Guides: COMM 3620: Intercultural communication: Writing Resources

Rhetorical Analysis

Organizing Your Analysis
General tips for plotting out the overall form of your essay.
Types of Outlines and Samples
Types of Outlines from Purdue OWL
Rhetorical Situations
Understanding and being able to analyze rhetorical situations can help contribute to strong, audience-focused, and organized writing.
Elements of Analysis
How to write a rhetorical analysis essay of primarily visual texts with a focus on demonstrating the author’s understanding of the rhetorical situation and design principles.
Analysis
Analysis is a type of primary research that involves finding and interpreting patterns in data, classifying those patterns, and generalizing the results. It is useful when looking at actions, events, or occurrences in different texts, media, or publications.

How to Write a Research Question

From the Writing Center at George Mason University

Close Reading and Critical Reading

CRITICAL READING: WHAT IS CRITICAL READING, AND WHY DO I NEED TO DO IT?
Critical reading means that a reader applies certain processes, models, questions, and theories that result in enhanced clarity and comprehension.
Critical Reading
You'll find many ways to read and understand a text, but keeping a journal as you read is one of the best ways of exploring a piece of writing. By integrating reading and writing, you can interact with the work more fully.
Close Reading a Text and Avoiding Pitfalls
Close reading a text. This covers prewriting, close reading, thesis development, drafting, and common pitfalls to avoid.
Close Reading
From Harvard College Writing Center
Poetry: Close Reading
By learning how to close read a poem you can significantly increase both your understanding and enjoyment of the poem. You may also increase your ability to write convincingly about the poem.
Reading a Play
These sections also discuss different approaches (literary theory/criticism) students may use to write about literature. These resources build on the Writing About Literature materials.
Audience Analysis Overview
In order to compose persuasive, user-centered communication, you should gather as much information as possible about the people reading your document. Your audience may consist of people who may have differing needs and expectations.

Developing a Thesis from a Story or Novel

Once you've read the story or novel closely, look back over your notes for patterns of questions or ideas that interest you.

Help with Topic Selection

Pew Research Center - A nonpartisan "fact tank" that provides information on the issues, attitudes and trends shaping America and the world. Offers results from public opinion polling and social science research and news coverage analysis.
RAND Corporation: Research Areas - Topics that are currently in the news or relevant to the public policy debate.
United Nations: Global Issues - Offers an over view of global issues, and links to other resources where you can get additional information.

Installing MS Office 365 ProPlus

Free Microsoft© Office 365 ProPlus is available to currently enrolled students.

https://it.unt.edu/installoffice365

ePortfolio LibGuide
UNT’s new ePortfolio system provides you with an opportunity to connect your experiences on campus and in
your community with demonstrable skills for your future career. Learn how to begin building and archiving a
personal repertoire of marketable experiences in your ePortfolio.

APA and Chicago Style Guides

APA Citation Style Guide
APA (American Psychological Association) style is most commonly used to cite sources within the social sciences.

APA Sample Paper

Chicago Manual of Style 17th Edition
The Chicago NB system is often used in the humanities and provides writers with a system for referencing their sources through footnote or endnote citation in their writing and through bibliography pages.

Chicago Manual of Style NB Sample Paper

Technical writing and literary theory and schools of criticism

Writing Report Abstracts
It covers informational and descriptive abstracts and gives pointers for success.
Professional, Technical Writing
These OWL resources will help you conduct research and compose documents for the workplace, such as memoranda and business letters. This section also includes resources for writing report and scientific abstracts.
Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism
Critical Race Theory, or CRT, is a theoretical and interpretive mode that examines the appearance of race and racism across dominant cultural modes of expression.
Feminist Criticism (1960s-present)
Feminist criticism is concerned with "...the ways in which literature (and other cultural productions) reinforce or undermine the economic, political, social, and psychological oppression of women" (Tyson).
Gender Studies and Queer Theory (1970s-present)
Gender studies and queer theory explore issues of sexuality, power, and marginalized populations.
Psychoanalytic Criticism (1930s-present)
Psychoanalytic criticism builds on Freudian theories of psychology.
Critical Race Theory (1970s-present)
Critical Race Theory, or CRT, is a theoretical and interpretive mode that examines the appearance of race and racism across dominant cultural modes of expression.
Ecocriticism (1960-Present)
Ecocriticism is the study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment.
Critical Disability Studies (1990s to Present)
Disability studies considers disability in political, aesthetic, ethical, and cultural contexts, among others.
New Historicism, Cultural Studies (1980s-present)
This school, influenced by structuralist and post-structuralist theories, seeks to reconnect a work with the time period in which it was produced and identify it with the cultural and political movements of the time.
Structuralism and Semiotics (1920s-present)
The structuralist school emerges from theories of language and linguistics, and it looks for underlying elements in culture and literature that can be connected so that critics can develop general conclusions about the individual works and the systems from which they emerge.

