a lot of hits, so
it’s high on the page.

21. Buuuuuuuuut…
Martinlutherking.org is owned by a group of hate-spewing
Neo-Nazis who wanted David Duke, a known member of the
Klu Klux Klan, to be President of the United States.
I shouldn’t have to ask, but I will.
Anyone think they’re a good source for information on Dr.
King?
But that was on the first page of Google’s search.
At one point, a few years ago, it was
THE TOP OF THE LIST.

22. So be skeptical. Always.
Don’t do bad research. It’s okay– in fact for this project
to a degree it will be imperative– to use the internet to
do research. It’s a big ol’ tool, perhaps the single best
research technology since the written word itself.
But verify. Know who wrote what you see, who posted it,
when, from where, on behalf of who. Don’t trust Phillip
Morris for facts about cigarette smoking. Don’t trust The
Egg Council for information about eggs and cholesterol.
Don’t trust Neo-Nazis at all.
That last one is just IMHO.
But don’t trust Neo-Nazis for info about an African
American leader.

23. Why you might not
trust Wikipedia

24. We can change it.
Enter Franken-PowerPoint.
Theme change in 3, 2….

26. INQUIRY 3
In inquiry 3, we will be entering into a consideration of
public debate by looking at… public debates!
This project is two parts: a research memo and a
researched argument.
Your goal is to pick an argument that is somehow related
to the Presidential campaign– my only requirement being
that at some point either the Presidential or Vice
Presidential candidate on each side have commented on it.
My second requirement, for your own sanity, is that it not
be something ill-conceived or petty, like the “Birther”
argument.

27. YOUR PRODUCT…
…for this inquiry will be a pair of approximately five
page texts. You can choose to compose them
together (with a big line in the middle) or as two
separate documents.
The first piece is a research memo on the topic. In this
piece, you will gather all the information you can
about your chosen topic and synthesize it into a
report. This will be packed with information and
contain NO– I repeat NO– signs of your own opinion.
In the report half of this, you’re neutral , writing as a
good news writer or as an amazing researcher. It’s just
the facts, Ma’am.

28. YOUR SECOND PRODUCT…
…is a five page argument for your point-of-view.
It should be based on facts, and draw citations from your
research memo, but this piece will be all about your stance
on the issue. This is where you move from being a critic of
rhetorical strategies to utilizing them yourselves. How will
you build ethos? Do you want to make an pathos based
appeal? Logos in the house? Do you want to utilize
something symbolic? Is it time to get hyperbolic and kick this
to the curve? You decide.
The first part of this is about being fair and sticking to
research and known facts. This second part is about, to
quote my dear friend Charlie Sheen, “winning, duh!”

29. YOUR AUDIENCE
Your audience for this inquiry is the voting population
of our great state of Ohio. I’ve chosen it because we
live here and many of us grew up here or near here,
but beyond knowing the terrain, Ohio is what is called
a “battleground” state.
Sadly, this doesn’t mean there will be actual battles
(first rule of Fight Club– never make a PowerPoint
slide about fight club!). What it does mean is that the
population of the state is split in such a way that most
views have a counter-balance. For every conservative,
a liberal. For every pessimist, an optimist. For every
Bengals fan, a Browns fan.

30. Rubric, this time from 150
1) Is the researched memo portion of the project properly
researched, properly cited, and free from opinion/bias? 50
2) Is the argument portion a clear staking out of a position
by the author? 25
3) Is the author’s position rhetorically sound? Is there
evidence of the learning from class and the use of the skills
we’ve developed? 50
4) Are citations used correctly and prudently, and is outside
research used to enhance and support—but not to
overwhelm—the argument? 25

31. DUE DATES
Workshop of rough draft: October 18th
Due for grading: November 1st.

32. Free-writing
On the next several slides are free-writing prompts.
You may respond to these on your Tumblr (if you
want me to look), in a Word or other WP doc (if you
want to save them for later on your machine) or on
paper with a pen or pencil (if you’re old school).
Please remember, though– keep going until I stop
you, even if you feel you’re writing something
mundane. More ideas WILL come to you. Trust me!

33. Prompt 1
Let’s start with something incredibly hard
to think about but hopefully easy to
generate a list from.
What matters to you?
To be more literal, what things are most
important to you in terms of major
ideological concepts? What do you value?

34. Prompt 2
This might be a little heavy-handed, but I
had someone ask me to write this once in
a writing course and what I came up with
was sort of astonishing (to me). So… let’s
try it.
Make a list of things you’d die for.

35. Prompt 3
Take a deep breath. Exhale.
Now look at the list of things you’d die
for, and as hard as this is to imagine, try your
very, very hardest to believe that a moment
has come and you really have to give– or at
least risk– your life for it.
Cross off anything you no longer feel
belongs on the list.

36. Prompt 4
Now it gets less Dead Poets Society and
more current events.
Make a list of all the things you can
remember any candidate for President or
Vice President making a stand on.

37. Prompt 5
Look at all your lists.
Where is there crossover between the things
you believe in and/or the things you would
die for and your list of issues mentioned by
candidates?
Remember, these can be uneven
relationships, or serious stretches.
Make a new list of the combined things.

38. Prompt 6
Look at your combined list.
Ask yourself this question: would I feel
interested enough in this topic to spend a
month researching and writing about it?
Cross off anything you can answer “no” to.

39. Prompt 7
Look at what remains of your most recent list.
Rank them in order from “the one I think
seems the best” to “the one I think would be
the least fun/educational/awesome.”
If you have more than three, spend some
serious time looking at the ones after three to
make sure they don’t deserve to move up the
list.

40. Prompt 8
Take the thing you ranked #1.
Do you believe one candidate on each side
has spoken about it? If so, begin writing about
the topic, listing everything you know or
know has been said.
DO NOT SHARE YOUR OPINION.

41. Prompt 9
Take the thing you ranked #2.
Do you believe one candidate on each side
has spoken about it? If so, begin writing your
stance on the topic.
DO NOT REFERENCE ANYONE OR UTILIZE ANY
EXTERNAL FACTS.

42. Prompt 10
Take the thing you ranked #3.
Do you believe one candidate on each side
has spoken about it? If so, begin writing the
opposite of your stance on the topic.
DO NOT REFERENCE ANYONE OR UTILIZE ANY
EXTERNAL FACTS.

43. Free-writing
Look over the three pieces of writing you have.
Ideally, I’d like you to pick one of them to work with,
but I’m not going to force you to make that decision
until next class.
File the three pieces away. Think about them over
the weekend. Bring them back with you on Tuesday
(or better yet, put them on your Tumblr).

44. Go here:

45. HOMEWORK
Go here: https://me.lib.muohio.edu/ . Login, and do it. 
It’s a library tutorial. We’ll talk more about its content next
class.
Tumblr question: What is your Inquiry 3 topic? I’ll be holding
you to this.
Tumblr prompt: the first Presidential debate is Wednesday
night. I won’t force you to watch it (you should, though). I
will ask you to do this, though: if you don’t’ watch,
somehow use your ninja research powers
to find out if your topic was mentioned
and write a summary of what each person
said about it.