Structuralism, semiotics, and post-structuralism are some of the most complex literary theories to understand.

Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quotiong from Purdue OWL

Sample Essay for Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting from Purdue OWL
This handout compares and contrasts the three terms, gives some pointers, and includes a short excerpt that you can use to practice these skills.

Summarizing

Paraphrasing

Quoting

Must reference the original source
The text is much shorter than the original text. (For example, one may write a single page to summarize a four-page article.)
Must use your own words, usually with a very limited use of quotations.

Must reference the original source
The text produced may be shorter or longer than the original text

Must use your own words

Must reference the original source
The text produced is the exact length of the original text quoted (unless ellipses are used)

Use the original author’s exact words
Put quotation marks around the original author’s exact words
Include the page number of the original source from which you borrowed the author’s original language.

Research Paper

Genre and the Research Paper by Purdue OWL

How to write research papers including discussing research papers as a genre, choosing topics, and finding sources.

Common Writing Assignments from Purdue Writing Lab

Common Writing Assignments

These OWL resources will help you understand and complete specific types of writing assignments, such as annotated bibliographies, book reports, and research papers. This section also includes resources on writing academic proposals for conference presentations, journal articles, and books.

Synthesizing Sources

Synthesizing Sources from Purdue OWL
When you look for areas where your sources agree or disagree and try to draw broader conclusions about your topic based on what your sources say, you are engaging in synthesis. Writing a research paper usually requires synthesizing the available sources in order to provide new insight or a different perspective into your particular topic (as opposed to simply restating what each individual source says about your research topic).

How to use RefWorks

RefWorks - Bibliographic Manager
How to create your Refworks account.
1. Enter the access code 1890-1506, go to the UNT Refworks login page at refworks.proquest.com/signup/university-of-north-texas (this link is also included in the Databases tab and in the Most Requested section on library.unt.edu)
2. Enter the UNT access code and submit.
3. Next complete the registration, and then you can start using your new account.
4. You can now login with your username and password through https://refworks.proquest.com/ wherever you have an Internet connection.
5. Visit our RefWorks Guide to learn how to make your research more efficient.

Video tutorials: https://guides.library.unt.edu/rwnew/videos

UNT Writing Lab

UNT Writing Lab
At the UNT Writing Lab, we offer free writing tutoring to all currently enrolled UNT students in all disciplines and at all stages of their academic careers--from English composition students to graduate students writing theses and dissertations. We do more than merely proofread; we teach you strategies and techniques to improve your writing for the long term.

Office of Disabilities Access

Interpreting and CART Accommodations
he Office of Disability Access works to provide reasonable access and an inclusive environment to UNT students who identify as d/Deaf, Deaf-Blind, or Hard-of-Hearing. Reasonable accommodations include, but are not limited to the following:

American Sign Language Interpreters
CART Services
Closed Captioning for information presented in an audio or video format
Advanced copies of PowerPoints or Handouts
Reserved seat in the front of the class
Assistive listening devices

COMM 3620: Intercultural communication

Rhetorical Analysis

How to Write a Research Question

How to Write a Research Question

Close Reading and Critical Reading

Developing a Thesis from a Story or Novel

Help with Topic Selection

Installing MS Office 365 ProPlus

APA and Chicago Style Guides

Technical writing and literary theory and schools of criticism

Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quotiong from Purdue OWL

Research Paper

Common Writing Assignments from Purdue Writing Lab

Synthesizing Sources

How to use RefWorks

UNT Writing Lab

Office of Disabilities Access

Additional Links